night shifts

[Dave Stones]

well, found out today i am scheduled to work a night shift this week, lovely 10pm to 6am on wednesday. however, having never worked a night shift in my life, advice is appreciated

the main question really is how to adjust my sleeping habits, if at all? i'm working 6pm-10pm on tuesday, is it best to go home after this and sleep all the way through the entire day until 10pm again, or should i stay up later and then go to bed at a different point in the day? or should i just have my normal nights sleep on tuesday, and then power through all of wednesday without having any sleep at all?

stocktakes eh? who'd have thought they cause so much chaos

I will tell you in a few weeks

I shall be on permanant nights in three weeks time - 10pm to 8am, 4 nights a week.

[Paul K]

Personally if it's a one off nite shift I would just try to crash out for a couple of hours Wednesday afternoon as you will only confuse your body clock if you tamper with your sleeping pattern. If you keep yourself occupied it will be a lot easier to get through as I found that I only really felt tired if I stopped and sat down for a while.
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Originally Posted by Paul M

I will tell you in a few weeks

I shall be on permanant nights in three weeks time - 10pm to 8am, 4 nights a week.

Permanent nights is a piece of P It will take a couple of weeks to settle into a sleep pattern but once you are there you will find that you sleep like a log during the day. I did 13 weeks on permanent nights to cover a machine that had to run no matter what. Normally on a rotating shift pattern I would get 4 hours sleep on nights but after 2 weeks of permanent nights I was sleeping 7-8 hours Best thing to do is dependant on the person doing the shifts and how they want to approach the "when do I sleep?" question but the only advice I can give is to settle on a pattern and stick to it. Your body will adjust and you will find it easier and easier to sleep and you will find you stop feeling tired after 4-6 hours at work.

[Mal]

This is not advice...

I remember doing some work experience at the local council, when I was at school.

For the department that I was put in, they worked one week 7am-3pm, the next 3pm-11pm and then the week after that, 11pm to 7am.

I'm glad that I didn't have to do it, but you would just get used to one pattern, then you would have to change.

[Paul K]

Originally Posted by Mal

This is not advice...

I remember doing some work experience at the local council, when I was at school.

For the department that I was put in, they worked one week 7am-3pm, the next 3pm-11pm and then the week after that, 11pm to 7am.

I'm glad that I didn't have to do it, but you would just get used to one pattern, then you would have to change.

Ah the good ol 3 shift rotation, I did it for 5 years Wouldn't enjoy doing it again

[blackthorn]

I`ve worked on a night shift pattern for 36 years and I`m sorry to say but the first one is always the killer. Pauls answer is the best one, I always crash about 3pm to 6pm (I start 12 hour shifts at 7) on the first shift. Watch out for 1.30am to 2am, thats when it gets you. After that its all downhill. Best of luck

[Dave Stones]

i'm one of the unlucky ones too... caffiene doesn't affect me in the slightest, im allergic to red bull, i hate coffee.... it's gonna be interesting

i suppose it's not too different to when i go out, minus the alchol... often dont get to bed until 5am then, so we will see.

when i finish, is it best to go straight to bed or to sit and power through again until normal bedtime?

[Paul K]

Originally Posted by Dave Stones

i'm one of the unlucky ones too... caffiene doesn't affect me in the slightest, im allergic to red bull, i hate coffee.... it's gonna be interesting

i suppose it's not too different to when i go out, minus the alchol... often dont get to bed until 5am then, so we will see.

when i finish, is it best to go straight to bed or to sit and power through again until normal bedtime?

I'd grab a couple of hours but then get up otherwise you feel like cr$p if you try and stay awake too long or can't sleep at the normal time if you go to bed for too long in the morning

[Xaccers]

I do 12hr shifts, 8 til 8, some days followed by a few nights.
I find that the best thing to do the night before going onto nights is to stay up late, then sleep through the day as much as you can.
If you can take things in to keep your mind going, like a laptop with dvd's or games that helps, books are ok to start with but through the night they tend to make you drowsy.

Going from days to nights is the easy part, going from nights back to days is harder. Either you stay up all day and go to bed about 8pm and sleep through the night, or you go to bed when you get home for a couple of hours, get up and then go to sleep as per normal.
If you've got a partner, then getting them to understand that it takes more than one night to recover is very difficult, both my gf and my ex have difficulties with not realising this and thinking I'm being lazy by sleeping lots of hours after my last night shift.

I did the nightshift for three years when I had a milk round.

I opened the dairy at midnight, finished around 05.30. Was home and into bed by 06.00, and awake at midday. Once you get used to living arse-about-face its easy, but if its week about it must be crap.