Pearl’s Journey: Flying Without Sleeping Pills and Facing Jet Lag Naturally (Part 1)

Pearl is a 49-year-old woman living in Miami with her husband. She’s the kind of person who shows up early, follows through on her responsibilities, and doesn’t make waves—even when the situation is deeply unfair.

She works in a high-stress corporate environment where the pressure never lets up. Her boss, to put it gently, is not kind. Over the months, I’ve heard stories that made me feel tense—and I wasn’t the one living through them. Passive-aggressive comments. Impossible deadlines. Glaring double standards. Pearl doesn’t just work hard—she works under constant emotional pressure.

Every morning, she straps on her emotional armor and prepares for battle.

So when Pearl first came to me last summer, it wasn’t surprising that sleep had become her enemy. She wasn’t sleeping naturally anymore—she was knocking herself out.

Years of sleeping pills had dulled her nights into a foggy blur.

At first, they helped. But eventually, she needed more—more pills, at different times of the night—just to stay asleep. And even then, it wasn’t deep rest. It was sedation.

Pearl told me her evenings looked something like this:

She’d finish work, feeling wired and worn out all at once. Then she’d stand in the shower, having full-on conversations with herself—saying everything she wished she could say to her boss but never would.

It was the only time she let herself vent. But it wasn’t relaxing.

“I talk to myself in the shower like I’m in court,” she told me once. “Like I’m on trial, defending myself, trying to prove I’m not crazy.”

The mental noise never stopped.

Pearl is sensitive. She notices everything. She cares deeply, works hard, and just wants peace. But instead of peace, she felt like her mind was a war zone. And with her job demanding full focus, she couldn’t afford to be tired during the day.

So the pills became her lifeline. Not because they worked—but because she believed they were her only option.

And as I often say to my clients: The mind believes what we tell it.

That belief—that she needed the pills—kept Pearl stuck. She didn’t want to slowly wind down at night. She wanted to flip a switch and be gone.

But something shifted last week.

Pearl came into our session lighter. Happier. There was a dance in her voice I hadn’t heard before.

“I’m going to Israel,” she beamed. “For two whole weeks.”

No work. No boss. No stress. Just joy.

Her siblings were flying in from Holland, and she hadn’t seen some of them in years. Her elderly parents would be there too. This was a rare and beautiful reunion—everyone under one roof for the first time in over six years.

They had rented a warm, rustic Airbnb in a quiet neighborhood near Jerusalem. The kind with arched windows and soft breezes at night. It all sounded magical.

But beneath the excitement, there was fear.

Pearl saw this trip as an opportunity. Maybe—just maybe—this could be the time she finally kicked the sleeping pill habit.

She was down to a tiny dose, barely a fraction of what she used to take. She knew it wasn’t really doing much anymore. But the idea of lying in bed without it? Terrifying.

“I don’t know how to just be with myself at night,” she admitted. “I’d rather be knocked out than lie there thinking.”

Then she told me something revealing.

Every time she gets on a plane, she automatically takes a strong sleeping pill. It’s a reflex.

I asked her gently, “Why?”

She paused. Thought for a moment. “I don’t know… it’s just what I do. It’s what I’ve always done.”

So I asked, “What would happen if you didn’t?”

She looked confused, a little startled. “I guess I’d… have to keep myself busy?”

I nodded. “Or,” I offered softly, “you could just be. You could close your eyes and let your body figure it out.”

Pearl looked unsure. The idea of doing nothing felt foreign. Being alone with her thoughts, unguarded, unmedicated, unsettled—it felt too risky.

And yet, she wanted to try.

So we started planning. I wanted her to feel prepared—not just for the flight, but for that vulnerable time when she landed in Israel.

Because jet lag + anxiety + fear of being awake = a perfect storm.

Here’s what I recommended:

Pearl’s Jet Lag Sleep Plan

1. Don’t sleep when you land. This is the hardest and most important rule.

Your body will scream for rest—especially if you land in the morning or early afternoon—but if you give in, you delay your internal clock from adjusting.

Take a warm shower to reset your system. Eat a meal. Drink water (planes are incredibly dehydrating). And then—go outside.

Even a short walk in the natural light helps signal to your body: This is daytime now.

2. Stay up until local bedtime. It’s not easy. You’ll feel like crashing at 4:00 p.m. But try to stretch it to at least 8:30 or 9:00 p.m. Even just sitting with family, listening to a conversation, or doing something low-stimulation is better than falling asleep early.

3. Take melatonin before bed. When your body is overtired, it can sometimes be too wired to fall asleep. A small dose of melatonin—ideally an hour or two before local bedtime—can gently guide your system toward rest.

This isn’t about forcing sleep. It’s about helping your body adapt.

Pearl took it all in. She asked thoughtful questions. She was nervous, yes—but she was also ready.

Because this trip wasn’t just about family.

It was about her relationship with herself.

It was about facing the part of her that always needed to numb in order to cope.

It was about believing that she could, maybe for the first time in years, trust her body to sleep naturally.

But the real test came later—when the lights were off, the house was quiet, and Pearl found herself wide awake in a strange place, alone with her thoughts.

What do you do in that moment—when sleep doesn't come, and the old fears creep in?

Tomorrow in Part 2, I’ll share what happened next, the gentle tools I offered Pearl in the middle of the night, and what it revealed about healing, control, and what true rest really looks like.