The older I get, the more difficult working a swing shift becomes. I only have to do so one week in three, but even that takes a toll. There's a seven hour swing for me, with the fist day starting five hours earlier than normal, the second seven hours earlier, and three on my usual day shift. You'd think it would be easy, one slightly short night, one very long night, then back to normal--
It's not. Somehow, "normal" never quite returns. I have trouble sleeping all week and trouble staying awake. The weekend comes and I'm wiped out; things often aren't back to normal until Sunday or Monday.
Whine, whine -- there are starving children in Africa who don't even have jobs. But my sleep suffers and so do my moods. Cue the tiny violins!
Regularly moving shifts has always seemed counter-productive to me. No matter what your age, your sleep patterns will be chaotic and your productivity and even your health will suffer. While in the Army in Belgium, I saw a group of military workers continuously cycle through three day shifts, three mid shifts, and three night shifts with only eight hours between shifts and they were constantly tired and hated their jobs.
ReplyDeleteRotating shifts spreads the "wealth" (maybe manure might be a better metaphor in this case) but that's the only advantage. Better for everyone if such were only done in exigent circumstances, i.e., "Ralph is going out for surgery, we need temporary coverage." If no one is willing to tackle swings or mids full-time, perhaps a quarterly or semi-annual rotation, but these weekly (or bi- or tri-weekly) rotas are unhealthy, and I don't know why Obamacare allows them. ;-)
ReplyDeleteWhere I work, we rotate shifts every 2 weeks...nights to days and days to nights. As we basically work 10-12 hour shifts (supposed to be 8) it makes it almost impossible to get anything done outside of work. And often we work Saturdays. Everyone hates the rotating shifts, but management refuses to change it. Of course, they don't have to work it.
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