What are your experiences working overnight?

You will become acutely aware of how many people do construction or yard work just as you're about to fall asleep. The first time I did graveyard the manager for my department mentioned he'd just read a study showing that every 5 years of night shift takes 6 months off of your life. Some people seem to manage fine but I always spent like a full day sleeping at the end of the work week just trying to catch up and have never eaten more fast food in my life, even with a physically intensive job I was still gaining weight.

When I worked overnights, I first tried a work-night/sleep-morning-afternoon/errands-evening thing. It was a bad idea, I was dead tired at the end of every shift. Then I switched to a work-night/errand-morning/sleep-afternoon-evening schedule and felt a lot better.

The hardest part is going to be maintaining any sort of family or social life. I couldn't handle that so I went back to days despite the reduced pay. But maybe it could work for you in your own particular circumstances.

I worked graveyard at a convenience store. It was kind of my dream job. Just don’t do meth.

I stopped calling myself a young person when I worked nights. I had no choice but to take the night job, but I wish I didnt

I long for the sun

four overnights will prematurely age you as much as smoking 3 packs a day. you'll look like someone your age did in 1978. don't do it unless it's for an implausible amount of money

I've always been a night owl and loved working overnights. Most places are much quieter and you're able to get so such more done without the big wigs looking over your shoulder the entire shift.

I did 3-4 nights a week anywhere between 6 pm and 6 am (til the job was done, basically) for like 4 years in my early to mid 20s. It was fine other than the one semester I took a morning class that met twice a week. I remember basically nothing from that semester, wasn't sleeping for more than 4 hours at a time except on weekends sometimes.

I'm still babyfaced and everyone seems to assume I'm somewhere between 18 and 22 so idk.

I'd get black out curtains and a sleep mask to make sleeping in the day easier but other than that I've got no complaints.

Overnight work isn't healthy. I've had several years of my working life where I did night shifts and it was absolutely destructive to my mental health. If you're young and a night owl, I'd say give it a shot but understand that you shouldn't do it long term.

Edit: I should say that one of the biggest challenges with night shift is maintaining a balanced and healthy lifestyle. It requires a lot of discipline, otherwise you will easily find yourself adopting bad habits. Things like eating tons of fast food because that's all thats open during your commute, etc. Socially you can find yourself struggling too, when everyone else is out while you're sleeping or working. If you can maintain the levels of discipline needed to eat healthy, get sleep, and meet your social needs, then its doable.

I did overnights a long time ago while going to school full time during the day. Do not do this. You will slowly deteriorate, with schoolwork suffering first.

I worked overnights at a group home and it was pretty easy for the most part. It's not great for your social life though.

It sucks, but there are upsides as well. My advice is it’s worth doing a tiny bit just for the experience and padding out your work history, but don’t stay long unless you absolutely have to.

I did it for a month before finding a better daytime job. It’s sucked watching the sun come up during my lunch break.

Going home to sleep on bright sunny mornings WAs impossible too, even though I had a quite blacked out bedroom.

I had a choice between second shift and third shift (overnights) and given those two options, I did the overnight for about a year until I got a promotion. Given the choice again, I'd do it all over again. Second shift is the worst. I don't know if that's your choice, but it was mine. I was able to get a lot of "official" stuff done right after work during the day when I needed to, was able to go out with my friends in the evenings that worked banker hours as well.

Long term, I know there are health risks shown in studies, but my dad did third shift for decades and I think it started to affect his mental health a bit (he was very happy to retire). But he actually got physically healthier as time went on during work. Lost weight by controlling his diet, starting taking up biking. Now that he's retired, he seems like any other man his age, looks younger, but I think that's just genetic more than anything. So, sample size of one, but the health effects may be manageable by still getting your eight hours of sleep a day (he was huge on this) and keeping yourself healthy in other ways.

But, as a short term thing, I found it OK. If you need to do it for a year or two, I think you can manage if you're being conscious about your decisions, which it sounds like you are.

I work security at a casino. It can get a little wild sometimes. Usually I just kick out addicts of one flavor or another though.