Re: Body cycles and night shift?

I can totally feel for you. I am a night person and I have always worked in the evening or very late night and when I switched to a job where I had to be at work at 6am, I spent 2 years being tired all the time because I could never get to sleep early.

I don't believe that all people are meant to sleep at night. Both my boyfriend and I are night people and we both function better being up at night and sleeping during the day. I think that it is completely individual.

I think it is better to go with the rhythm for your body and it sounds like working at night may not be the best for you, so hopefully you will be able to change at some point.

Also, it can take about 3 weeks for your body to get used to a new schedule. A couple of things that can help are melatonin supplementation when it is time for you to sleep and 20 minutes under a sun lamp when you wake up or going outside upon waking if there is still enough sun.

As I often wake up in the middle of the afternoon, I use the sun lamp when I get up and it helps a lot and also burns off the melatonin in your system to help you wake up and not feel groggy. I mostly do this during the winter months though, as there is usually still ample sun in the summer and I just go outside for a bit when I wake up.

Hope you are able to find something that works for you while you are obliged to work this schedule.