Night shift workers
Discussion
Evening guys
New job in my work has came up step up and would give me good experience only thing is it’s nightshift hours are 10-6.
Is there anyone here that does constant nightshift or has done ? How did you all find it ? Would hope after 12 months a could get onto a better shift . My concern is have 1 kid and other one due in a few month .
Thanks
New job in my work has came up step up and would give me good experience only thing is it’s nightshift hours are 10-6.
Is there anyone here that does constant nightshift or has done ? How did you all find it ? Would hope after 12 months a could get onto a better shift . My concern is have 1 kid and other one due in a few month .
Thanks
Not constant night shifts as I work 4 on 4 off. 4 days, 4 days off & 4 nights.
I work 7-7 and don't mind the nights.
The important thing I've found is ensuring you're in a good routine for your first night and getting yourself out of the night shift mode when you finish your working nights. For example, the day before I start my first night shift I stay up over night to ensure I get a good quality of sleep during the day I'm due to start work. And the opposite side to this is only sleeping for 3 hours after finishing my last night shift to prepare me for sleeping at night.
It's not as bad a people say but I find you either like them or loathe them
I work 7-7 and don't mind the nights.
The important thing I've found is ensuring you're in a good routine for your first night and getting yourself out of the night shift mode when you finish your working nights. For example, the day before I start my first night shift I stay up over night to ensure I get a good quality of sleep during the day I'm due to start work. And the opposite side to this is only sleeping for 3 hours after finishing my last night shift to prepare me for sleeping at night.
It's not as bad a people say but I find you either like them or loathe them
Ex night club worker / manager (7 years) and casino worker (10 years).
Night shift pros:
No rush hour traffic.
The supermarket is always empty when you do your shopping.
You’ll catch some beautiful sunsets and sunrises.
Working night feels a little special, like your in some sort of a unique club not many others get to experience. The world sleeps whilst you work.
Night shift cons:
They’ll be a period when you don’t see any daylight and a period when you don’t see any darkness.
Sleep during the day can be tricky, especially if the council are digging up the street outside of your house, or if you have children.
It’s a great way to ruin a relationship with your partner, especially if she’s operating in normal ‘daylight’ hours.
You will hardly ever see your children.
Studies have shown that working nights drastically reduces your life expectancy.
I left working nights when my daughter was born. I wouldn’t go back for 4x the money.
Night shift pros:
No rush hour traffic.
The supermarket is always empty when you do your shopping.
You’ll catch some beautiful sunsets and sunrises.
Working night feels a little special, like your in some sort of a unique club not many others get to experience. The world sleeps whilst you work.
Night shift cons:
They’ll be a period when you don’t see any daylight and a period when you don’t see any darkness.
Sleep during the day can be tricky, especially if the council are digging up the street outside of your house, or if you have children.
It’s a great way to ruin a relationship with your partner, especially if she’s operating in normal ‘daylight’ hours.
You will hardly ever see your children.
Studies have shown that working nights drastically reduces your life expectancy.
I left working nights when my daughter was born. I wouldn’t go back for 4x the money.
Edited by 105.4 on Sunday 25th September 20:01
colin86 said:
Evening guys
New job in my work has came up step up and would give me good experience only thing is it’s nightshift hours are 10-6.
Is there anyone here that does constant nightshift or has done ? How did you all find it ? Would hope after 12 months a could get onto a better shift . My concern is have 1 kid and other one due in a few month .
Thanks
You will die considerably sooner working nights than if you work days.New job in my work has came up step up and would give me good experience only thing is it’s nightshift hours are 10-6.
Is there anyone here that does constant nightshift or has done ? How did you all find it ? Would hope after 12 months a could get onto a better shift . My concern is have 1 kid and other one due in a few month .
Thanks
It’s a slow, anti social death. Tiredness is your constant companion. I did shifts for years. When you move back to not living like nosferatu, it’s the little things you notice first. Having to clip finger and toe nails more often. Not having to use alarms to wake up. Not feeling exhausted all the time.
Unless you are someone who genuinely doesn’t need much sleep, I’d avoid if you can.
Unless you are someone who genuinely doesn’t need much sleep, I’d avoid if you can.
I used to work a 3 shift pattern, with a 22% payrise for the inconvenience, all that went away during covid and we're back onto regular days.
It would take alot of money to get me back onto a night shift, i'd start to think about it for a 50% payrise, I certainly wouldnt go back onto them for 22%.
It would take alot of money to get me back onto a night shift, i'd start to think about it for a 50% payrise, I certainly wouldnt go back onto them for 22%.
I work a three weeks on/off rota. For about a year and a half (during covid) I worked nightshifts 1900-0700.
I hated it, even when I got used to being nocturnal it was just knackering. Communication with your family is difficult, the lack of vitamin d and the difficulties in sleeping through the day all made it terrible. I wouldn't do it again.
I hated it, even when I got used to being nocturnal it was just knackering. Communication with your family is difficult, the lack of vitamin d and the difficulties in sleeping through the day all made it terrible. I wouldn't do it again.
Done them for 6 months in a row: 4 on/4 off. Over 5 years ago, so I was younger (and more desperate for work). Those were 12 hour shifts too.
First night is bad, as tricky to get enough sleep during the daytime (not tired enough). Which leads to a very very long shift…after which you need be fully awake on a busy motorway.
First night is bad, as tricky to get enough sleep during the daytime (not tired enough). Which leads to a very very long shift…after which you need be fully awake on a busy motorway.
There are all sorts of ways of making it 'feel' less bad but ultimately you will be constantly fighting your circadian rhythm. My father has done night shifts for his whole life and I do them intermittently - you never really get used to them, and the habits for getting through them are generally unhealthy.
You won't sleep well enough in the day time as your brain sees daylight and warmer temperatures and operates in day mode, and you will not feel awake during the night for the opposite reasons. 3am is the critical time when your body is preparing for the next day, it diverts resources away from things like digestion and immunity, so you are prone to overeating and getting ill if you are awake at these hours. If you are doing 10-6 I'm assuming it's five nights with two off - this means means you never end up in a normal day routine unless you are on annual leave.
As above there are lots of studies showing the correlation between night shift work and early deaths, and socially you will struggle ever finding time to see friends and family.
For the serious introvert it is a good excuse to stay inside and keep yourself to yourself, but it is never healthy to be doing permanent nights. You should ensure you have a definite way out after a specific period of time rather than risk being stuck and dependent on the night shift premium.
You won't sleep well enough in the day time as your brain sees daylight and warmer temperatures and operates in day mode, and you will not feel awake during the night for the opposite reasons. 3am is the critical time when your body is preparing for the next day, it diverts resources away from things like digestion and immunity, so you are prone to overeating and getting ill if you are awake at these hours. If you are doing 10-6 I'm assuming it's five nights with two off - this means means you never end up in a normal day routine unless you are on annual leave.
As above there are lots of studies showing the correlation between night shift work and early deaths, and socially you will struggle ever finding time to see friends and family.
For the serious introvert it is a good excuse to stay inside and keep yourself to yourself, but it is never healthy to be doing permanent nights. You should ensure you have a definite way out after a specific period of time rather than risk being stuck and dependent on the night shift premium.
I do 12hr shifts, either 3d/2n, 2d/3n or 2d/2n. I quite like shift work, getting half my work out the way when others are sleeping. I can cope on circa 4.5 hrs sleep between nights, but by the 3rd night I'm struggling. I also try and do lots of outdoors stuff (cycling running walking) on days off and between the nights (and the swing days) to counteract the feeling of constant darkness during the winter.
I find having a snooze on the swing day key, even if it's just 90mins before work and timing food/coffee during the night absolutely imperative. I tend to eat at work around 8pm and then have a porridge or huel shake around 5am. This keeps food regular and helps me get back into day mode quickly.
I tend to make sure I'm up and about by 1130 after my last night so I'm good for bed that night, but I can be a bit cranky with the kids on that day. I'm not sure I could go back to Monday Friday 9-5...I'd miss being able to do stuff when others are at work and school.
I find having a snooze on the swing day key, even if it's just 90mins before work and timing food/coffee during the night absolutely imperative. I tend to eat at work around 8pm and then have a porridge or huel shake around 5am. This keeps food regular and helps me get back into day mode quickly.
I tend to make sure I'm up and about by 1130 after my last night so I'm good for bed that night, but I can be a bit cranky with the kids on that day. I'm not sure I could go back to Monday Friday 9-5...I'd miss being able to do stuff when others are at work and school.
I worked night shifts for 20 years, Monday to Thursday 10 hrs a night.
I found the key to sleeping during the day was a cool dark room, blackout curtains helped a lot. I also wore earplugs while sleeping.
I was lucky as I had choice of two bedrooms to sleep in, front bedroom was cooler in summer and switched to back bedroom in winter.
You will either be able to cope with them or hate them, night shifts seemed to suit me and 33% shift allowance helped. The engineering firm I was working at were quite good about shifts, if they asked you to go on nights they gave you a month on them to try them out and if you did not like them then back on normal day shift or double days with no repercussions, they were never short of night workers. Ask your employers if you could have a trial period on nights.
Bad points.
I always seemed to be hungry during the night and had to be really careful with my diet.
Regular bowel movements were impossible, eating at weird times really messed up my system.
Going into work at 9pm on a lovely summers evening could be depressing but winter never bothered me.
Night shifts seem to attract more weirdos, maybe that's why they suited me
I found the key to sleeping during the day was a cool dark room, blackout curtains helped a lot. I also wore earplugs while sleeping.
I was lucky as I had choice of two bedrooms to sleep in, front bedroom was cooler in summer and switched to back bedroom in winter.
You will either be able to cope with them or hate them, night shifts seemed to suit me and 33% shift allowance helped. The engineering firm I was working at were quite good about shifts, if they asked you to go on nights they gave you a month on them to try them out and if you did not like them then back on normal day shift or double days with no repercussions, they were never short of night workers. Ask your employers if you could have a trial period on nights.
Bad points.
I always seemed to be hungry during the night and had to be really careful with my diet.
Regular bowel movements were impossible, eating at weird times really messed up my system.
Going into work at 9pm on a lovely summers evening could be depressing but winter never bothered me.
Night shifts seem to attract more weirdos, maybe that's why they suited me
limpsfield said:
For about a year, I did some work on a BBC radio show 3 days a week which meant I had to get up at 3 a.m.
Absolutely hated it, constant feeling of jetlag.
Your experience may be different, but I think it is a tough gig for most of us .
I did a stint of working half a week days, and half nights. I struggled with the transition often doing 24hrs + without sleep mid week.Absolutely hated it, constant feeling of jetlag.
Your experience may be different, but I think it is a tough gig for most of us .
Ever since I've struggled with sleep patterns and will often have periods of insomnia (while being insanely tired), even though I only work days.
colin86 said:
Yes it 5 days a week start on a Sunday night . Would give me the leadership experience needed to open up other doors but not sure ideal with young kids .
With kids in school it works because you'll see them/they'll see you every day between coming home from school and going to bed. Younger than that it really depends what your other half does.98elise said:
I did a stint of working half a week days, and half nights. I struggled with the transition often doing 24hrs + without sleep mid week.
I can relate to that. Lately (last year) done 4 on (2 days/2 nights), 4 off. The first night was bad, really struggled to power through the shift in the early hours (close to finish). It really messes your body clock…plenty of people got caught sleeping and ended up fired. Now back on days, in a different job. Miles better, apart from the peak hours commuting…
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