I was wondering what all of you husbands and wives do to spend time with each other when one of you works nights and the other, days. I work 5 nights a week. I leave the house around 10 pm and get home around 7:30 am. My husband leaves for work at 7 am and gets home at 4:30 pm. I try to wake up early...like around 7:30 pm every night so we can spend about 1.5 hours together before I get ready for work but it isn't enough time!
Even on the days off, I like to try and sleep in a bit, but if I do that, I don't see him at all on my days off : (
I was thinking that I might have to start working part-time so I can see him more. Do any of you have a similar situation, and if so, how do you deal with it?
When we do have a day off together, like every other weekend, or my days off during the week, about once a month we rent a hotel room and just hang together all night. No work talk! We have teenagers so privacy is an issue. At the hotel, we get a room with a jacuzzi, order in dinner and talk and ...it really revives our relationship and reminds us why we are working so hard.
Another reason I love my 12s! We don't see each other much on the days I work (roughly an hour and a half, more or less depending on my sleep) but with four days off a week we still have plenty of time together.
Another reason I love my 12s! We don't see each other much on the days I work (roughly an hour and a half, more or less depending on my sleep) but with four days off a week we still have plenty of time together.
I think 12 are a nice solution for partners working opposite shifts especially if you you do 3 on and get four off...ect...
Specializes in ICU, Acute Dialysis, Telemetry/Stepdown.
I work days while my husband works Nights as a Police Officer. I absolutely hate that he's on nights. We have three young children (ages 5 years, 19 months, and 7 months) and our opposite shifts makes family life very difficult. From many of the posts here, I gather that most that enjoy the opposite shifts don't have children yet? Maybe I'm wrong. Things sure change with kids. I worked nights for 5 years and LOVED it. However, those kiddos are day-walkers and it's impossible to interact with them like I should when I'm a zombie off a night shift...so, day shift it was!
hey! I cant be of help with that yet, as I am just going into nursing. But I am already worrying about a situation like yours! so I was wondering, (I will spare the details, but they are there!), Can an RN get a part time job working like 2 twelve hour shifts a week instead of three shifts? and most importantly, have both shifts consecutive like monday and tuesday, or thurs and friday?
I dont care if it is night shift, or if they rotate me from day-night, I just really want to have that prospect of working 2 shifts consecutively even if it was 15 hour shifts! Any advice or encouragement? . . .or just a needle of reality to pop my bubble?
I have been married 25 years this year and even though right now the hurdle we are jumping through is that type of schedule, there have always been situations that kept us from spending time together. I thought when I got married that I would have this guy 24/7 and we would talk all the day long, walk on a sandy beach at least once a week, go out to dinner a few times a week, and just be in each other's arms every possible minute . . . . just like in the movies. That has never been my experience. :icon_roll He has to work and be gone for most of the day. So even when he used to come home, he was tired. I just started back working night shift about 6 months ago and I can honestly tell you that we spend about the same amount of time with each other as we did before I started working nights. The only difference is that he stays home a few hours in the morning anymore. He adjusted his schedule a little. I like that because I think he's more alert and I'm not a grouch because I just woke up. I feel like I have to have a few business hours to be awake to get anything accomplished in life and I don't like handling those types of conversations and people when I just wake up. So I sleep from 12noon to 7PM. That works out real well for me. I have about 5 hours of daylight, which I love! I can shop, go to a doctor's appointment, or take care of some sort of personal business in that time frame. He was saying the other day that he would like to go out to eat on my day off. I suggested we go somewhere like Cracker Barrel or Denny's where I could eat breakfast and he could eat dinner at the same time. Hope that helps.
PS. This wouldn't work, of course, if I worked 7P-7A.
I look at work with a different perspective. It is simply a means to an end, and my other priorities come first. I'd never allow work to interfere with family. My husband can make his own hours pretty much, within reason. I work 1-2 nights a week. He takes the kids to school and meets me for a quick breakfast together, then he goes to the office and I go to bed. I get up at 2pm to get the kids from school, so I'm up long before he gets home about 6ish. If I am returning to work, we usually meet for dinner as a family at a restaurant between home/the hospital/husband's office. This has worked fine for years, it is only grad school that has put a serious crimp in my social/family life!
I was wondering what all of you husbands and wives do to spend time with each other when one of you works nights and the other, days. I work 5 nights a week. I leave the house around 10 pm and get home around 7:30 am. My husband leaves for work at 7 am and gets home at 4:30 pm. I try to wake up early...like around 7:30 pm every night so we can spend about 1.5 hours together before I get ready for work but it isn't enough time!
Even on the days off, I like to try and sleep in a bit, but if I do that, I don't see him at all on my days off : (
I was thinking that I might have to start working part-time so I can see him more. Do any of you have a similar situation, and if so, how do you deal with it?
I worked nights for over 25 years and we found ways to make it work. For one thing, I always went to bed as soon as I got home so that I could be up by 4pm to fix dinner. I have a strict sit-down-together dinner policy. Almost nothing inteferes with that family mealtime--phones off, TV off. As I tell my kids, "You don't have to eat but you can certainly make sparkling conversation." I also limited my outside responsibilities so that I didn't have to be gone too often in the evenings. We tried to have date nights from time to time to keep the connection going. And we had to be creative, if you get my drift:coollook:
For us, part-time works best. We have 3 children, one of whom is profoundly mentally handicapped. So we have a lot of stress in our lives. Six years ago my husband became very ill with Sarcoidosis and since them has become fully disabled. About 3-1/2 years ago I left night shift hospital work for school nursing. Initially it was full-time, but I found that with the intensity of my home responsibilities part-time is a better fit.
DH & I will be married 30 years in April. :redbeathe So we must have done something right.
I used to work nights... when I was much younger, and my husband has always worked days. I remember I really liked it when he came home after work in the evening whilst I was still asleep in bed and climbed in next to me... etc. etc. Not nearly as romantic now that I work days...!
I work 10 hour shifts at night (9pm-7am) and my fiance usually works 5-midnight or 2am. He's a doll, he stays up all night chatting with me on Skype. I have wireless access here at work, and I have a ton of down time. We go to bed when I get home around 7:30am. And on the days he works, we just sleep all day. So, we don't get a ton of awake time together. But, our days off coordinate, so that works perfectly! I know it won't always be that way though, but its good for now.
That has never been my experience. :icon_roll He has to work and be gone for most of the day. So even when he used to come home, he was tired. I just started back working night shift about 6 months ago and I can honestly tell you that we spend about the same amount of time with each other as we did before I started working nights. The only difference is that he stays home a few hours in the morning anymore. He adjusted his schedule a little. I like that because I think he's more alert and I'm not a grouch because I just woke up. I feel like I have to have a few business hours to be awake to get anything accomplished in life and I don't like handling those types of conversations and people when I just wake up. So I sleep from 12noon to 7PM. That works out real well for me. I have about 5 hours of daylight, which I love! I can shop, go to a doctor's appointment, or take care of some sort of personal business in that time frame. He was saying the other day that he would like to go out to eat on my day off. I suggested we go somewhere like Cracker Barrel or Denny's where I could eat breakfast and he could eat dinner at the same time. Hope that helps.
evolvingrn, BSN, RN
1,035 Posts
I go to sleep about 8 and wake up around 3.... if allowed to sleep to my content i sleep until 5. working opposites works well for us....