Growing up in the Philippines, where daylight saving time (DST) is not practiced, it took me quite a while to adjust. It has been just over a week since Canada began this season’s DST, where people adjust their clocks forward an hour in the spring and adjust back during autumn. The practice is done in order to prolong daylight, which conserves energy.

While DST may be welcome in the autumn, as it offers an extra hour of sleep for people living in this part of the world, the change in time for spring causes us to lose one hour of sleep.

This year marks my third DST experience and I am already displeased as my body has yet to adjust. The first few days of every time adjustment has been a total struggle considering my body clock has to reset. Since I was accustomed to waking up an hour later for the past few months, my body felt tired considering the lost hour. I felt that I wasn’t productively working because I tended to feel sleepy in the middle of the day. It usually takes me an entire week to adjust.

It is believed the process itself is not healthy and the modification is a coping mechanism the body goes through – some are unable to adjust at all.

Surprisingly, it is not only me (a foreigner) who isn’t happy about DST. Many Canadians have complained about this tradition since they no longer see the point in its practice.

Studies showed that practicing DST may not be as useful as it had been ages ago considering our generation’s resources, practices, and ways are far different from the time when DST began, over a century back.

Furthermore, recent data showed that not only does it increase the risk of developing serious illness by throwing off the body’s natural sleep cycle of sleep but the lack of sleep can also cause fatal accidents involving pedestrians and car collisions. Being groggy on the road due to the lack of sleep caused by DST only does more harm than good.

Having said this, many people living here are hoping to put an end to DST and I am definitely with them./WDJ