How to Form Habits or Patterns to Make Adjusting to Night Shift Easier
The transition from working a traditional shift to working the night shift can be difficult. You have to get used to sleeping during the day, adjusting your regular eating and exercise routines, and staying alert when every part of your body is telling you it’s time to sleep.
While the challenges of adjusting to the night shift can be overwhelming, they are a lot easier if you start embracing new habits.
Forming new sleeping, eating, and exercising habits can help you get used to the night shift in no time and help you maintain your sanity if you start to feel burned out.
Here are a few tips to help you form healthy habits when you switch to working nights:
Understanding How Habits are Formed
When a behavior is habitual, it means that you have done it so regularly that it is now automatic.
Sometimes we form habits without even thinking. Have you ever made the wrong turn on a street when you’re headed somewhere new because you are used to turning in the opposite direction every time you reach that area? That’s because you’ve turned so many times that you don’t even think about it when you get to the end of that street. Even though you likely didn’t set out to create that habit, it has become a pattern for you.
While many habits are developed unintentionally, like in the previous example, there are ways for us to deliberately create habits to help us meet our goals.
Habits are formed through repetition and triggers.
For instance, even after they change their layout, you might still always head left when you enter a grocery store because that is normally where they kept their produce. The repeated action of entering the store and heading left causes your body to automatically want to head left when it sees the double doors of the grocery store.
You can create your own habits by focusing on three things: a cue, a repeatable action, and a reward.
For example, if you want to start making your bed every morning, you can use your alarm as a cue, making your bed as your repeated action, and the dopamine increase that comes from the satisfaction of completing a task as your reward. If you immediately get up and make your bed every day when you hear your alarm, you will eventually start to do this each day without thinking.
Using Habits to Make the Night Shift Easier
When you work the night shift, there are a few habits that can make transitioning to these unconventional work hours a lot easier.
Here are some habits that you should consider adopting:
Prepping Your Meals
If you get in the habit of meal prepping once or twice a week, it will allow you to maintain healthy eating habits and avoid getting into the routine of eating fast food or vending machine snacks during your shift.
Pick a day that is convenient for you and always meal prep on this day, preferably at the same time. If you know that every Sunday after you eat dinner with your family, you are going to prepare meals for the week, you will eventually make this a habit- one that your body will thank you for!
Completing a Bedtime Routine
When the night shift has your circadian rhythm all out of whack, it can be a challenge to fall asleep at night. When you’re not getting enough sleep, you will feel fatigued throughout the day and have trouble focusing during your shift.
You can help combat this by adopting a bedtime routine. If you complete the same actions in the same order at the same time before bed, your body will eventually start to feel tired when you start your bedtime routine, which will help you fall asleep faster.
Whether your routine involves reading, brushing your teeth, laying out your clothes for the next day, journaling, or meditating, incorporating specific, calming actions into a bedtime routine will help you adjust to your new sleep schedule.
Exercising Daily
Exercising provides a lot of mental and physical health benefits, especially for those who work the night shift. Daily exercise can improve your quality of sleep, help you stay in good spirits, and decrease your risk for serious health conditions. As such, you want to make exercise a priority.
However, when you sleep during the day, your traditional exercise routine might not be feasible. Find the best time for you to exercise with your new schedule, preferably not right before bed, and try to exercise at this same time each and every day without fail. Before long, it will be a habit that will help you stay in shape and fight against some of the negative effects of working nights.
Night Shift Nutrition is a community focused on living your best life, while working nights. We do this by sharing our experiences and science based educations. The point is to not only survive working nights but to thrive! If this sounds like something you’d like to be a part of you can apply to join our facebook group or subscribe to our email list.
