Anyone Work Shift hours?

Make sleep a higher priority.

Yea...11pm to 7am. Usually 3-4 cups of coffee per night.

I work rotating shift work and my shifts are 12 hours long. I don't do a whole lot during my work cycle other than eat and sleep, sometimes I work out before night shift or after day shift. I find it is better to concentrate on eating right and getting sleep and leave the real workouts to my days off. Add me if you want to!

I used to work rotating shifts, it was tough. 12 am - 8 am (week 1) , 8 am - 4 pm (week 2), 4 pm - 12 am (week 3), with 5 days on /2 off (week 1), 5 on / 2 off (week 2), 6 on / 24 hours off (week 3). It was brutal. My coworkers gave me some advice that was absolutely fanastic about maintaining my health and sanity.

They suggested I rise 4 hours before I had to be at work, and go to bed 4 hours after work ended. This meant that no matter when my shift landed, I had some "prime daytime" to interact with other people, and also wasn't completely exhausted at work because it was in the middle of my day. Also, it meant I wouldn't feel like I was going to die if I had to come in early or stay late to cover half of someone else's shift.

So the 12 am - 8 am week I woke up at 8 pm, went to bed at 12 pm. I would generally have energy to exercise before work , if I so wanted . At the time, I did not so want; it was a factory position and during a single 8 hour shift I climbed approximately 60 industrial flights of stairs, and covered more than 25,000 steps. Frankly, that was enough exercise for me.

Even when I went to normal hours again, the habit stayed with me. I like having that leisurely time before work to get things accomplished, including a full workout.

I'd suggest trying to get up at 12 pm, and going to bed at 4 am. You can work out during normal gym hours (actually during completely non-peak hours, hooray!) before you're out of energy from work.

I work 10p-7a and 6p-7a, and I've found that I do pretty well completely flipping my schedule. I eat at 6p, midnight, and 8a, with snacks when needed. I usually walk on the treadmill for a while after my 'supper', then sleep from 10a-6p. If you are having trouble getting to sleep during the day, I suggest melatonin and black out curtains. I bring healthy frozen meals, or measured out leftovers to work for lunch, and I try to keep busy so as to not snack all night. It helps that in my town nothing is open when I'm coming to or leaving work so I'm not tempted to get fast food.

I recently started working the overnight shift. I only have 4-5 hours to sleep during the day and a quick nap before work. My shift is 11p-7a, with an hour commute each way. I have settled into a more manageable eating pattern in the last couple of months, I was hungry ALL the time at first! I eat dinner with my family around 5:30/6pm, I have my "lunch" break at work between 3-4 am (usually leftovers and fruit), and I eat when I get home between 8-9am, sometimes eggs, sometimes leftovers.
We (I) cook a LOT at home and I plan for these leftovers to be utilized all week. I have 3 kids, so I can USUALLY manage to batch cook and not waste food and rotate for interest, but it is a challenge! Always have healthy food ready to go! Sometimes I wake up from my little pre work nap a little late, and I need to literally open the fridge and grab and go...