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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To think some people don’t get that working nights mean you need sleep during the day

83 replies

Redcampions · 20/02/2019 15:30

Started a job working three nights a week from 8pm till 8pm. I then go home have something to eat and go the bed till about 2-3ish.
The amount of people who have said stuff to me like
Can you have my kids during the day in the holidays since you are working nights
We can meet up on such and such a day since you are working during the night
And a couple of people try to ring me for chats after a night shift even though I have told them I am asleep.
My MiL told my DH who is a teacher so off during the holidays that he will be able to help them re decorate the kitchen and living room and hall over half term as I will be in each day with DS
The final straw is that I have found out today the neighbours have told the postman that I will be in all day to receive their parcels
Don’t people get you may be working nights but you still need sleep at some point
Does anyone else have this problem

OP posts:
WeeDangerousSpike · 20/02/2019 19:26

I've never worked nights, but have worked 12hr day shifts in a 24hr business. So I get it.

What I don't understand is how people don't understand?! It's literally as simple as 3pm = 3am. How can people not get that?!

Brilliantidiot · 20/02/2019 20:23

What I don't understand is how people don't understand?! It's literally as simple as 3pm = 3am. How can people not get that?!

Because most people don't see 3am regularly, and even rarer is they've been awake several hours before and will be after and actually working, not in bed unable to sleep for example. It's a one off occurance for them and usually people can sustain one night of only minimal or no sleep and continue as normal, so they view it as that - they don't compute that night workers work 4/5 nights in a row and minimal/no sleep is unsustainable.

100Birds · 20/02/2019 20:36

I’ve never worked nights but regularly done 4-midnight and people do expect me to be up as normal the next day. I think people hear midnight and assume that’s when I go to sleep. I defy any of them to be asleep literally when they finish work then get up 6 hours later!

I am a library assistant in 24hr university library so not a particularly physically demanding job. I don’t know how people in healthcare/emergency services/factories or warehouses etc do it. Hats off to you all!

Biancadelrioisback · 20/02/2019 20:42

I used to work in hotels and sometimes had to work an early DM shift (7am-3:30pm) then a nights shift (11pm- 7:30am). The amount of people who used to ask me to do stuff after my morning shift as I was off until 11 was ridiculous. They thought it was like a split shift or a break. Usually a split shift is one shift split in 2 (2 X 4 hour shifts in a day), what I was doing was covering for arseholes who didn't come in for work and working 2 full shifts. Often after my night shift I would be back in at 12pm for one reason or another. People are idiots

longearedbat · 20/02/2019 21:03

We used to have a murderous change over system as well, where you finished nights at 7am, and changing to a late shift on the same day, had to be back at work 8 hours later for 3pm. The same applied for lates to earlies - finishing a 11pm and starting again at 7am the next morning. Some people had long commutes so used to try and grab some kip in a quiet place at work, rather than bothering to travel home and back.
And people wondered why I was bad tempered a lot of the time.

Stompythedinosaur · 20/02/2019 21:08

I remember my sil going on at great length about how disgustingly lazy it was to sleep during the day when I worked nights. She is an otherwise intelligent person so I have no idea why she couldn't understand that if you have to be awake all night then you need to sleep during the day.

WeeDangerousSpike · 20/02/2019 21:25

Brilliantidiot

Because most people don't see 3am regularly, and even rarer is they've been awake several hours before and will be after and actually working, not in bed unable to sleep for example.

That's what I'm saying - 3pm for a night worker is the same as 3am for a non night shift worker.

They wouldn't ring someone at 3am, so don't ring a night worker at 3pm! It's not exactly a complicated rule to remember, that's why I don't understand why people* don't get it.

*'people' being the hard of thinking that believe night workers don't actually sleep. Ever.

HelenaDove · 20/02/2019 21:28

I used to work nights in the early 2000s My housing association refused to accomodate this when they wanted to do the gas safety check Wanted an all day call. Explaining that i worked nights didnt work so i had to argue the toss and then they would only give a four day window

Still the same today and the tenants round here who work nights/shifts now are put through this every time.

When they wanted to come and discuss a refurb...........yet another seperate all day call.

the new doors .................an ALL WEEK call. i shit you not Then they moan they cant get access to all the flats.

HelenaDove · 20/02/2019 21:30

*four HOUR window

WeeDangerousSpike · 20/02/2019 21:37

Bianca and Bat were those jobs in the UK?

I know you both said you aren't in those jobs any more, but that isn't legal - you have to have 11 hrs off in any 24. So finishing an 8.5 hr stint at 3.30pm means you shouldn't have started any earlier than 2.30am the next day!

Brilliantidiot · 20/02/2019 21:46

@WeeDangerousSpike

Yes, and the hard of thinking people cannot comprehend something they've never experienced. So even though it's the night workers 3am they can't get that to them it's "But it's 3 in the afternoon!"

So they just don't care about it.
I've got loads of examples of this type of thing from years of nights. From people banging the door down because 'they know I'm in' and work nights to 'Well what can you possibly do all night?!' to colleagues wondering why you can't tidy up a massive garden effectively on nights because it is dark you fuckwit and I don't have night vision

It's the hardest thing about working shifts IMO, that someone who does 9-5 just cannot comprehend that being awake and working through the night equates to being awake and working through the day. They just want what they want and stuff anyone it doesn't suit. Pisses me right off.

longearedbat · 20/02/2019 21:50

@WeeDangerousSpike it was the Met police in the 80s. 8 hours between shifts was the minimum accepted time. I have no idea what hours they work now. I was at the Brixton riots. I started my shift at 3pm but didn't get off until 12 noon the following day - I still had to be back at work at 8pm that night as I had had my regulation 8 hours break. The fact I had just done enough overtime to cover my next shift and more counted for nothing. I don't know whether current working time regulations cover the police even now (although I am sure someone can tell me) as it is a disciplined force and operational necessity always came first.

WeeDangerousSpike · 20/02/2019 22:05

Bat I don't know if regs cover the police either. I'd imagine the armed forces aren't covered, quite possible the emergency services aren't either.

Redglitter · 20/02/2019 22:07

Police are covered by working time regulations. Fire fighters arent

PurplePepperEater · 20/02/2019 22:21

Herculesfan he’s taking you for a ride love, nothing to do with working nights!

HelenaDove · 20/02/2019 22:24

Back in 2002 i wanted to put a sign on our door "Night worker sleeping. Knock at your own risk" I was that fucked off but DH said that was too threatening.

allotmentgardener · 20/02/2019 23:05

I opened the door to the postman once in my pjs. "Oh have I caught you at a bad time? Wink wink"
No I've been doing 12 hour nights now f**k off.
Ok it was rather harsh. But 1. Hed woke me up. 2. He'd been darn rude and 3. The parcel wasn't even for me!!!!!
He didn't wake me again.

Kezzamo · 20/02/2019 23:17

I resort to parking my car down the road so my drive is empty when I'm working nights. I also have to go through the absolute torture that is staying up to take the kids to school! I finish at 7am but then have to stay up, take kids to school and most often get up to pick them up again!

Those 2 hours are the worst!

Maelstrop · 20/02/2019 23:26

He comes in at 6am, showers and is in bed by 6.30. Gets up at 6 when we come in from nursery, has his breakfast handed to him and leaves at 7pm.

He’s taking the severe piss! 11.5 hours sleep?? Mine also works nights, home by 7.30, bed by 8, up by 3pm normally. If he finishes on a Friday, he’ll be up by 12 in order to reorientate himself for dayshift. I go to bed at 11.30 pm, up by 6.15. There’s no way I could sleep for over 11 hours. Surely he’s awake and just on his phone or something within 8 hours?

A mate divorced her dh because he failed to find a job that wasn’t permanent nights. It’s shit when you have kids.

DamonSalvatoresDinner · 20/02/2019 23:55

I agree about a sign. NIGHTSHIFT WORKER SLEEPING. GO AWAY.

My DH works a strange continental shift set up, sometimes days and sometimes nights. My neighbour has learned DH's shift pattern (which is all over the place but there is a pattern) so that he doesn't do any DIY or his carpentry work outside in his workshop on those days before a certain time. He knows his sawing and hammering would keep DH up.

WeBuiltThisBuffetOnSausageRoll · 21/02/2019 00:01

They are sleep snobs, OP. They just don't understand anything but sleep between 11pm and 7am.

I remember my sil going on at great length about how disgustingly lazy it was to sleep during the day when I worked nights.

Some people are very dim indeed and unable to realise that other people are not them. These are also often the people who will consider, say, an otherwise-fluent Norwegian very thick for not being familiar with a particularly long and unusual word in English (maybe their 3rd or 4th language), but if you challenge them to say any very simple statement in Norwegian, they'd look at you like you were mad: "But I'm not Norwegian!"

Even for people who don't work nights, I've never understood why night owls are considered lazy and larks virtuous. Surely, it's what you do with your time that makes the difference, whether you do something at 6am after rising early or at 2am before going to bed - what does it matter, as long as it fits in well with your family and work?

They'll happily call you lazy for not getting up until, say 10am, on a non-working day, but if you in return call them lazy for going to bed at 10pm, they'll take the greatest offence, because "That's bedtime, duh!"

I used to work a normal daytime job and did 9-5, whereas others did 8-4. Same hours, slightly staggered, no big deal, you'd think. Except they didn't half think themselves superior. "Good morning, I've already been here an hour!" Congratulations - and you'll go home an hour earlier too. This department has to be covered between 9-5, so if I didn't willingly do it, you'd have to; being allowed to start and finish an hour earlier than the core operating times is a concession that the bosses make for you. And aside from all this, on the odd occasion when I had cause to get there early myself, it became evident that they spent most of that earlier hour chatting (probably about how virtuous they were) and eating breakfast, whilst I got in for 9 and was straight to work, as the emails started coming in. They were still coming in and being dealt with by me once they'd gone home at 4.

With some people, the fact that they rise very early is the only thing they have to boast about, which is so sad and pathetic - like boasting that you have a blue front door or prefer leek to cabbage. They'll randomly ask when you got up, just so they can then reply "Oooooh, I'd been up three hours already by then!" That's nice for you, dear - do you want a medal like Muttley? In contrast, I have a friend who gets up at 5:30 every morning, as he enjoys an early morning walk. he doesn't go around telling everybody about it, nor does he judge people who rise later, because he's a reasonable person who understands that people live their lives differently. I couldn't imagine being up for 5:30 every morning, but I am not him, so judgement and criticism are most definitely not forthcoming from me.

HelenaDove · 21/02/2019 00:13

Sausage Roll ive always been a night owl I often have some of my eureka moments at 2 am

its not staying up late to watch repeats of Life on Mars honest

AlexaAmbidextra · 21/02/2019 00:13

it was the Met police in the 80s. 8 hours between shifts was the minimum accepted time.

longearedbat. I thought you might say the Met. I was married to one in the 80s and thought this particular aspect of the shift pattern was appalling. Often wondered just how safe area car drivers and similar were having just done a stretch of seven nights and then back the same day. I assume they don’t do it now but I don’t know.

PleaseComeBackSafe · 21/02/2019 00:35

@weedangerousspike So a 5pm-11.30pm shift then an 8am-4pm shift isn't legal? because that is (ok its late, my maths won't work...) 9.5 hours off? No wonder my sleep is screwed on a weekend! But others do the same and start at half seven, so i am grateful for my extra half hour! Catering, no formal contract, casual shifts! But I think the WTD doesnt apply to catering?