Thread: Gasman and the nightshift

Just to give you all an update on my new job...

The first couple nights were rough to say the least. Im used to getting up at 12 or 1am, going to work and hitting the road by 3am. Working until 5 or 6 pm. Now, with this new company, they want me to work from 5pm to 5am. By the third night it was getting easier. By night #5, i was adjusted to it to the point of comming home and not passing out.

Now for my weekend i need to readjust so im up with the wife so i took a 3 hour nap this morning and im spending time with her now. Will hope to go to bed this evening, be up on my sunday. Sleep my sunday night then grab a nap before going back to work. This way, i can be back on the night schedule but days during my weekend.

Crossing my fingers this will work out as i will be on this shift for a while. Im still the Gasman as i still haul gas, just in a black truck now instead of a red truck. Ha. Will need to change my avatar.

Jerry, it will take a while but you will adjust to the night shift. I probably worked nights for around fifteen years or so. The hardest part was re-adjusting back to a day shift schedule on your days off. You have to manage your sleeping in a way that works for you. Some guys get home and sleep for 3-4 hours, get up for the day, then sleep another few hours before going back to work. Some guys go to bed and get all their sleep at once. Get some good curtains that block out the light for sleeping during the day.

I used to love the fact that it was much more peaceful and quiet working the all night shift.

Give it a little time and you'll be aok.

Good luck with the new job and stay safe.

Pete <:-}

When after nearly 40 years my dad was assigned to work the night shift during asparagus harvest to say he wasn't pleased would be an understatement. Work started at 6pm and he got off at 6am.

On his day off he stayed up all night. He might do his reloading or read a book but he refused to adjust his hours saying that it was easiest to just keep the same sleep schedule.

Harvest was only for a few weeks and then it was back to day shifts of 8am to 5pm and it took him awhile to readjust.

One of my reasons for retiring when I did was my company would work me say to 11pm and then bring me back in at 9am the next day. The following day I might be scheduled to work at noon until 9pm and the following day I might work at 7am. That's for a much younger man. One of my fellow long time employees told the assistant manager (who wrote the schedule) that guys like him and me shouldn't have to work schedules like that. They should be consistant. He was told that the contract called for the 'Quantity' of hours for seniority not the 'Quality' of the hours.

Good luck Jerry. You do what you need to to survive.

Id love to just stay on the night schedule on my days off. Would make it easier on me in one way, but in other ways i can see myself sitting in MY ROOM (ha) drinking beer all night playing on the radio and surfing the web. Not a good use of time. Plus i wouldnt be able to get out the power tools as the wife and neighbors would throw a fit.

So, i guess i will see how it goes, bouncing back and forth and napping. I dont nap well. Thanks all for your well wishes.

I work nights in the hospital for @8 years now and the schedgule is variable.
I learned that a propper diet and exercise help...also hidratation and some vitamins. It will take some time to adjust... about a month.
Good luck !

Worked all my life on shift work with the last being on 12 hour shifts, 2 days, 2 nights and 4 days off. Been retired for 8 years now and my sleep pattern is still screwed up. Wish I could tell you a routine that worked well. You do find how to cope with it but the effects can be long lasting even after you are off shift work.

Bob

Hope it works out well for you. Take care of yourself (and those big tanks of combustible fuel.)

I work 21 days straight, working a day shift and on call at night. Randomly we have to work through the nigh. It gets tough and I use vitamins to pull through those all nighters. It is how I have found to cope best. When I worked the commercial boats it was vitamins and aphedrine to pull the crazy hours. I do not recommend aphedriine to pull through long nights but I hope the vitamins give you the boost you need. A good B stress complex seems to do the trick. Occasionally I will top that up with a straight B12.

I have worked many nights and rotating shifts. Rotating is the worst and the reason I quit my last job.

Remember to take care of yourself and your wife will have to adapt also!

It is not only you. If you can get to sleep by 7 and get up by 1 pm or so you have the afternoon and evening with her etc. on the weekends. Or for myself I have a hard time going to sleep right away after getting home. If she gets up at 6 am then you can spend the morning together and you can go to bed at noon.

Random thoughts. Good luck! There is a reason that there are shift differentials in pay.

No difference in pay for me in this line of work. That would be nice.

I'm trying the Vitamins (the ones your recommended) Shaun, but I'm not really noticing anything from them. I eat when and what I want so my diet sucks, I get no exercise so that doesn't help. I'm just a fat, lazy truck driver. I'm just happy that driving for hours and hours don't bother me.
The wife doesn't get out of bed until around 8 am so she isn't helping me out in that mater. But I don't blame her. She waits till everyone is out of the house before she gets up.
I'm thinking this will work out ok but, but for now, I'll just keep plugging away at it. Wish I could take some good drugs, but in my line of work, it's not worth losing my job if something was to go wrong, so I'll stick with the gallons of coffee I drink. The problem there is, I've been drinking gallons of coffee for years.