Night shifts...

M

MiniMarc

Well-Known Member
Anyone else do em?
Finished at half 4 , currently wide awake drinking beer as not working tomorrow at all so it sort of feels like a frieday night but no one else to pary with. have been doing em for last 3 weeks , it slowly wears you down and you have less n less energy n generally get abit grumpy i find. got one more week then our project delivers then thats me till jan. the joys of being freelance!

posted at 05.40am for ref...
 
Never done nightshifts per se, though many times I've worked through a day a night and the next day, at year end, when a tender's going in or I'm setting up a contract or because of something else extraordinary.

In my mid/late teens I did plenty of nightshifts on the jackhammer, digging holes in London's roads - nothing like seeing people going out/coming back through the night while you're breaking your back!

Generally, nightwork wouldn't suit me as I can't sleep in daylight hours no matter how tired I am. (Wags posting photos of my famed disconaps back in the day do so at their own risk!)
 
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Was working nights for a few months at the beginning of the year. Loved it! We were re-wiring a school in Devon, doing 12 hour nights so we got all of our hours done in 4 nights. 4pm-4am which were pretty decent hours for nights. It meant leaving for work at 1pm on a Monday, work 4 nights, then got home about 6am on a Friday morning. Used to sleep till early afternoon, and wake up feeling fine for a long weekend. And all that for 33% on top of our normal hourly rate. The weeks went really quickly and the weekends were long. I bet it's not usually as good as that on nights though.
 
yeah its good in some respects , i have 4 day weeks mon - thurs night. i find if i get home by 5am i still awake by around 11am so theoreticcaly have the whole afternoon to do whatever but you def dont have as much energy as u would normally. The freelance thing can be good too as Ive worked solidly last few weeks my smas brea will be friday 14th - 4th jan but then theres no gurantee of any work from jan onwards at this stage so its horses for courses
 
haven't done night shifts for a year or so now. I quite liked them although it was on railway weekend possessions so there was pressure to get work done by monday morning. That kept you going.

They don't do your eating habits any good though.
 
I use to do 12 hour shifts of 4 days on 4 off then 4 nights on 4 off - The coin was goooood but over time that set up wears you down!

Certainly not a healthy one!

My Ipod got me through some dark times @ that job! :lol:
 
I do them twice every five weeks, one lot of 3 nights then another of 4 nights -10pm till 7am.

I find that I never properly recover each time and after 19 years, I am still not used to it. It makes jet lag look like a walk in the park.

Hence I have the stamina to do drug free clubbing.
 
When I was at university, in one summer, I worked at a plastic factory, 3 nights on (7 pm until 7 am) then three nights off, then three days on, 3 days off..... it was awful!!!!
 
so its 4am sunday night and im still awak. worked daytime saturday but not enough to reset the body clock. one more week to go then off till 4thjan minimum
 
Never done night shifts and never would but am looking forward to working 5am - 9.30am shifts Wednesday, Thursday, Friday next week (instead of 9am - 5.30pm). Works for me as I only live 5 minutes from work. They asked me to do the full week but didn't think a 5am start would be a good idea on Monday and Tuesday after being out.
 
presumeably get less money for the less hours tho?
got 2 more nights then thats me done till jan. will have been 4 and abit weeks and i feel knackerd! Body clock never quite resets on the weekend and finding I have slowly less n less energy so cant wait to return to normality
 
I'll add that some of my colleagues who had been doing these shifts for years were in a right state! It had aged them heavily. The switching from day to night regime in such short bursts completely screws your body clock!

Those on a permanent night shift set up didn't fair much better either tbh :lol:

We're not naturally nocturnal.
 
makka said:
We're not naturally nocturnal.
Click to expand...

Some of us are ... my 'natural time' for going to bed is about 4-5am. Rarely if ever ready before 2-3am even if I've been up for 18 hours. My natural waking up time is 10am.

If I try to operate outside these parameters my whole body feels out of sync, I am grumpy and unable to cope with basic things. So had to find a life which accommodated it and everything is fine now. 9-5 jobs were a torment for me - I just could not work around those hours or get up at 6-7am, but can happily work late and long hours.

It's odd because if I go back 5 hours (say to West Indies) my body clock stays the same and doesn't adjust. In other words I am ready for bed at midnight and wake up at 6am. When I fly home it's back to the same old routine. Perhaps I should be living there instead and I'll be able to work to a conventional "clock". It certainly doesn't happen in Europe !!! Strange ......
 
right just finished 4 weeks of em and this time round it killed me! had no energy to do anything in the few hours i was awake in daylight. didnt open my eyes tilll midday earliest and then been useless rest of day anyway.
just got home from last one and now at least im done till january!
 
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