I’ve worked 2nd (afternoon), swing (evening), and 3rd (overnight) shifts for the majority of my life. I recently moved into a training position where I’m Monday through Friday, 8am to ~5:30pm (I get OT while I’m cleaning up and writing reports).
As much as the 2nd/swing/3rd shifts screw with your life in other ways, the difficulty in scheduling any kind of life services outside of working hours is maddening. Doctor’s appointment? Nope. DMV? Maybe Saturday, if you’re lucky. Chaperone your kids field trip? Hahahhah no.
I don’t want to burn sick time for a doctor’s appointment (I need to save those for when my kid is actually sick), and I sure as hell don’t want to use up a “vacation” day for it. How tf are you supposed to get anything done?
I don’t have kids so I just work like 6-2 and the occasional weekend in order to keep afternoons open. It also helps that I’m basically unsupervised and nobody really keeps track of what I’m doing. Maybe once every six weeks I intentionally work like 4 hours on a Saturday and make a big fucking deal about it to give the perception that I am both busy and productive.
Yeah, I’ve done early morning shifts like that before. I loved being done so early in the afternoon, but I’m a night owl and always had trouble going to sleep / waking up on time. I can do it for about 2 weeks before I crash out lol