Surprise Night Shifts!

Surprise, Mr. FreeCompliments, you're doing 2 weeks of nights shifts now!

One of my colleague's father passed away, and this colleague was scheduled to be on 2 weeks of night shifts in the medical intensive care unit (MICU). Obviously, in light of these circumstances, he requested a lighter rotation so that he could take care of all the business involved - plus have time to grieve.

Requests for help tend to be directed at those who are most reliable, but I'll be fair to my program: they went to everyone else before they asked me for help. Others just simply aren't willing to lose their easy rotation to cover 2 weeks of night-time shifts in the ICU. I understand that, and I was somewhat reluctant, especially given the recent health problems with my Grandmother AND Mother.

However, I'm Mr. Reliable, and I've worked around these issues before. I can do it again.

Hence, I took the night shifts.

It's likely not going to be very good for my mental or physical health. This I already know - the kinds of shifts I'm doing aren't regular working hours. Humans aren't designed to work these types of hours for an extended period of time; burnout is virtually inevitable. At least I'm just off of a "vacation" (in quotes because this barely felt like one), so the chances of burnout are going to reduced.

Fortunately, I'll get compensated for this. Maybe it will be enough for me to send my Mother on a nice cruise later in the year when her recovery improves - she definitely deserves it.