nagalit ang patay sa haba ng lamay : FAQs on this OFW & night shift, the last nine years

[ A very light-hearted title, tongue in cheek of course. Paumanhin (apologies) to any sensitivities I might have offended. thanks and acknowledgment to webastion.wordpress.com for the awesome pic!] IT’S NOT CALLED Windy Wellington for nothing,  with Storm Signal No. 1 winds (60 to 90 kph) here as common as an overcast, matrapik day. If anything a more accurate name for my adopted city is Chilly Wellington. The vivacious weather girl forecasts 9 to 15 minimum maximum temperature for the weekend, but the wind chill factor makes it feel far colder than that, closer to 6 to 8 in the deepest of night, mahigit kumulang. Enter your Loyal kabayan Blogger’s secret weapon, hot, steaming showers come in, warming you up on the inside and outside, unclogging your arteries and veins, opening up those bara-bara  (fluid retention) in your arthritic joints and ligaments, and extending your waking hours until you’re ready to finish the shift. In fact, hot hot showers are my solution to almost anything: sore muscles and gouty ankles? Hot showers dissolve the lactic acid buildup and gout crystals if you’re patient enough, and no one else has queued up to use the shower. Can’t get rid of the cobwebs in your brain and had a little too much of the amber bottle last night? Again, hot showers will take care of your sluggishness almost instantly, not too hot though, baka matanggal na’ng balat mo. Feeling lazy and uninspired for the day’s labor? A few minutes of nearly steaming ablution will do wonders, and you’ll be raring to go as soon as you dry yourself from the droplets of vapor, which are gonna slide off you in the cold air anyway. **********          **********          ********** A word of caution though. One thing the hot hot shower WON’T cure, in my years as an OFW here, is a chronic lack of sleep, which is defined as a deficiency in zzzz’s from a few days to God forbid, a few weeks, after which you had better see a doctor to find out what’s wrong with you kabayan. A totally different case or situation however is when we suffer or endure lack of sleep because it’s the nature of the job and part of the hazards of the job, usually brought about by shift work, specifically night shift or extended shift work. **********          **********          ********** Ironic, but in a way I prepared myself for shift work in my last job back home in the Philippines, working in an outbound call center. Because we had to call during the day, US time (Eastern, Central and Pacific times) our work needed to be done at night in the Philippines, that’s when the money was made in the form of questions answered and surveys filled. But I was younger then, so much younger than today, the desk work of call centers wasn’t too strenuous (although ubos lagi laway mo), and the physical nature of my present job makes shift work a little more stressful. Coupled with the fact that it’s no longer practical for me to leave my work now, and you can see why I have made working at nights second nature. I’ve divided myself between interviewer Noel and interviewee Noel to share with you my answers to FAQs or frequently asked questions about night shift and the OFW, specifically me. I assume you compensate for not sleeping at night with sleeping during the day. Are these the same? Yes and no. I have to explain that wishy-washy (neither here nor there) answer. First, I’m fortunate in that I only do night shift every third week, or roughly once a month. If ever I don’t get quality sleep because I turn my sleep cycle around, I go back to normal after one week. Secondly, I have found that as long as you keep your sleep location as dark as possible, keep your sleep uninterrupted and compensate with healthy food and drink, I strongly believe your body will adjust. But that’s just me. Can you relate regular night shift to your general state of health? Again, I have to qualify. If, even before you’ve engaged yourself to work nights, and more nights the rest of your natural life, you’ve been smoking like a chimney, drinking like a fish, and consuming processed food, sugar and trans-fat like you owned a Seven-Eleven (which btw doesn’t exist in New Zealand), now, how in your opinion would working night shifts make it any worse? On the other hand, if you’ve generally kept yourself fit and healthy with good nutrition and exercise, kept yourself well-maintained by staying away from vice, stress and the wear and tear of strenuous work, then if you compensate for regular shift work by resting on the weekends, drink more liquids and avoiding depending on alcohol to sleep, I doubt if you’ll be bothered too much by night shift, assuming you enjoy the work, which brings my interviewing self to… Can you catch up on sleep by regularly taking a beer or two, or a glass of wine? I know this sounds like a trick question, because so many people I know, including myself, use a beer or glass of wine to help go to sleep, especially when it’s broad daylight outside and you’re going back to work in less than 12 hours. OF COURSE you can, but drinker beware. A glass or two doesn’t sound like much, in fact it helps with the drowsiness and sends you to dreamland oftener than not. But (1) you learn to depend on it, paano na kung naubos ang alak? and (2) alcohol has been known to disrupt the regular light and deep sleep patterns that regulate our rest. In simplest terms, you can almost bet that when I’m forced to take two Heinekens or Asahi’s, I WILL fall asleep, but in less than three hours I’m inexplicably awake, admittedly it’s also because I need to go relieve myself or because I’m too warm; in any case I’m usually back to square one, because I can’t go back to sleep again. In the meantime, I can’t use alcohol again (facepalm). Too much na. Last question Noel. Does shift work make you age faster? To be blunt, does shift work make you feel older? Please forgive the ambiguity of my answers Precious Reader / kabayan, but if you believe in mind over matter, it’s all a matter of perspective. If you think that after a long night shift, coming in at dark and finishing in the  brightest of day, you still retain your sunny disposition, if you convince yourself that as long as your work provides for family, provides for your basic needs and you make a contribution to society, then anything else is worth your while including working while everyone else sleeps. Attitude wins over the day, anytime and everytime. I may feel old and wasted some of the time after night shift, but feeling good about myself more than makes up for it. Thank you interviewer Noel, muchas gracias interviewee Noel, and maraming salamat, Precious Reader. Mabuhay!