I’m interviewing for a night shift position in a couple days and I’ve always worked 8-4 or 9-5. I’m a little scared of the idea though! I’m worried about seeing my family less because my sleep schedule will be totally different than theirs.
So, night shift workers of the world, what has your experience been like and how do you manage being present in your family life?
Night shift is the fucking best if you have ADHD. You have no traffic at all on your commute to and from work, you just show up and do your job (no useless phone calls or emails to distract you), you eat lunch at like fuckin 1am so there’s no crowd, you get done with your work and just clock out (no stupid-ass meetings), and when you get home you just crash and sleep for as long as you want. Wake up at like noon, and you’ve got the whole afternoon to run errands or fuck off, and then casually go back to work that night.
Exactly this. Only important thing is to stick to your sleeprythm also on your days off. So stay up all through the night even when you are not at work!!
In a perfect world. I work a 12hr graveyard shift and flip to dayshift schedule on my days off.
You need to do it in a structured way. Get home, nap a few hours, go to bed at a normal bedtime, wake up, a dash of adderall. Good to go.
Structured AF
Mixed bag in my opinion.
The good: No traffic, get to know yourself better since you have a lot of time for reflection, discover way more media (podcasts, books, games, movies) because you’re always doing the night owl thing, always have an excuse to get out of social events during the day time, easy to go to doctor appointments during the day before work, feels like you have a ton of free time, usually meet interesting people on the night shift (see bad part of this below), get to dress down, don’t have to see a high level boss usually, things feel more profound late at night - you’ll have a much deeper appreciation for all that media I described (try some music or an audiobook at night - better yet, try writing. I always feel things deeper at night), get to see the moon all the time which I absolutely love more than anything, etc.
The bad: sleep schedule will be like being a teenager again, there will be days where the sun is shining and you can hear lawnmowers which will make you sleep like garbage, you’ll probably eat like shit, seeing friends and family is hard, friends and family will not understand that you need to sleep during the day - trust me, you’ll meet the outcasts of society on night shift along with all those interesting people I mentioned and some of them will be weird or off-putting, you’ll feel super lonely at times but it’ll be kind of nice somehow (???), you’ll have too much time alone with your thoughts, you’ll be doing shit during the day but have work hanging over your head for hours whereas normal people work and have free time after work to look forward to, driving home tired in the early morning is like having a hangover somehow, etc.
Personally, I’m glad I’m not doing it these days. After COVID, stores aren’t open 24/7 anymore. Night shopping on days off was the best and not being able to get stuff at night now sucks.
I’ve been working a night shift for a few years now. Last 2 of which have been from at home. The social isolation is real. The only people you’ll ever really get to hang out with outside of work, are the people you work with, since most of your normal-sleep-schedule-having friends aren’t gonna be available when you are. There also won’t be anywhere good to hang out at because everything’s closed by the time you’re off work.
Most of the world isn’t designed for people with our schedule, unfortunately. Need to go to the post office for something? You’re gonna have to either get up early or stay up late to do it. Need to do something that can really take up some time, like go to the DMV? You might need to schedule some time off, because that’ll ruin your sleep schedule for a few days.
Being able to retain your sanity on this schedule really does require a bit of self-sufficience. You’ll need to rely less on services that aren’t available at night. You’ll need to get comfortable with losing sleep to get important stuff done. It’s tough, and while a lot of companies pay a differential to hourly employees on the night shift, it’s rarely enough to justify the toll it takes on you if you don’t have the right mindset for it.
The differential is usually not enough. I mean almost no income is enough to lose sleep time and time again. Just saying.
Anyway. I’m curious, so please share. What do you do exactly and how did you get to L2?
Overnight wasn’t bad because I could sleep while the kiddo was at school. 2nd is pretty rough though if you have a family.
My youngest is about to enter kindergarten; I need to transition to daytime. It means leaving my current job, which is love, but otherwise I’ll never see my kids.
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Are you already a night owl? If so, it’s fine. Just working, very few distractions, no meetings.
If you’re a Sun child, it’s going to be horrible. I can’t give specifics because I’m a night owl, but from what others have told me, it’s awful.
What’s it like working night shift?
- constant fatigue
- constantly explaining to the same people over and over that you are not available in the daytime because that’s when you sleep
source: worked night shift for many years
also weight gain. I worked 6pm-6am for almost 2 years straight and gained 40lbs without changing my eating habits.
started drinking every morning after work too. and days (nights) off were a total clusterfuck. wake up, hit the grocery store before they close, start drinking because wtf else am I gonna do at 11pm alone in my camper with no wifi and spotty cell signal. my experience is probably not the norm lol
If you started drinking everyday your eating habits changed. You started taking in more calories.
The night shift for me was the purest form of hell. My favorite shift was the 2-10, 3-11.
Like 2nd shift or morning shift?
prolly 2nd, mornings are really busy depending on where you work
I worked nights for fifteen straight years and honestly, it isn’t all bad… Provided you get the sleep sorted. The amount of people who rolled up thinking they could survive on 4 hours of sleep a day was pretty disturbing.
It is nearly impossible when you are not living on your own and able to keep circadian rhythm. It also just sucks IMO. I wouldn’t do it again unless I was paid 3+ times as much as a day shift.
I did two, two week stents while living out of a hotel…I will never do it again if I have to do it out of a hotel. But 6pm to 2 am etc out of my own place I’d consider.
It’s just hard at first forcing yourself to sleep. Blackout curtains help. Or a sleep mask.
Yeah I have a hard time with that already…
My current schedule is two swings, two days, and then either a third day or a graveyard. Weekly overtime can be any of those three shifts, and not necessarily the same per week. I’ve been doing it for sixteen years. Arguably, you get used to it, but consistency is key. Having a kid wasn’t too bad at first, but now that they’re school age, it makes it pretty difficult to be as present as I’d like to be. So, I get by with a lot of coffee. I had a respectable drinking habit for a long time, which I thought helped somewhat, but it really didn’t. Regular exercise helps a ton if you can swing it. Blackout curtains and ear plugs or a noise machine are huge. I also use an eye mask too. Best of luck, nights aren’t for everyone.
I personally love working nights. I’m not a morning person by any stretch of the imagination. In fact I am actively worse at things the earlier I wake up. Conversely my brain feels clearer and more active after 10pm.
That being said, my social life is almost entirely online. I rarely go out IRL. I sleep like a rock and only need about 6 hours anyway.
If you are someone who needs to talk to people, has trouble sleeping during the day, or requires a lot of sleep, the night shift is likely not for you.
Some people are built for it, some aren’t.
So wondering if you mean 2nd or 3rd shift. And for those wondering 1st shift is the “day” shift. Where your start time is ~8 AM and then you end ~3 PM. Then 2nd shift is where you start at ~3 PM and end at 11 PM. And then finally 3rd shift is where you start at ~11 PM and end at 8 AM.
As you can see there is a BIG difference between 2nd and 3rd shift and what someone might call a “night” shift.
Thank you for this! I was literally about to google this because I wasn’t sure.
Look up “night shift belly.” I did night audit at a hotel for a year and a half. By the end, I could only really stomach eating the kale salad from Whole Foods and not much else.
It also wrecked my social life and when I got sick, I got really sick, so I think my immune system was out of whack in general.
Like others have said, the commute is a dream. The shift itself is quiet with plenty of time to have deep conversations with any coworkers you may have, read, listen to podcasts, etc. It’s like living in a different world.
I say give it a try, but listen to your body and find something else soon if your health is affected.
