Hey all,
I’m just about to start working nights (12 hour shifts - 8pm to 8am) permanently, after previously being contingency in work which meant a combination of both day and night shifts.
I was just wondering if there were any night shift workers on the forum, and whether you had any advice/tips in terms of how to manage food intake?
I work 12 hour shifts, I usually have a ‘supper’ of Granola and fruit and a ‘breakfast’ around 7am. If I’m particularly busy I may have a bar as well. It depends how active you are but I try and not eat too much to keep control of my weight.
I would try and have a normal evening meal before work and see how you get on.
Many thanks for the response 
So you’d advise against eating during the wee hours? For instance, on previous night shifts I’ve had something small to eat at break times which tend to be at midnight and 4am.
I try and keep my body in a fairly normal routine so treat night shifts as a night so nothing too heavy. I usually have Granola and a banana around 12 and try an apple or a bar around 4 if you feel you need it.
You’re on permanent nights now, man. There’s no sugar-coating the fact, and no strategy for your meals is going to make it much better. You need to conceptualize it like your whole routine has been inverted - night is now your day, and you need to act accordingly.
Wake up at five, half five in the afternoon; and have your breakfast. Eat your bait at “lunch”, in the middle of your shift, as normal. Wait until you get home and have a proper dinner, then head to bed.
It’ll be murder for the first week or so, but I’m sure you’ll cope. Night shift is my favourite shift - I seem to get the most sleep then. The only downside is no life 
I’ve done plenty of nightshits in my life…but it’s not as easy as that if you actually want to make use of your days on your days off…and also eating when you get home before you go to bed is probably not the greatest thing to do. Also it depends on what you are doing. I had one physical night job and one office based and it was asker on the latter…although that could be quite boring at times and made you feel like snacking.
Oh and it depends on how many hours. I did night shifts from 8pm til 8am and I did nightshifts from midnight to 8am. I preferred 12 hrs.
actually make use of your days on your days off
Days? What are days? When I was on permanent nights, I tended to spend my weekends in restaurants, down at the casino, in pubs, at late-night cinema showings, at car meets, in the gym… Literally living the night life. I’m amazed I didn’t get some sort of Vitamin D deficiency.
But then, I guess I could get away with it. No family, no commitments, doing my groceries online.
It would be harder for someone in a different situation, I guess. Or even someone in the same situation, who simply happened to be less idiosyncratic than I am.
Damn…I couldn’t do that…much as I like doing things in the evening/night I do appreciate day time activities too.
I am lucky now…I work for myself at a job that needs no regular hours so I can work day or night or both…I haven’t used an alarm clock in over 2 years. Much more chilled.
Well, now one week out of three is a night shift for me. Rolling shift pattern - days, lates, nights, days, lates, nights, et cetera. It’s not so bad because night shift starts on Sunday, which means I can use Friday to hard-reset my sleep cycle. I force myself to stay awake all Friday, and go to bed on the evening.
It sucks, but I guess that’s why the pay is so good!
…you’re right though, never seeing the light of day does strange things to a man. It was a weird period of my life, but I remember it being super fun at the time :’)
Thanks for the responses all,
I just did my first week of permanent night shifts. 4 in a row and now I have 4 days off. I’m beat 
I have to say, I’m not sure if eating during the late night/early morning hours is for me. Found it hard to enjoy any food that I had close to and past midnight this week. Ha! I’m considering trying to restrict my eating to the four hours or so I have between waking and up starting a shift. I’ve always fancied giving something like intermittent-fasting a go. I finish at 8am, get home around 9am, sleep until about 3pm or 4pm, and then I have to leave for work around 7pm so that I can get there for 8pm.
I do shiftwork (nights shifts are for 3 weeks out of 15)
And I have ‘breakfast’ about 4.30am (2 scoops of huel and water)
Then go to sleep when I get home, I can’t sleep that long as I had the school run at 3pm so I would wake up, shower, get dressed and have a Huel lunch before the gym session at 1.30pm and head to the school at 2.45pm
Then a proper meal about 6-7pm
Not ideal … but it works for me !
No specifics, but I live between the river Tyne and the river Wear. Almost slap bang in between them, actually. The night life is literally unbeatable - everything from illegal raves to jazz cafes, casinos to bingo halls, or dominos tournaments at the local working men’s club. A plethora of gyms and dojos. Art galleries, independent cinemas, film clubs, book clubs, nightclubs. Filthy posh girls from the various universities. Huge Chinese community to practice my Mandarin with (and occasionally play mahjong with at one of the bigger casinos). Massive street racing scene - at the witching hour, every car park bustles with guys in lurid dole rockets flexing on one another. Birthplace of the English makina invasion. Wear your dressing gown to the shops and nobody looks at you funny.
You’re never more than ten minutes away from the roaring seaside, never more than ten minutes away from the sleepy countryside. Some of the most dramatic landscapes in the world. Northumbria lies a short drive in one direction, Durham a short drive in the other. York and Edinburgh are each a couple of hours away by train.
I mean, I’m not trying to blow the regional horn or anything, but it’s essentially bloody heaven up here. Not even joking. I love my life. The only thing we lack is a decent French restaurant.
Anyway, there’s so much stuff to do here, and night is just when it starts getting interesting!
When’s this film coming out?
I live in Glastonbury. Half the population goes to the shops in their dressing gown during the day…the other half go naked…or just wearing a witches hat.
I’ve often said we need a film set in the region. Or an iteration of the Grand Theft Auto franchise.