Of absenteeism

Last summer, the night shift got together and decided that we wanted a set schedule. Let me explain. Working nights is not like working days. I can't work one on, one off, etc. I will die. When my schedule is the same every week, I work two on, five off. The first day home after working, I just sleep. I get up some time in the late afternoon and pretend I don't feel like death. Then, I try to go to bed at a decent time and lay there half the night wide awake, still feeling like death, knowing that I'm gonna have to get up and take care of kids in...three hours now. The next day, I feel mighty crappy, but try very hard to get something done around the house. Day three is usually better, but still tired. Day four, I'm starting to perk up a bit. Day five is when I feel my best, but then I have to sleep all afternoon because I have to go back to work that night. Anyway, I never get any good sleep, but it's doable.

Now, after we had done the set schedule thing for a few months, one of our nurses decided that it wasn't fair that she wasn't working any weekends (because you make more money on the weekends). Technically, it says in our contract that everyone is supposed to work every other weekend. So we had to do away with the schedule and rearrange everyone. Then, I went to working one on, three off, one on, two off, two on, two off....etc. I wanted to die. Without a set schedule, I pretty much spend every day in either day one or day two mode. I always feel awful, and I never get anything done. And then, the holidays rolled around, and people had requested vacation time (oh, and that particular nurse who was not happy quit), and a few more people quit, so they rearranged our schedule again to fill the needs. Which, by the way, was extremely unsuccessful. We spent more than one night two or even three nurses short. (PS I would like to apologize to anyone who had a baby during the last two months because I'm sure they didn't get nearly as good a care as any of us would have liked due to the shortages.)

So basically what this means is that I've had no real sleep for months, and my blog has taken the back burner in a major way. We're back to a semi-set schedule now, and I'm hoping it stays that way. There's talk about not allowing people to take vacation time during the days they usually work because it messes up everyone else's schedule so badly. Not that they wouldn't be able to take those days off, but they'd have to use PTO, and the hospital would need to find someone to come in extra to cover the shift. Or we could switch shifts with another willing nurse.

If you didn't read my entire rant, I'm sure you're not the only one. Just don't be upset with me if I (A) don't answer your calls in the middle of the day, or (B) growl over the phone, or (C) answer the phone strangely, agree to things, and never follow through (because I'm talking in my sleep).