Insomnia Guilt – A Night Shift Affliction
One of the worst things about working the night shift is planning your sleep. On most days, I sleep in the morning, right after I get off work and get Ashlynn to school. Other days, I may have to stay up and sleep later in the day. On my transition days (days where I switch from being a normal night-sleeping person into a batty nocturnal person and vice versa), I usually have to fit a nap sometime during the day. When it works, it’s great!
But when it doesn’t work, it’s oh-so-bad. Being unable to sleep is harder on us night shift workers than it is for the rest of you folks. We do the same thing you do when you can’t sleep. We toss and turn. Watch something crappy on TV in hopes it lulls our brains to sleep. We eat crappy food which bothers our stomachs and keeps us awake longer. But we also have to deal with what I like to call night-shift insomnia guilt or I-have-something-better-to-be-doing-isis.
What is night-shift insomnia guilt or I-have-something-better-to-be-doing-isis?
See when you normal people can’t sleep and it’s 2:30 in the morning there’s nothing else you can do. Your goal at 2:30 am, the goal that you are spectacularly failing to achieve, is to be asleep. This is what is expected in normal people land. 2:30 am is not the time to clean your house, mow your lawn or run errands. While you may do some of these things anyway, you don’t feel guilty about not getting them done.
Now imagine it’s 2:30 pm and you can’t sleep. The sun is out, the grass is long, the kitchen is a mess and you’ve been laying there for 2 hours trying to sleep. 2:30 pm IS a great time to clean your house, mow your lawn and run errands in normal people land. It’s also a great time to work out, go for a hike, kick a puppy or hang out with a friend. While I don’t operate by all the rules of normal people land, I still like to feel like I belong so I end up feeling guilty. “Why am I laying here when I could be doing something better with my time?”, “I should’ve tried to nap some other time so I could be getting something productive done now.” These are the thoughts that run through my head while I try to hide from the sunlight.
This happens a lot to us night-shift-types. I wish I knew how to fix it, but I don’t know how. Oh, and I was kidding about kicking puppies. I was just curious if you were still paying attention.
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Tags: graveyard shift, guilt, insomnia, night shift
Personal Musings, Public Safety | 
Scott Pantall | March 29, 2010
By Rachel, March 29, 2010 @ 5:40 am
ugh. I’ve been there! I was foolish enough to Tweet about finally figuring out how to sleep during the day last week. Yeah, I spent all day Saturday laying in bed. after being woken by the phone several times and unable to go back to sleep. Yesterday, Rich unplugged all the phones in the house so that we could avoid a repeat performance! I love that guy! Think I’ll keep him. =)
By Scott Pantall, March 29, 2010 @ 7:43 am
I’ve been on graveyards since July and I still have days where I just can’t sleep. Good idea by Rich. Phones are annoying enough at work without having to deal with them when you’re supposed to be sleeping. If I were you, I’d marry him. :p
By Rachel, April 3, 2010 @ 3:02 am
Bwahahahahah! k, I’ll consider it! thanks for the advice!