NHS shift work including nights

[prospectivenhs]

I have the opportunity to retrain in an NHS role at university. I'm mid 30s and have always had jobs with longish working hours but daytime only.

For those of you that do shirt work in the NHS, how do you manage it with small children? Is it even feasible? Especially if you do three nights in a row. I'm worried that my relationship will suffer or I won't feel as present.

Looking for honest experiences and answers.

Why would the relationship with your DC’s suffer? I’m assuming their father will do bedtimes?

I meant with my dh, not children. Yes, he will be present for bedtimes.

I did nights for years when my dses were little, at one point I did weekend nights, DH worked all week.

It worked, we did it and I have done long day shifts for many more years. Only the past 2.5 years I’ve done 9-5 but that doesn’t really work for me so I'm going back to shifts.

Nights as a nurse were my idea of hell. I left nursing to avoid them. Everyone is different though and it actually works better for childcare for some people

My aunt was a nurse and did night shifts for 40 years. She left around 7pm and came back at 7am when she took her children to school. She was always at home when they got back from school.

Nights as a nurse were pretty crap, but manageable. Nights as a junior doctor were even worse.

What role will it be?

It’s tough.

The tough part is the back to back long shifts.

The 7.30am -8pm meant I couldn’t do the school run, wasn’t home to cook and eat dinner, wasn’t home when they got home from school and missed parents evenings, school plays, fairs things like that and if I did 3 of these shifts back to back my kids were either in bed or about to go to bed so I just never saw them.
My days off were me being exhausted and no fun at all.

Nights were torture because I just couldn’t sleep, summer was so noisy, school holidays when kids were home was impossible to sleep AND be a mum to them.
lawn mowers, kids screaming in back gardens, postman banging on the door, the heat, the light, zero sleep day after day after day.

My husband became the main caregiver taking on 90% of the child care as we had no other support.

I missed huge chunks of my kids growing up. I utterly regret missing things that were super important as rotas were done months a in advance and I was unable to swap or take leave at such short notice.
Think seriously about it, it’s not for the faint hearted.

I didn’t mind nights. I made sure that I had a good routine and as a family we went for quality over quantity time wise.

I did shifts as a nurse before I had children.

It's two different things really - if you are on random shifts swapping every week or if you are on set shifts each week.

I would say if it's random (one week days, the next nights, the next weekends, the next a couple of days and a couple of nights etc) it would be a nightmare forever having to think about all the arrangements.

If it's set shifts the same every week then it would be manageable.

I'm not a good sleeper (very light sleeper) so I really struggled with the switching from days to nights / trying to sleep in the day.

I know a couple of people who do it, one it works fine as she has good support from her parents so they are able to do pick ups / drop offs when needed. And when it's summer holidays etc keep the kids for a bit so she can sleep in the day. But we're talking maybe 5-6 hours sleep in the day (either school hours or when parents helping). She couldn't do it without them.

Another friend is a paramedic with random shifts. Young children. Nightmare. Husband has the children when she's working as he has quite flexible work, but trying to sleep in the day is awful for her. If he takes them out it's for playground etc and then the noise is back. He's forever trying to keep them quiet.

Nights are better than days, in my opinions, it means I see the kids before they go to school, and after they come home, I'm only not there for sleeping. The 12 hour days I found more problematic, because it is basically ho,e, shower, sleep, leave.

@AndSoFinally it's to train as a midwife.

@Brandnewskytohangyourstarsupon that was my main concern. I've just left teaching because I found the 7:30-6 days, plus weekend work took too much time away from my family and also meant I wasn't able to attend school events due to being in school myself.

So during the training you will be on all sorts of shifts and a mix of community and hospital. You'll likely have blocks of shifts - perhaps 6-12 week placements etc and then chunks of time at uni with no shifts. If you have a nice co-ordinator on the clinical placement you may be ok, and technically you should be super-numery in your training so if you have to swap things it may not be too bad.

Once you qualify I think most wards nowadays are quite accommodating with regards to shift patterns and it's easier not to have total changes every week so you may find you are able to request something.

I guess the bonus with long 12-13 hour shifts is that usually it's only 3 days a week. So plenty of time to see family at home. Also you have the option of going into a community role which would be more "set" hours with the odd hospital shift to keep your skills up.

It will be a challenge but it will be possible with the right level of support and organisation. As long as you're the kind of person that doesn't mind having to be super organised you should be ok x

The shifts plus the study is short term during training.

I sound so very negative I’m sorry but it’s the brutality of it.

The emotional toll must be considered as you will see some very distressing things, in nursing and midwifery it’s not just about getting home and collapsing into bed exhausted. I used to struggle to sleep at times because I couldn’t stop thinking about and trying to process the things I saw and dealt with. They would dominate my thoughts for days sometimes weeks.

I did it for many years and then was assaulted badly on shift for the last time, then suffered burnout so have a very bad outlook. Again, it’s the brutality of the reality, not just the shifts.

Then there are wonderful amazing and great days where you think “yes, this is why I’m here”.