Man, I blew it

slou! · Nov 1, 2006

Now I am NOT a nurse, so the work was different, but I did do night shifts for my other job. How long have you been doing it? I automatically thought I would love them because I really am a night person, and could stay up all night if I didn't make myself go to bed. I did it, and I also didn't really like it too much. I didn't have a choice because I already signed up (what I was doing was setting up a new store for the company, I work in retail, and basically build all the fixtures then stock the entire store.) and they couldn't get anyone else at that point to do it since I had already started, so I stuck with it. I ended up liking it better! I just needed to get myself used to it. It took a couple of weeks for my body to adjust to nights, and like I said I loved doing the overnight shift more than before. I was sad when the store was completed and I had to go back to my day shifts

I think it is like this for a lot of hospitals, because I have seen other posts where people want to switch to days and have to wait on a LONG waiting list.

Once again, I am not a nurse, so I do not know what it is like to do nursing on the night shift, but I thought maybe my experience might help :) Good luck!

willdgate · Nov 1, 2006

Thanks you, working the night shift at an understaffed hospital sucks.

RNKay31 · Nov 1, 2006

Willgate I hate the night shift, but I wish you all the best or you can try somewhere else, remember you are marketable, LOL

Pompom · Nov 1, 2006

Can you transfer to another area of the hospital?

DolphinRN84, MSN, RN, APRN, NP · Nov 1, 2006

I'm sorry you're having a difficult time with the night shift. Definitely, I understand when you're working on an understaffed floor it stinks. But like slou! said....give it a couple of weeks and you may like it. I'll be starting my new job next week and its a day/night rotation. Personally I would prefer nights because i'm not really a morning person. I used to work one night a week while I was in nursing school. It wasn't too bad I guess. Though I only got 4 hours of sleep before my shift...and sometimes I wasn't able to get to sleep and i did have a roommate at the time. But it turned out ok...it was hard to stay up..but usually I can stay up at night. I hope things work out ok though.

km5v6r, EdD, RN · Nov 2, 2006

I worked nights for 18 yrs. Yes, they are hard. Yes, it does take time to adjust. It is manageable and not unusal to have to wait to go to day shift. Sorry, but hospitals are open 24 hours. Someone has to work nights. I came to enjoy nights and the lack of procedures, visitors and doctors. I could actually put a chart down, come back 15 minutes later and it was still there. Working nights was much easier to do things like schedule a dentist appointment or go to a school program. I could be short of sleep once in a while if necessary. Work the Holidays on nights and you still have time with family even if you are tired. Work the Holidays on days and that's it. I haven't seen a child yet who would wait until 8:00 at night for Christmas presents. I'm happy if the family (aka The Locus) leave enough turkey for a sandwich and don't decide to open my gifts for me. :icon_roll Beware though things could be worse then straight nights. Studies have shown that rotating shift will shorten the life span.

DeLana_RN, BSN, RN · Nov 2, 2006

How are you scheduled? The only reason I hated working nights (7-7) on a PCU was because of the horrible scheduling - one, off, on, off - which means that I had to constantly switch back and forth between a day (home) and night (work) lifestyle. They would never schedule me for more than 2 nights in a row and as a result I hardly had any quality time off.

My husband (ICU RN) works nights in a weekend program; not only does he get premium pay, but he is always scheduled 3 nights in a row with 4 days in between off; now that's very do-able.

Give it a chance, you may yet like it. If not, there are lots of places that will hire new grads on days.

Good luck!

DeLana :)

P.S. I was able to get a day position after about 5-6 months. Although I'm very much a night person (note the time of this post), one major issue I had with working nights: I have trouble sleeping during the day. Ideally, night shift workers are night owls who can sleep anytime.