A closer look
Traveling eastbound causes significantly worse jet lag than traveling westbound because the human circadian rhythm is naturally slightly longer than twenty-four hours, making it biologically easier to delay sleep than to advance it. When you fly to Europe from the United States, you are brutally forcing your internal clock to fast-forward, resulting in a zombie-like state that ruins the first three days of your incredibly expensive itinerary. You will spend your first days in Rome staring blankly at centuries-old architecture while your brain screams that it is three in the morning and demands pancakes instead of pasta. It is a cruel biological joke that your body punishes you for expanding your cultural horizons by making you feel like you have been hit by a truck while standing inside the Louvre
