Daylight saving time stirs up loads of combined emotions: You’ll kiss the dreary winter darkness goodbye (and really feel your seasonal despair lifting with the longer days)—however you’ll additionally lose an hour of valuable sleep when the clocks spring ahead at 2 a.m. on March 10.

And this may actually screw along with your system for a bit. Because the time shifts, you’re “shifting your pure, organic clock” (a.okay.a. your circadian rhythms) with it, Kuljeet Okay. Gill, MD, a sleep drugs specialist at Northwestern Medication’s Central DuPage Hospital, tells SELF. This may mess along with your hormones, alertness, starvation indicators, and all types of different physique features and behaviors, she says.

“Our brains by no means totally regulate to sunlight saving time,” W. Christopher Winter, MD, neurologist and sleep specialist at Charlottesville Neurology and Sleep Medication and host of the Sleep Unplugged podcast, tells SELF. “[It] has been proven to be tougher on our our bodies and worse for our well being than merely staying on normal time all yr—which the American Academy of Sleep Medication has been pushing for.” There’s additionally been a legislative effort to eliminate daylight saving time through the Sunshine Safety Act, however the invoice has been stalled since final yr.

To make this all suck a bit much less, we requested specialists what it’s best to put together for now that can assist you regulate to the time change. Right here’s find out how to really feel rather less depressing within the week forward.

Drag your self off the bed at your normal time.

In case your alarm usually goes off at 6 a.m., then stand up at 6 a.m., regardless that you might be painfully conscious that it nonetheless feels like 5 a.m. Why? Getting up across the similar hour every morning trains your physique to know that’s when your day begins. If you happen to slip into the behavior of waking up at completely different instances, even for a couple of days, your mind would possibly get a bit frazzled and begin releasing melatonin—a hormone that helps regulate your sleep-wake cycle—at bizarre instances, which might have an effect on each your capacity to sleep nicely at night time and keep alert through the day. (It’s not all that completely different than how jet lag feels, as SELF beforehand reported.)

“I are inclined to have individuals focus extra on wake time,” Dr. Winter notes. “In case your wake time stays constant, your bedtime ultimately types itself out.” Simply do your finest to log a ample quantity of sleep as your physique adjusts—ideally, a minimum of seven hours an evening.

And if you happen to’re tempted to “relaxation your eyes” within the afternoons, heed this warning from Dr. Gill: “No naps.” In any other case, you might need bother drifting off later, which is able to solely maintain your sleep schedule tousled for longer.

Take pleasure in some morning mild.

Getting a robust dose of daylight after you get off the bed is among the finest issues you are able to do to stabilize your circadian rhythms, because it “stimulates your mind and shuts off melatonin manufacturing,” Dr. Gill explains. “That’s a sign that it’s time to stand up,” since melatonin’s job is to make you’re feeling drowsy.