Graveyards kickin my arse

[KFhunter]

Rotated into Graves, can't sleep during the day and I have ~5 more weeks of this crap before I get back into *almost* normal hours.
I'd make a terrible vampire

I always felt horrible (huge understatement) if I ever tried to take OTC sleep aids, Tylenol PM etc, now I'm on CPAP think I'd wake up not feeling like a Mack truck run me over?

Gonna head to the pharmacy and look for something to put me to sleep, something just short of a huge hammer to the skull. Any reccomendations?

[MrSandman]

I can so relate... I hate to sleep during the day. I just wait till I am so exhausted I pass out but option #2 is clonazepam for anxiety and I just got option #3 which scares me and I have tried but generic Ambien. Hard to sleep when all 5 kids are home running around.

I absolutely love working nights but can't wind down to sleep during the day. I darkened my room which helped. I am on my 3rd week.

Oh and just the oposite - now you are on cpap so the sleep aid will not make you choke and apnea more so you may wake up feeling better than ever.

[KFhunter]

working nights wouldn't be bad, if I wern't so tired.

I get to feeling Ill in about three days, stomach acid goes nuts (already started prolosec), mood turns rotten and I can't remember or function. I'm going to give the sleep aid a try, 1 good days rest will tide me over for a night or two.

I have kids too, thank gawd though they are staying with their Grandma until the wife gets off work, so I have from 9am until 6 to sleep, lately though I'm in bed around 9 and back up by 11, force myself to sleep and I'll maybe nap till noon then its game over. I'll take a nap before work from 8 to 10:45 but I find thats when I'll sleep decent and I wake up hard, and yawn all the way to work and fight it all night.

[alnhwrd]

A few day sleeper essentials.

Block the windows of your bedroom with black cardboard or construction paper. I get the big sheets from Walmart. With the blinds and drapes (or a blanket hung on a curtain rod) you can acheive near nighttime darkness.

Get a large box fan and run it in the bedroom (door closed) on low. Once you get used to the noise it will drown out the TV, conversation, toilet flushing and footsteps elsewhere in the house.

No phone in the bedroom, let the machine take messages for you.

While you are on graves, stick to the same sleep schedule, even on your days off. Otherwise your body will never know when you are supposed to be awake or asleep and you will sleep badly.

Limit your caffeine intake. If possible, do without it. I know, it's what keeps you alive during that dreaded 4am to 6am stretch, but it will also keep you awake or keep you from staying asleep once you get to sleep. For me, fruit juice, especially cranberry juice, would perk me up enough to get me through the night without keeping me up all the next day.

If you can, try a few minutes of light exercise before going to bed, or a good workout when you get up before going to work. Either one has made sleeping easier for me.

Staying up for an hour or two before going to bed in the morning helps me too. An hour or two to decompress can let some of the work stress melt off and you wil sleep better. Also, who do you know that gets off work at five and goes home and goes straight to bed? No one, so your body being used to a sleep, work, rest, sleep pattern gets confused when you change it.

I often sleep better during the day than at night once I get acclimated and if I don't let the needs of life, family and friends take priority over sleeping. Hope you can use some of this to make your life easier!

[LinkC]

One solution would be to negotiate with your employer to work days (or at least a consistent shift). You have every right to request an accomodation under the FMLA or ADA.

[KFhunter]

OSA qualify as an ADA disablilty?

[MrSandman]

I believe it can be used as a reason to force your employer to keep you on day shift.

I am afraid to do so because as we all know - it will be held against you one way or another. Just like when I had to go to HR over an issue with a well liked employee. Retaliation is not allowed - yeah right - they just screw you in every other way and your advancement is pretty much over...

[KFhunter]

that would be me

I tried some OTC pills yesterday morning and I got a decent sleep, maybe 5 hours.
with the CPAP I woke feeling ok, not like before!



I talked to the wife and she's gonna dissapear with the kids today (Saturday) or I'd be screwed for sleep. They arn't trained for daddy working night shift
It'll be 3 more shifts before I get 2 days off..not only do I rotate schedules I never have the same 2 days off


Today my little neice was in the house, and sure enough the girls were squeeling and playing leap frog in the living room right above my head

I want to advance, I have a rating of 100% and once I get supervisor I'll have a normal schedule!! mon-fri 8am-4pm., man I can't friggn wait for that.

[kebsa]

I did permanent night shift for a number of years working as an RN on a busy medical floor and then in a home nursing call centre- i had always coped well with night shift in fact it seemed easier to deal with than the continual random rotation of late shifts, early shifts (where you get less than 8 hours from the end of one shift to the start of the next! with night shifts and double shifts thrown in for good measure! I had found myself with limited options for work as an RN as i was wheelchair dependant amputee. I got the job working casual in the home nursing call centre and when i heard they were looking for a permanent night worker i used my willingness to do nights as a bargaining chip to get permanent part time status- it worked well for a couple of years and then i strated having awful bouts of vertigo everytime i was due for days off, i would stay up all day that first day off to get back into a day routine- i had used this way of dealing with changing from nights to days for years so i was quite puzzled about what was going on. i had also been having some other odd symptoms that ther did not seem to be any explantions for.

i have a strong family history of cancers including brain tumors so my Doctor sent me for MRI to rule that out- it certainly did that but it did show up that i had MS instead- now all the other vague signs and symptoms fir neatly into place! Night shift suits some of us better than others that is definite but there is a growing body of research done over many years following nurses that has shown a very clear pattern of serious heath problems at higher incidence rates that the rest of the community when matched up for age, sex etc. ONly last week i read of one country in europe (i can't remember which one though) who were actually paying staff who had worked in the government hospital and had done night shift for extended periods- the compensation was paid when the subjects developed breast and or bowel cancer- they were accepting the notion that night shift increased the persons of contracting theese serious illnesses- the link seems to be the way that night shit alters a persons immune respone increasing the risk of cancers and in my case leading to the dx of MS. I have met an amazing number of nurses who have a variety of auto immune diseases, the more common ones being MS, Lupus and rheumatoid arthritis and the thing we all seem to have in common is lenghty periods of night shift! i like a lot of the others i met have not just one auto immune problem nut often 2 or three. I also have diabetes ( that is considered auto immune), a form of arthritis that is auto immune and for a number of years they have suspected that i have systemic lupus- it has not been confirmed yeat but they have not beenable to rule it out either!

night shift and rotating shifts does some really crazy things to our immune systems- its like being permanently jet lagged and that is for those of us who actually manage ok. If i were offered a great job but it was night shift, knowing what i know now adn what i have experienced, i would not take the job, the effects on health as just not worth it! MS has had a major effect on my life and my ability to live independantly- even my sleep apnea is considered to be due to my multiple sclerosis! i am glad that at least that has beendx and i now have a good machine that is adressing the situatuation but there is a part of me that can't help thinking that even though i am not doing shift work now the damage has already been done and the effects will continue to pop up every now and then. SOmebody has to do night shift when it comes to nursing and medicine but there should be limits to how long a person can subject their body to the stress of shift workuntil they have done some more work and hopefully come up with answers about how to manage shift work in a safe manner.

i love my work as a nurse but i feel i am now paying the price if doing a job i loved very much! Sleep disordered breathing has serious effects on our health not to mention conditions such as MS! if had known that night shift could have played apart in developing MS - i would never have done it! MS is a cow of a disease that is robbing me piece by little piece of my independance and perhaps even more frightening is teh effect it has on cognitive function. I think they are only just beginning to learn just how important good sleep "hygiene" is to to our overall health!

I will officially get off my high horse!

[TSSleepy]

You've already got the good advice on how to cope: black out windows, try to stick to the same sleep schedule even on your days off, et cetera.

But I want to throw in a word of caution. There are two periods in my life when I did not sleep a normal night-time routine.

1) Last two years of college and all of grad school: Routinley pulled all-nighters, did not sleep enough, slept at different times, "make-up sleep" where I slept for 10-11 hours at once. I ended up putting on 90 lbs and my mental, physical, and emotional health plummeted. I was always tired, strung-out, and depressed. Dropped out of grad school.

But then I got a normal day-time job, started sleeping a normal 7.5-8 hours per night, and started getting some exercise. Tried a low-carb diet, lost the 90 lbs, got feeling physically, mentally and emotionally happy again. Yay!

2) Changed careers and started alternating shift-work: Shifted around between early Days, Swing, Grave, sometimes worked weekend 3 x 12, sometimes worked weekday 5 x 8...my schedule changed all the time. Gained 125 lbs and my physical, mental, and emotional health once again went down the toilet.

I've been back ot a normal schedule for a few years now, but this time I couldn't pull myself together without help. It took a few years to figure out what the problem was...obstructive sleep apnea. I've been on treatment for 4 weeks now and am starting to feel better and lose a little weight.

What's my point? Simply, be careful with shift work. If it starts negatively affecting your work performance, the quality of your life, or your relationships with your family...you'll really have to sit down and ask yourself, "Is this the right thing to do?"

Would the periods of my life where I slept funky schedules have kicked my arse so hard if I'd been on CPAP? Probably not. But now that I know I have a sleeping issue, I know that it's gambling with my heath and well-being. I wish you the best of luck, and I hope you get that supervisor position soon!

[deerhound]

Just be glad you have already been diagnosed with OSA. I worked shift rotation for 27 years and thought I was always tired because of the rotating shifts. After a few years of retirement I was diagnosed with OSA and I now know what it feels like to not be tired all the time. Who knows how much I damaged my heart and brain by going so long without good oxygenated sleep? Looking back at my life I know I was always falling asleep in classes in high school and college. I think I probably had OSA most of my life. At least I am doing something about it now! I never found out how to get good sleep while I was working rotating shifts. We rotated through 3 different shifts every month, so I never could get used to a regular sleep time.

Dale

[KFhunter]

now I'm sick
head cold, can't breathe thru my swift LT. No FF mask yet.

I was diagnosed because my blood pressure was thru the roof, unable to control my BP thru medicine I was ordered a sleep study. Severe OSA.

I'm going to promote out of graveyards soon hopefully, in hindsight I wouldn't take a shift work job ever again.