4 Ways Nurses Are Avoiding Night Shift

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Now let's dive into today's Hello everybody, welcome back to Club Nurse. My name is Colton, your host of this podcast. So we had a little bit of a technical difficulty today. I was supposed to have a guest on, and unfortunately we were having some issues with our podcasting platform that we use, and she was not able to join. So we're going to iron that out and she will be back. She's really amazing. She's got some awesome Uh, things that she does in the nursing community, in the nursing world, that I think you will find some deep interest and value in for sure. So she will be on. But with that being said, uh, as we have to do in nursing that we're so used to, I had to pivot and I had to think of something else to talk to you about and give you something that I found valuable. And I sat here for a second and kind of thought, what would I like to talk to the audience about today? And it just popped into my head like, hello, let's talk about the night shift, because this is obviously something that we have to deal with as nurses and shift workers, is the likelihood of working the night shift in our career. So working the night shift is something that I have been very passionate about in my career not doing. I refuse, actually, if I'm being quite honest. Uh, if I— if this was something that came down to I had to either be homeless or pay my bills, I would work the night shift. But, uh, for me personally, I have found that I do not operate well at night. And I think, to be fair, humans just are not made for that. We're not made to be up all night working through the night and then trying to function the next day. Because, you know, all you night shift nurses out there, y'all are a different breed. You'll work the entire night shift and then you'll like stay awake to do family functions and to just like operate in your normal life, take care of your kids, and sleep for a couple hours and do it again is absolutely insane. And I get it. I mean, what are we supposed to do? There's no solution to the— in this, uh, I mean, we need 24-hour care. Hello, hospitals would not operate without people who work overnight. I am just saying, and this may be, I don't know, a privileged place for me to come through in this sense, but I don't have kids. I don't really have to consider many things other than kind of my own life when I'm looking for a job. But even those of you with kids, I think that there is a way around this. And this is really for any nurse out there, anybody who works any kind of shift work, and then also a lot of the new grad nurses who may be interested in skipping out on the night shift. And in my career, I've been a nurse for almost 7 years at this point, and I have never held a night shift position. ever. That's not to say I haven't worked some night shifts and gotten myself into some situations where I've had to do it for a couple weeks, but other than when I was in high school— my very first job in high school as a CNA at a SNF, at a skilled nursing facility— I would work nights. I think I did it once or twice a week. I would work overnight, which is crazy, and then I would go to my friend's house because I didn't live in like that town. I lived outside of town. I'm from a small rural town in Northeast Arizona. So to get home would have been like 30 to 40 minutes. So I'd go to my friend's house. He lived right by my high school. I'd go there. I would sleep until I'd get off at like 7. I'd get there. I'd shower. I'd go to sleep. And then I would sleep for like 3 or 4 hours because I didn't have any classes in the morning. I would sleep, wake up, have some food, and then go for my afternoon classes in high school. And I only— but I only did that for like a couple months because first of all, it's not sustainable. And second of all, it was my senior year of high school. So I was moving out of my hometown anyways. So I quickly learned that, that I was not made for the night shift. I also did this in college for my last— one of my last semesters, not my last, but towards the end of my college career. I did get a job in the hospital working also as a tech on a step-down unit in which I also worked nights. But I learned very quickly that I did not want to do this. I did not want to work the night shift. I felt terrible. The night differential pay was just not worth it to me. And I just, I just can't do it. I will say this though, I will say this. The night shift people, those are my people, man. I, I love the night shifters, the vibe, just the energy, just their personalities. Like, those are my people. I like them a lot. It just makes the shift— I remember I've worked some mid-shifts quite a lot actually, and I'm just saying, when the night shift would come on and the day shift would leave, the shift in energy and just the way that the shift went from that point on was so much better, so much calmer, so much just— even when things, you know, shit was hitting the fan and things were going crazy, it was just like so much better to be around people who weren't so, uh, just grouchy. And I'm sorry, my day shifters, I love y'all too, but man, day shift needs to just like just relax a little bit, man. Like, I don't know, I'm just saying, the night shift, they, they've got it going on. And that's just— I think that's just because of their personalities, the life that they live. Like, they, they can just tolerate a lot more is the experience that I've had. I love night shifters. I love my day shifters too, but I, I just have to say that they are a lot calmer. But anyways, so what— how I wanted to talk to you today, what I wanted— the message I wanted to portray in this episode is talking to you about how I have avoided the night shift in my almost 7 years as a nurse. And these are things that I've thought about, and I want to give kind of that Those little tidbits or advice to you. So if this is for— if you are a new nurse, or even if you've been a nurse for a little bit and you want to get off of the night shift, or you, you don't want to work night shift, when you're looking for a job, the less specific and particular you're being, the more likely you'll be to be able to work day shift or mid-shift. I'm okay with mid-shift. It's not ideal. I would really like to work like 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM if I had my choice. Choice, but I'll do a mid-shift. My cutoff is 3 to 3. That is still like not great, but I'll do that. You can still function as a pretty normal human being doing that. But ideally it's like either working at 7 AM, 9 AM, 10 AM, and then 11 AM. And those are like the 12-hour shift increments that like I am like, I can function pretty normally. When you go beyond that, you're pushing it. But anyway, so the more particular you're being, the more specific you're being in the job that you want, the exact hospital you want. So you want, say you want this The exact hospital, this exact unit. If that's, if that's what you're looking for and all that they hire for new staff are night shift, then guess what? You're gonna have to work the night shift. You're not going to have a choice because you're— that's what you're looking for. That's the, that's the specific specialty that you want. So there's not going to be options for you. If you're a little bit more open, if you're like, okay, I really want this kind of specialty, but I'm open to the hospital, like it doesn't have to— I don't really care which facility I'm at, I'm just looking for this particular experience. Again, maybe a little bit more difficult, but you're opening up your options. You're not pigeonholing yourself. Is that a word, pigeonholing? Whatever. You're not cornering yourself into just one job that you are looking for. So I think that this is really especially true for my new grad nurses out there, because when you're graduating nursing school, if you are like, I really want to work at Stanford in the ICU, particularly the cardiac ICU at Stanford Hospital, and all Stanford cardiac ICU hires are night shift nurses, especially for new grad nurses, then guess what? You are going to have to work the night shift and there's no way around that. But if you're open, if you're like, eh, I don't know, I don't really care, I'm really open to anything, you will be surprised at the places that will hire especially even new grad nurses during the day. When I was a new grad, I was in Arizona and I really wanted— I actually, it's kind of funny because I went into it pretty convinced that I was going to have to work a night shift position. I didn't want it and I didn't know at the time that I even had options. But when I got hired through the facility, it's a, it's a very common healthcare facility, uh, hospital system in Arizona. Um, it might or it might not start with a B. That's where I started my career. I, they gave me the option. I got hired as a new grad nurse where I did my capstone and my preceptorship. And they're like, okay, do you want day or night shift? And I was like, really? Like, I have the option? And they're like, yeah. And I took a day shift position. So as a new grad nurse on a med surg unit. I started out on the day shift and it worked out really well for me. Another way to avoid— if you're this— and this one I feel like is more for my like more experienced nurses. If you're a new grad nurse and you're going straight into outpatient work, it's okay. There's nothing wrong with that. Totally doable. People really do that. But just know it makes a transition into the hospital a little bit harder, just in my experience and from what I have seen. I do recommend that new grad nurses start in the hospital if they're wanting to really hone in on like clinical skills and understanding the pace and how the workflow goes of a hospital system. But if you don't care, girl, go get your job at an outpatient surgery clinic or outpatient, you know, primary care office. Go off, girl. I think you totally should. But again, that's a huge way around working the night shift. And for a lot of people I'm learning is, you know, it's not necessarily like the job of nursing that's the priority for people. It's the schedule. It's how, you know, how can I make a good amount of money with the best schedule? Some people are really, you know, say you're a new nurse and you're starting a family and you don't want to work weekends or holidays, an outpatient clinic is going to be perfect for you because you're going to get that stability and that, you know, Monday through Friday or maybe 4 10s to where it's a very consistent schedule and you're getting, you know, to work a normal quote unquote normal schedule. You're not working holidays, you're not working weekends, and you're not working nights. So that is, I think, probably the easiest way around working the night shift is just to go to an outpatient clinic. Maybe it's endoscopy or an outpatient surgery clinic or just anything along those lines, a primary care office. I will say typically, and this is typically, the money at those places are not as good. It's not as good money working in an outpatient setting. I'm sure there are people out there who would disagree with me. I would love to hear from you and kind of your experience in that, but from what I know and from what I have seen in my nursing experience, you are less likely to make more money outside of the hospital setting and less opportunity for things such as overtime, holiday pay, things like that. But you know what? It's not always that important to everybody. So, a quick way away from the night shift, work outpatient. Oh, this one's great, actually. This is something that I don't know if a lot of people know exists, and I don't know if it's everywhere around the country. So when I first moved out to Boston, when I first started travel nursing, I also thought I was going to have to do night shift, but I got lucky. My first travel gig during the pandemic, I was able to land a 48-hour week contract doing mid-shifts. So my shift was 3:00 PM to 3:30 AM. So that's where my— when I say that that's kind of where I push, that's where my limit is, is like 3 o'clock. That's because that's the truth. I would be able on the days that I would work, and mind you, I was doing 4 days a week, which was not the most fun, but I would be able to get off at 3:30, be home and sleeping by like 4:30 at the latest and then still be able to get up and like go to the gym by noon and still kind of have a day. So that's again where I push it. But anyways, what I was saying, when I moved to Boston and I got a job in Boston, I went to the surgical ICU and the job that I took was a rotating day and night position. And I was like, oh my God, I just don't wanna do this. But I had had this idea that I was gonna go to CRNA school and it was this whole thing. It's like, So I was like, well, if I want to go to CRNA school and I really need this, you know, I wanted the surgical ICU experience. I specifically wanted to work at this hospital in the surgical ICU. That's what I'm saying. I didn't really give myself too many options. I kind of cornered myself into this job and I took it. But when I started, and here's the thing, I trained on days. I did maybe a week or two of training on nights, which I had to power through. It was so miserable. Oh my gosh. I don't know how people do it. You are all angels. And don't let me, don't let me feed you full of compliments and make you feel good about it if you're miserable. Girl, if you're miserable, get off of the night shift. Get out of there. So when I was at this job, they, somebody had mentioned to me, or I had seen through like the schedule or the workflow, that there were people who only worked weekends. And so that's what I did because I worked every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. And that meant that I could work days. It was a weekend-only position. So I was able to get out of my rotating job, didn't have to work nights, and I worked every Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Now, major cons to that. It's really hard to schedule vacations and stack your shifts and work like 6 in a row so that you can, you know, go travel without having to take a bunch of PTO because you are working a very consistent schedule. And so that part was hard. And then I also didn't love having to work the 3 days in a row every week because especially working on the inpatient side and ICU, That meant I had the same patients Friday through Sunday, and that can be a very good thing or that can be a really terrible thing. And you all know what I'm talking about. If you get the wrong assignment on Friday, man, you are stuck with that until Sunday and it is rough. And I was newer, so I typically just did not have a great assignment. I hated it. Oh my gosh, I hated it. I tried to have a good mindset and good attitude. It was just, it was terrible. Granted, I did not last at that job very long. I ended up going back to the emergency room. But my point in telling you that story is that was my way Out of the night shift. That was my way around it. It was a loophole in the system to not have to rotate days and nights because that is terrible. And I don't know how any of you do that. Night shift alone is terrible. I don't know how any of you rotate days to nights. Like, how do you constantly flip your brain that way? It's not natural. And that's why a lot of night shift nurses end up having health problems or You know, having things happen to them that are not ideal because it is not normal to work night shift. Some of the nurses will tell me that they've been in like 5 car accidents on their way home because they commute from Maine to Boston and they're exhausted and there's weather and all these things going on you need to be alert for. And after you've just worked your 3rd night shift in a row and you're driving from Boston to Maine to go home, like, hello, like the likelihood of you getting in an accident is so high. It's like Probably the equivalent of being drunk. I'm serious, this stuff is crazy. I am a huge and major advocate for getting off the night shift if you can. And again, I get it, there are some people out there who choose the night shift. They love it, it is their vibe, they don't want any part of the day shift. They would tell me that I'm crazy for working day shift, and that's okay. That's what makes this world and this nursing healthcare world go round, is there are people who will do the night shift, there are people who would will do the day shift, and then there are the people who will do the mid-shift and get the best of both worlds. I'm just telling you, for my nurses out there, for those of you who were like, girl, the struggle bus is real, this night shift is taking years off my life, I feel like I've gained weight, I can't get into the gym, I can't eat right when I'm up all night, I just am snacking, my caffeine intake is through the roof, my relationships are struggling, I have no motivation, I feel depressed. You're not alone, okay? That is— I'm telling you, you are normal, because it is not normal for us to be awake like that. So have some grace for yourself. And if it is something that is taking that big of a toll on you, girl, you've got to prioritize yourself first, okay? You cannot take care of these patients if you are not okay yourself. And I know that that is so cliché, but it is the damn truth. And unfortunately, working the night shift is like a one-way ticket to just To doom. And again, I am not talking to you if you're— if you are the night shift nurse or healthcare worker or whatever field you work in. If it works for you and you're thriving, love that for you. I'm talking to those of us who really struggle through this. It's hard. And if you are listening and you are somebody who works night shift and you thrive, maybe give us some feedback, give us some tips and tricks. And how do we help people who are stuck on the night shift for a while? How do we help them through this? And I am very— I say stuck lightly. I don't think you're ever stuck, but if you're doing it for a purpose, if you're trying to get into CRNA school or you really want this experience in the unit that you're on, and you know after you're there for a year you'll start going to day shift and you just have to stick through it, I feel you. I hear you. I really do. And sometimes we do have to just go through things that are like less than ideal to get to the other side, to get that reward, to get that experience that we want. And I totally understand that. But if you don't really love the job and the night shift is killing you slowly, Girl, we've got to make some changes. And that's what I'm telling you. Like, there's ways around this. The next way around it, which is— I love this. I love this option. And you know who I talked to this about is hospice nurse Julie. We talked about working per diem or part-time. But per diem really is amazing. And again, this is kind of dependent on the facility and the healthcare institution that you work for. But per diem is the ultimate flexibility, man. Like, first of all, you work whatever shifts you want. And again, I get it. There's some things that deter people from taking this route, such as finances or the stability and the assurance of the hours that you get. In my experience, if you work per diem, there's not typically a shortage of hours, but I do understand the need for stability. I understand if you have kids to support or you have a family that you're supporting or aging parents, or you really need the money for yourself because you're in debt or whatever it is, like, hello, we all need money. I understand the need for that stability and to not have to stress about it. But if you're asking me a way around night shift, per diem status is the way. And don't talk to me about benefits, okay? There are ways around benefits too. You can do your own retirement. There are ways to get insurance on your own. So if that's the only reason keeping you in a full-time position that you're working night shift that you can't stand, I'm telling you, there are ways around this. There are ways to invest and to Save for retirement and to get healthcare benefits without having to be in a full-time job. Okay, yeah, you might have to jump through some hoops. You may have to do some research. It might not be as good, but to me, quality of life trumps everything. Like my quality of life in the way that I feel every single day. Okay, not every single day, most days, majority of the time. The way that I feel majority of the time matters way more to me than the title of my job, and it took me some time to get there again. As I pointed out, there were times in my career where I was accepting the night shift. When I was a new grad, I thought I would be working night shift. I was accepting it. When I got that job in the surgical ICU, I took a rotating day and night position and I was accepting it. But at this point in my career, at this point in my life, I refuse. I absolutely refuse. Again, if it came down to the wire of me being homeless or having to pay my bills, I would work the night shift. But I'm telling you, it would not come down to that point. And I, I just know that. Uh, in my bones. I just know that as fact, uh, that there are ways around this. Also, this is a total side note. I don't know if I said this. I'm recording in my room. There's no Club Nurse sign behind me. I am in the midst of moving, so my apartment is in array— disarray. Okay, it is chaotic in here. It is not giving aesthetically pleasing. So I thought, well, the lighting here is good next to my window, and you get some blurry background of my pillows and fake plants on the wall. And my beautiful vein that you could sink a 14-gauge into. All right, I think that I kind of covered my thoughts on how to get around night shift. So let's recap this a little bit. So the first way to avoid night shift is to be more open to jobs. The more specific and particular that you are about the type of job that you want, the more likely that you may have to just work nights for a certain amount of time until you get enough seniority or until you've been there for X amount of time to where you can work the day shift. But the more open you are, The higher likelihood that you can get a job that you're not stuck working night shift. The second way is see if your facility has a weekend option only. And these are, I think, a little bit more rare. Obviously it's a little bit more of a difficult route to it, but you never know. I mean, look into it. It might be a thing. I know that there are hospital systems out there that offer weekend-only positions that are day shift and a way to get out of the nights. And I did that. And also, I forgot to make the side note on that. I also got paid a lot more money. I think that my— the— yes, it was $16.

$16.

1-6 extra per hour to do that. So I was off night shift and I got a $16 differential to work every single weekend. And I know that for a lot of you, that's probably like, ew, no thank you. But it works for some people. And also the commute. If you live in a city, the commute on Saturday and Sunday, you can't beat it. And there's also no management or administration. On Saturday and Sunday, and that's 66% of your shifts. Another way around the night shift, and this is mostly for my ER people out there, my ER nurses, try to get a mid-shift position. Best of both worlds. You don't have to stay there all night, but, and I will say mid-shift is very busy. You typically hit the ground running and you're usually busy throughout your whole shift, but mid-shift is one of my favorites. So if I, if I had the option, I would go mid-shift over night shift any day. That way you're still functioning on a semi-normal schedule. And the last thing was work per diem. It's an amazing way to get flexibility, have control over your life. And like I said, there's ways around the benefits, there's ways around the retirement. I understand the stability and the, the security of having a full-time job, but you asked for the ways around night shift and that's what I gave you. I don't know if you asked, but I'm giving it to you anyways. Because I feel like this is something that I wish I had heard as a new nurse was Do I have to work night shift? Is this something that I have to do forever, or is this just like an initiation into the field, is having to just work night shift? And there's pros, there really are pros to night shift, and there are people out there who will tell you that you should do it, you should start on the night shift. The pace is a little bit easier to learn, especially on the inpatient side. It's an easier environment to kind of slow down and get your bearings and collect yourself and learn how to function as a nurse. I do appreciate that, but it's not impossible. I'm telling you, it is not impossible to start as a new grad on day shift in an ER, in an ICU, on a med surg, on labor and delivery, on OR, PACU, pre-op, whatever it is that your specialty is, it's possible. All right. So I think that's a wrap on this week's episode. Thank you so much for being here. If you're looking for any nurse news, be sure to check out nurse.org/news. There are so many articles there for you to go through on the most up-to-date and breaking news in the nursing and healthcare world. Again, my name is Colton. Find me on Instagram @coltonallenlord or @nursecolton. Find me on TikTok @nursecolton. I have been a little bit slower or a little bit less on my socials lately. Just been dealing a lot with a lot, a lot, a lot on my plate. I'm in the middle of moving. Just a lot of stress and things going on in life like you, like you, like me. We're all in the same boat. It's rough out here and sometimes we just can't show up like we want to. But anyway, thank you for being here. I hope that you found some, some kind of benefit or nugget in this episode. And if you did, please share this with somebody that may be also struggling with night shift, or maybe there's a new nurse out there who would benefit from listening to this episode. All right. Thank you for being here at Club Nurse. I'll see you guys next time. Bye. From the bottom of my heart, I wanted to thank you for being here at Club Nurse.

I hope you gained something valuable From today's episode, and if you did, remember to share this episode with someone that you love. Follow me on socials at Nurse Daddies or Colton Lord 17, and be sure to follow nurse.org to stay informed with all of the hottest healthcare topics. Until next time, take care of yourself the way you take care of everyone else.

Love ya.

Bye.