I might need to get a night job in addition to my full-time day job. This means that for 5 days of the week, I might have to function on 3 hours of sleep a day, making up the “sleep debt” over the weekend. I expect this to last for a maximum of 6 months.
I fully expect that there will be some effects on my health as well as my performance at work, but if I eat right, nap for half an hour during lunch breaks and try to get some exercise during the weekends, I might be able to get through it.
It’ll be a living hell, but I might be able to get through it.
So have you ever had two jobs simultaneously? Ever had a day AND a night job? If so, how did you cope?
I was young, 19 or 20. Job 1 was Mon-Fri from 5:30AM to 2PM; Job 2 from 3PM to 11:30PM and was close to Job 1. 30-min commute from home. Both jobs were medium-level of physical activity.
After only a few weeks, I was struggling with this schedule. I didn’t really need the money (fortunately) so I quit job 2.
That was many years ago (I’m in my 50s now). I remember it being brutal.
How crucial is it that you take on this second job, Bibliovore? At 37 with two young kids, I don’t think 3 hours sleep a night is manageable by any stretch. 5 maybe. Weekend ‘sleep debt’ balancing is bullshit IMO, and more than likely it also means you’re pretty much out of the picture as far as any family stuff is concerned.
Six months is a looooong time to do nothing but work, and sleep deprivation is a form of torture ya know.
It’s pretty much unavoidable, at least for the short-term. The night job is a “Plan B”, to last only until I find a better day-job. If I don’t actually find a better day-job, the night-job will take care of things over the next six months.
I’ve done a bit of research on sites for Doctors dealing with night-shifts. “Sleep-debt” is real and has to be paid back, but I think the intention is that you pay it back the next day, not five days later.
I know it’s going to be hell, but unless something lands in my lap soon I have very little choice. I’m just looking for advice on how best to cope, how to limit the damage and how to just get through it
I’ve held second, part-time jobs often. The retail second jobs I had were, say, from 6pm to 10pm or so, 3 evenings a week and then a full shift on Sundays. So I could work the 9-5 job and then get to the retail one on time.
These days, I have a full-time job that’s 4 days a week and a part-time job that’s just one day a week. It used to be two days, Saturday and Sunday, but I got pretty burned out on that so it’s just on Saturday nights now. Both jobs are 2nd shift, so my schedule is the same all week, just one day I have to go to a different location, and I have Sundays and Thursdays off, about 50 hours a week total.
If you’re really proposing trying to work two full-time jobs, I don’t think you’re going to last nearly as long as you think. I know two people who tried it, who were young and single and no kids, and they were babbling idiots and useless at work within just a few weeks. Part-time is totally doable, though.
I might very well have my ass kicked harder and faster by this schedule than I realise, but does anyone have any solid tips on how best to delay the onset of inevitable babbling idiocy?
Thanks. The commute to and from the day job is by train, so I can catch half an hour of shut-eye each way. I also plan to power-nap during my day-job lunch hour and my night-job lunch hour, so that could be up to another 2 hours of snatched sleep per day.
Years ago I had a temporary bout of insanity where I worked three PT jobs simultaneously. Luckily, they were all near one another and less than five miles from home, but it was still unsustainable. I’d fall asleep in the middle of talking to someone, even eating; wake up crashed out next to my plate with a full fork still in my hand.
On the plus side, quitting the third one made the other two seem quite doable, and I worked at both places for over a year. I was young and had no other responsibilities though, I can’t imagine how I’d do it now.
Balance the fruit with protein, it’ll keep you babbling incoherently a wee bit less.
Thanks. I’ve read that a high-protein diet helps combat the effects sleep deprivation and reduced melatonin production, escpecially if eaten during the night shift.
When I was in my thirties I worked a full time job (9 - 5), a part time job that was a 12 hour stretch twice a week, and I taught a Community College course that was 2.5 hours a week. In addition there was prep work for the college course.
It sucked. I slept during lunch breaks. I had weird episodes where I would wake up, answer the phone and talk to someone, then have no memory of the phone conversation. I drank coffee all the time. I was jittery.
I did it for a year. The money was nice, but other than that it sucked.
For around a year I had two PT jobs: running the machines that fed advertisements into newspapers, and a dishwasher at a retirement community. Both were seasonal, the newspaper for the holiday ads, and the retirement place because of the snowbirds. So during the summer I’d get maybe 30 hours a week between the two, but over 60 during December. And the second October, my car broke down for good so I had to bike between the two (it was basically a triangle, 7-8 miles, three times a day). Then during December, once I did this plus 75 hours working!
kayaker reminds me, in my 30s there was a stretch where I had a F/T and a P/T job. The F/T job was office/computer work, so it wasn’t physically demanding. It was 9A-5P M-F. The P/T job was night security at a hospital, so mindless and light walking - easy. It was about 15-20hrs/wk.
That wasn’t too bad. Lack of sleep wasn’t a problem. I try to avoid coffee, and didn’t really need it then. It’s doable, except I missed some of the kids’ activities. I did this for not too long, about 4-5 months.
If you can somehow get 5 hours sleep you can make it. I got by for many years on 5 hours well up into my fifties. If I go a few days under 4 hours it totals me out quickly. I was always able to find a second job where my weekend hours were longer than my weekday hours. I never did well for very long working 2 full 8 hour shifts 5 days a week. I spent many years with an eight hour job and a 6 hour job.
Need for sleep is pretty individual and it changes as you age. When I was 17 I was working full time and going to high school full time and living on 3 hours of sleep and junk food and partying my ass off on weekends. If I were to try that schedule now I’d be dead inside of the first week.
It sounds like you’ve got a solid plan in place to deal with it, just a couple little pieces of advice.
When sleeping on the train and at lunch, wear headphones and set an alarm on your phone, put it in an inside zipped if possible pocket. The diet changes are a good idea and if you’re not a caffeine drinker now, save it for emergencies. If you drink it all the time it’s generally less impactful than if you never have it until you need it to stay awake. If you’re already a coffee addict well, ignore that
Melatonin might help on the weekends but I think it lasts too long for weekday use with such short bursts of sleep. Make sure your wife is onboard with helping you get extra sleep on the weekends and isn’t saving up a honey doo list. Try and find a few minutes a day to talk to the kids and keep up with their lives or you’re going to hate this time even more than you already will.
