I'm in a very, very fortunate position in that not only have I almost done four decades of shift work, but I have coached hundreds of shift workers as well, and what this has done has given me great insight into how shift workers self-sabotage and cause a lot of their own problems around shift work and they just give up. But in today's episode I'm going to discuss how you, the shift worker, can thrive and not just survive. Shift work can be brutal, but it doesn't have to be Welcome to a healthy shift. My name is Roger Sutherland, certified Nutritionist, veteran Law Enforcement Officer and 24-7 shift worker for almost four decades. Through this podcast, I aim to educate shift workers, using evidence-based methods, to not only survive the rigors of shift work, but thrive. My goal is to empower shift workers to improve their health and well-being so they have more energy to do the things they love. Enjoy today's show. Hello, and welcome back to another episode of a healthy shift podcast. I welcome you and thank you for listening. I am ever so grateful that you have tuned into this episode while you are either driving to or from your shift working job or you are out enjoying a walk in between your shifts.
Speaker 1In this podcast, we dive deep into the evidence-based strategies for thriving in shift work environments. I'm your host, roger Sutherland, and today I would just like to talk about whether you can in fact thrive and not just survive in a shift working. Well, and what I am going to say from the very outset is this not only do I believe that you can, but I absolutely stand behind it and I'm also testimony to it to myself. Now I do want to say this also If there's one thing that we can see on social media, or if you ask any doctor, professor, scientist or anything around shift work whether it's good or bad for you, they will absolutely say that shift work is bad. And there is no argument that shift work is bad for you if you don't know the best way to go about it. And the reason why I can say this today is because research is very new in this area. When I say new, I'm talking the last 30 or 40 years maximum.
Speaker 1Now, a lot of the research that's been conducted has been conducted retrospectively, and it's also been conducted on people who are not shift workers, who have been just taken off the street, put into a trial and forced to stay awake overnight, and that doesn't work for people All right. So we need to make sure that we're using actual shift workers that are adapted to rotating schedules and shifts, and I'm convinced that over a journey your body learns to adapt to those sort of that timing as well. I'm testimony to that and I'm convinced of it. Now, a lot of research that's been conducted and considering that, a lot of the research that's got a lot stronger is literally only in the last five to 10 years or so has been conducted prior to any education. Now I'm here to break the research down as it is released and because I'm purely, I'm truly blessed to be in a position where I have done almost four decades of shift work. I'm able to literally have a look at what the research tells us and then realistically apply that into a 24 seven shift working environment what would work and what wouldn't.
Speaker 1It's no good actually having someone who's studied shift work but never done it. It's no good having someone who lives with a shift worker and thinks they get it but they don't, because you don't actually work it. But when you've worked it, and worked it for an extended period of time, you really do know, understand and empathize with people as to what shift work and working. Shift work is like Now. I'm here for it and what I'm doing is I'm trying to put out as much education around the best possible way to go about doing night shift. There is and for you it's not pills. You don't take a shift work pill that fixes it. And truly to be truly to explain one thing to you, is the good thing, the really good thing about a lot of the strategies around shift work are free, and I will go into all of those strategies today to help you to adapt a lot better to shift work if you are prepared to just do a little bit of work around it. Now we're learning strategies from the shift work which I can actually apply into the shift working environment to help you.
Speaker 1I've done it. I know what it's like, I know the feelings and there's nothing that you could realistically tell me about shift work, as in doing shift work, that I don't already know. I've dealt with it through all the decades. I've gone through all the different rotations of rosters and how that all works and what we do. I've worked predominantly nights. I've worked rotating shifts. I've worked the whole lot. I get it. I know I've done the quick shifts, the quick changeovers, the twilight shifts, disco shifts, the whole lot. I've done all of that. So you can't really come at me and say you don't know what you're talking about, because I literally have been there All right.
Speaker 1Now let's just stop for one second and have a look, because everybody at their workplace has that one person that they look at and they are literally thriving. They come in and they bounce, they're bouncing around work, they've got tremendous bodies, figures, they look really well, they're happy, they're upbeat, they're upbeat, they're about. You know that they've been for a run or a gym session or they walk or ride, or they do jujitsu or they're doing whatever they're doing, and they're up and about and they're happy. They're happy at home, they're happy at work and they're in good shape and they're healthy. You know the person because, as I'm saying this, this person has already come to your mind.
Speaker 1Now, you may be that person, which is the very reason why you'll listen to this podcast, because you're a health-seeking individual but if you're not that person and you're looking for answers, have a look at what the person that I'm talking about is doing in your workplace, because they're doing the same job, they're doing the same shifts. And do they have bad days? Absolutely they do, but what defines them and makes them different is how they respond to that, and then the strategies that they have in place as their pillars that they can fall back on whenever they hit a hurdle. And this is the issue that you may not have in place in your life, and this comes from building habits and routines over time. Now, we always get thrown curveballs in a shift-working environment, whether it's been over time or whether we've had major incidents that we've had to attend or we've been called into work or whatever it is. We do have those incidents, but the good thing, or the one thing that that person that we were talking about has in place, is they have solid pillars of health in place that they can fall back on. That will actually stand them in really good stead, because it's no good having a tired, stressed and fatigued body and then having to deal with a major incident because your body literally will not cope with it. Now they have kids and they have a husband or a wife and they're still thriving. So why is that? And that's something that you've got to have a look at and you can have a conversation with them, because there's one thing that is not scary and, unfortunately, generally they're the sort of person that can't help themselves but tell you all about what it is they're doing and how they're going about it.
Speaker 1But what you can do is find out where they started. What did they do to really start? One thing that they do do is they are very, very well prepared. They're prepared, they know a routine for a day shift. They know a routine for a night shift, they know a routine for an afternoon shift. They know a routine for a disco shift. They know, and have, a routine for a swing shift. Your planning starts the shift before, and that's something that's very important for you to remember to get yourself positioned right to launch into the next shift, instead of waking up and crawling across the floor and wondering why nothing's working for you. But it works for Jenny from the office. They have good routines and really good structures in place.
Speaker 1They move daily. Now, when I say move daily, what does that mean? And we'll talk about that in a little while as to what moving daily actually means. And moving isn't just getting out of bed, right? That's not considered moving, all right, I say that tongue-in-cheek. Of course, we need to get out early in the light and we need to walk or we need to just get some form of movement into our body, and whatever your jam is, do that, whether it's Pilates, or whether it's yoga, or whether it's resistance training or swimming or whatever. Those things are all the things that we need to be doing for movement, and I'm going to touch on that one again a little bit later on.
Speaker 1But what these people do is they focus on all the pillars of health and I call them my five pillars of health because they're the five things that I focus on with clients to make sure that they are really nailing, because it makes such a difference in their life. And let's start with number one, and that is sleep. Sleep must be a priority and it must be a priority in your life. At all times. You need to make sure that you're not doing anything other than focusing on getting to bed and getting to sleep. Sleep actually has so many health impacts. It's not just so that we're not tired. It literally has huge impacts on our life, and I won't go into that. I've covered that in so many different podcasts. But sleep is imperative and you can't say I will, I'll sleep when I'm dead, because you're literally killing yourself by not getting it.
The next one believe it or not is very simple, and that's hydration. We need to make sure that we have high hydration at all times, particularly as a shift worker, more so than normal. And the reason why we need to have higher hydration is because of the circadian misalignment that digestive tract can become very clogged up, very confused as to what's going on, but that hydration is what helps to keep everything moving through it as well. It also supports and assists with moving bacteria and toxins that our body is cleaning out of our system. It helps to move that on and actually get rid of it as well. So it really does strongly support our immune system. Hydration as well, and also some of the reasons why we think we're hungry as well and we always feel like we need sweet treats and to snack, can literally be dehydration. It comes from the same center in the brain and it can be a very confused signal. Our brain is not that smart and it can be a very, very confused signal as to whether it's either hungry or thirsty, and you can find sometimes, in fact, a lot of the time instead of being hungry, if you have a big glass of water, you can actually find that that will satisfy your hunger as well. So just keep that in mind.
Speaker 1Nutrition is the next pillar, number three, and one of the things that we've got to focus on there is just focus on food. Just focus on getting nutritious food. Don't worry about macro counting and containers of this and containers of that. Make yourself up stews and curries and soups and things like that, things that you can just get nutritious food in, because don't worry about the contents of it. Just get nutritious food, because all of the nutrients that are coming in, all those different foods that you're getting, the vegetables and proteins that are in it, nuts and seeds and things like that, are going to make such a big difference to your health all around and it will make a huge difference.
Speaker 1Movements, the next thing. Movement is something that we just need to do, and it can literally be as simple as walking around the block Get up, get out in the early light and move. And the last one that I focus on is stress and managing your stress. As shift workers, particularly those in frontline health or first responders, we need to manage this stress. We can't live in this sympathetic state that a lot of us are living in all the time because our body is keeping the score and it will shut us down. Make my words all right Now.
Speaker 1What I want to make a point of with all of this is these things are all free. They don't come in a bottle, they don't come in a jar. You don't have to go anywhere to get them. Sleep, hydration, nutrition, movement and stress are all things that have little strategies that you can do, that are free, and that is really important to note. So, while everyone's scrolling the internet looking for the secret pill, herb spice strategy, keto carnivore this is the diet to go with low carb. Do whatever you want to do. The bottom line is you've just got to focus on all these five things. They're all free, and that will help you in absolutely. These become the pillars that will hold you up in your shift working life. Now, these things that they focus on are all free, and if they can do this, then you can do this as well. But it's important to note that those people at your work that are thriving, they did not start thriving. What they've done is they've put a little habit in place, they've started working towards it and then they've continually built upon that until such time as they have absolutely crushed it and they've absolutely nailed it, and then they move on to the next. All or nothing will always end up as nothing.
Speaker 1Now I want to move on to the next topic, because this is the one that upsets me the most of all, and that is that shift workers are chronic self-sabotages and we are, and I think if you really stood in the mirror and had a look at yourself, you would realize that you are self-sabotaging yourself with a lot of things that you're doing as well. We don't prioritize sleep enough. We come home, we fiddle around, we do this, we do that. We're not. Sleep is important. We need to get to sleep. It's not that we can go through whole days on quick changeovers or recovery days or things like that without sleeping. We need to prioritize it and make it the most important thing in the world as a shift worker because of the benefits that come with it.
Speaker 1Shift workers are also chronically poorly hydrated as well, which makes such a big difference to your fatigue levels and how you feel and how your system runs, and it also comes down to why a lot of shift workers are sick a lot of the time as well, because they're not giving their body a chance to flush out what their body has detoxified them from. So keeping your hydration low is going to cause you all sorts of problems. So make sure that you've got a bottle of water and you're drinking it all the time with you A sports bottle or something like that. Just have it with you and keep sipping on it. If you've got it with you and it's in front of you, mark my words you will continue to drink it.
Speaker 1There's also a lack of preparation, or even just the knowledge around what to do around meals, and that's a massive, big problem and I can certainly help with that with people if they wish. But it's just about getting nutritious food in and being prepared so that you're not ending up getting the Ubers or you're not ending up doing something stupid while you're out on the road whizzing by the fast food. We don't want to be doing that. It's highly processed, full of sugar, it impacts on our sleep, it causes us all sorts of problems, not to mention the sodium content, fat. It's all a massive problem for us All. Right, on a pinch every now and again, fine, but not all the time. The way shift workers also self sabotages their stresses through the roof.
Speaker 1Now the body does keep the score, and I've said that just before. But I can tell you now the body keeps the score. I've got a client at the moment that actually just basically couldn't move off the couch over the last week, and this is important because I said to her the reason why this has actually happened is because I've been watching this building for some time and your body has just gone. That's enough, can't do this anymore. Do you want to get to that stage? Do you want to get to the stage where you think that you're highly strung at? Everything's running really well, because this is my life. It's so stressful, but your body will crash, I can assure you. Your body will crash and it will crash at a time when you least expect it, when it's least convenient, and you will end up having to take time out when you didn't make the time before to look after it along the way. Keep that in mind. It's really really important and it doesn't have to be go to the gym, it's just getting out and going for a walk.
We sabotage with absolutely no movement in any way whatsoever. Now, movement getting up and getting out and going for a walk every day, just 30 minutes, that's all you got to do? Just get up and take yourself for a walk. Research is clear and it shows that just walking, just movement, 30 minutes of exercise every day, has a 20% reduction in cancers. That's 20% reduction in cancers. You can reduce your risk of cancer by 20% by just going for a walk for 30 minutes every day. And to explain one of the main reasons why this happens is because our lymphatic system is not a heart that doesn't have a muscle that pumps it clear. It counts on the muscle contractions for us to be moving to pump the toxins and rubbish out of our system, and then the water that we put in there flushes it out.
Speaker 1With no movement and being sedentary all the time, sitting there, doing nothing, eating highly processed foods, what do you think is going to happen down the track? It's going to have a major impact on your life and once again, your body keeps the score. It will catch up with you. Now I've had clients that have started with me and well, I'll glow a little here. But I've had clients that have gone from absolutely no time to walk as a shift worker Well, they tell me no time to walk to training for half marathons. Now have a think about that from not walking at all to running 21 kilometers. Or what is it for? 13 miles? For my American friends that are listening, 13 miles, that's a long way. It's a long, long way to go to go from not even walking to training for half marathons. Keep that in mind, because you actually start to gain more and more and more momentum.
Speaker 1You can swim. Now I've started swimming three times a week and that's enough. I jump in the pool, swim 30 laps. It takes me about 35 to 38 minutes to swim 30 laps. I'm no major Olympic swimmer but I really, really enjoy it and I just feel so good. On the black line of meditation, there's no phone, no, nothing. I'm just in the pool, swimming upwards and forwards. I'm getting the vitamin D. It's an outdoor pool. I get the vitamin D, I'm getting the movement, everything's pumping through my system. I feel fantastic and that can be something that you can enjoy as well. Three days a week is all you need of exercise as a shift worker. Three days of resistance training, three days of jiu-jitsu, three days of resistance training, three runs, three. You know I prefer if you walked every day, but three days a week is realistically all you need.
Speaker 1The other thing is a list session as a shift worker is enormously beneficial and I've done a podcast in relation to list sessions, my two bank for buck exercises. A list session is really important as you're burning only fat for fuel. Now we call it the fat burning zone, but we're actually burning fat out of our bloodstream. We're actually burning triglycerides as the energy. Now, as shift workers, we have naturally elevated triglycerides, which causes us to put on weight. Now, as a stress shift worker as well. With cortisol, it inhibits fat burning. It inhibits fat loss. So what we need to do is we need to burn that triglycerides out of our system. So if you want to find out more about list training, go and have a look at my podcast, which actually talks about my two biggest bank for buck exercises, and it will explain all about it.
Speaker 1Now the other thing is here self-sabotaging. Put your hand up if you're the one that crawls out of bed, go to the couch and you just basically stay there with no energy until you have to work next time. You go to the fridge and when you get to the fridge, there's nothing really there. You go to the cupboard there's nothing there. Go back to the fridge nothing there. You're like a 10-year-old boy looking in the fridge, looking in the cupboard, looking in the fridge, and you end up picking up your phone, ordering Uber and sitting on the couch. Is it any wonder that you feel fatigued? You've had zero daylight, you've got insufficient movement. You've walked to the front door. That's as far as you've gone, and you're probably eating highly processed snacks or you're having takeaway which is high in sodium, high in fat.
Speaker 1Now, this is one of the reasons we are what we eat in this way, and that's why we need to be getting that good, nutritious food in and letting it make a big difference to our life. Now, having a day on the couch don't get me wrong is absolutely fine. There's no problems with having a day on the couch to just give yourself some self-care time and relax. But get your ass up and get out into the daylight early and have a walk first and then go back and camp on the couch for the day. Now, some of the reasons why people make such a big difference in relation to from what they're doing compared to what you're doing is meal prepping, and they do prep their meals.
Speaker 1Now, it does not have to be containers of food laid out all across your kitchen bench. Just go with any nutritious food. Get slow cooking going. Get your air fry going. Get food. Have frozen foods. Have your pantry staples, have things. Learn about those staples to have in there that you can just throw together. You can get a chicken fillet and you can grill it. You can put some steamed vegetables with that and you can air fry some potatoes up. Done Like it's so easy. People see me that. Follow me on social media. See I cook all the time. I absolutely love it and the more you do it, the better at it you get and the easier it becomes to put food together to make it highly nutritious. Look at a three-step meal prep One day, pick what you want. Second day shop for it. Third day meal prep it. Break it all down into small tasks, but just get nutritious foods in and don't overthink it.
Suffering from gut issues. A lot of people, in particular female shift workers, will suffer a lot from gut issues, but you don't have to. A lot of the reason why this actually occurs can be a number of things. Number one circadian misalignment Eating the wrong foods at the wrong time and this is a massive issue. Now, if you go to my website, ahealthyshiftcom on there At the very bottom is a. You can download my ebook around the circadian fast to show you what you should be eating at what times, to help you to actually fast overnight so that you don't get those digestive issues in your gut which is causing you all sorts of problems. But not only do we have circadian misalignment, but we also have highly processed foods in our system. We're eating the wrong thing at the wrong time. We have hardly any hydration at all and in recent research what we have learned now is that insufficient sunlight of that UV on the skin is actually showing that it improves our gut microbiota as well. Who would have thought? But that is another reason why we need to be getting that sunlight on our skin as well to improve our gut health. So if you are someone who suffers from gas, bloating, digestive issues and you think, oh, that's it, the other one, stress, high stress, the first thing that goes is your gut, and I can guarantee to you that if you eat rubbish, your mental health is poor, and if your mental health is poor, your gut will be poor as well. There is a gut brain axis which causes us all sorts of problems there. All right, let's move on from that. I've made that point mental health.
Speaker 1Shift work by its very nature is very lonely, and it is because everybody all your friends are going out at night while you're heading to work, and that can be a really lonely existence. It can also be an awesome excuse to get out of family functions as well, or to get out of going to catch up with people that you really don't want to catch up with. But the most important thing is that you don't isolate yourself. Have those one or two friends. Don't put pressure on yourself with 30 friends that you've got to catch up with all the time. Have a look at who is valuating to your own life and add those people and keep going with those people. Keep them in your life so that you have someone that you've just actually got as a contact point. Make plans in advance and look forward to catching up with them. Don't wait until the last minute and then get to the end of the day and think, oh, I could have caught up with Jenny today, but you didn't. Please make a plan in advance to make sure that you actually get to catch up with them.
Speaker 1Have a support network in place and seek help or support if you need it. It's okay to ask for help. If you are struggling mentally, it is absolutely okay to be out there and ask for help, but I can't. I have no energy. It's a simple thing. Also, when did you last have your bloods checked? Have a look at that and get that checked. If you've got gut and digestive issues, have a look in case there is a fructose intolerance or a lactose intolerance or whether you could actually have ended up being a celiac. I've had a client recently that's been diagnosed as a celiac and that can be a problem obviously as well.
Speaker 1If you're not sure, it can be a whole range of things, but a blood test can start to show those sort of things as well and in your bloods, if they look at things like iron, your B vitamins, your vitamin D level and your electrolytes, it can actually tell a really good story as to why you are feeling chronically fatigued. Here in Australia you can go and get a blood test and it costs you nothing to go and get that done. So go and see your doctor, get a referral and go and get your bloods done. If you haven't had your bloods done in the last six months or so, go and get them done and stay on top of them. They're a great window into our body.
Speaker 1Hydration is another. Dehydration is a symptom of fatigue, so make sure that you've got your hydration up, and I've talked about this. And this is another thing. Where you've got no energy, this is where the circadian misalignment is actually destroying you. Regular sleep makes a big difference here, and when I say regular and you say, oh, you're good on your rods, you know I work rotating shifts, I don't disagree with that. But are you coming home at 11 o'clock and then sitting around watching TV until one or two o'clock? Are you not doing the right thing by yourself? Are you getting that regular sleep when you can? Are you still sticking to a routine of sleep on your days off? Because that's what you need to be doing. And I will say this to you, and I'm going to be very clear on this Sleep ins don't work. You cannot catch up on sleep. If you've worked four afternoon shifts and you finally get a day off, then it's not a day to sleep in, because what you're going to do is you're going to throw your circadian rhythm even further out. So forget about it. Get up and get going and get moving If you need to a nap is your friend. Have yourself a 25 to 30 minute nap. That will make a big difference. But get up, get out, get that early light and movement and tell your body that it's actually go time and it will absolutely respond really, really well.
Speaker 1Now we just solve sabotage in so many ways that it's just completely unnecessary but can really easily be fixed. I know this is a long podcast we're nearly 30 minutes already but I just wanted to make these points that this is where we go wrong and you don't have to fix all of these things at once, pick a few out, work on a few and then continually have it stack on top of those. But majority of what I've mentioned is all free. It's not about going out and buying this supplement and buying that and buying these magic pills and doing this. It's literally all free and it's just stuff that we've got to work on which is going to optimize our shift working life, and it's just knowing about how to going about it and having some form of accountability. But I can promise you this and make absolutely no secret of it it will catch up with you, your body absolutely keeps the score and it will shut you down when you least need it physically and or mentally, and then it's a long way back. It is a long way back once that starts to happen.
Speaker 1Now I can help you with all of this and that's what I do. I do stay abreast of all the latest research around shift work and I can apply it in a practical sense from a veteran shift workers perspective. I've literally coached hundreds of people like you, which helps me to to actually talk to you about these self sabotaging practices that, once I'm working with clients and they start identifying where they're going wrong and by simple routine changes and changing things, literally make such a big difference to them. Simple habit based coaching is all it is. This is not about macros and meal prepping and going to the gym six days a week and all that. You're a shift worker. You just don't have time for that. What I want to do with you is I just want simple, habit based coaching, just starting to put habits and routines and structure in your life, building a routine that you can rely on, a routine that you can fall back on, addressing body image issues.
Speaker 1A lot of disordered eating literally comes from body image issues and we can address that and work back on that. We, as shift workers, we have to wear a uniform every single time we go to work and it constantly reminds us of where we're actually at and addressing disordered eating habits. So many clients that I've come across have actually had disordered eating habits without even realizing, and it isn't until we flag that with them around the intuitive eating sphere that they start to understand. My God, I didn't realize just how disordered that was. And when it comes to women's health as well, I can absolutely help around things like PCOS and endometriosis, as well as things like PMDD and just identifying certain things around the female cycle and helping you with that as well. I'm well read on that area, but I do put my hand up and say I will never know exactly what that's like, obviously, but I've had some clients that have been totally open and honest and I've learned an awful lot in relation to that as well.
Speaker 1Now if you're interested in coaching from me, then you can actually go to the link in the bio. I do coach clients one to one. I also do one off consults with people as well. If you follow the link in the bio, it will literally take you into the, into the my inquiry form, and once you submit that inquiry form, it will give you access to my calendar where you can book a time to have a conversation with me, which is a free and non obligation, and I will show you how I can help you to thrive in your shift working life.
Speaker 1Now you probably think that this whole podcast was a sales pitch, and what I'm selling you and what I'm selling you is is my belief. I actually believe that you can do this. It's not a sales pitch, because I believe, yes, you can thrive and not just survive while performing shift work, because you've got those people in your work post. But I would really love to teach what I'm learning through social media, my blogs, my website and through this podcast, so we can prove the previous science is wrong and make our shift working environments and you and you are much better person to be around and a much better place to be. And that is a wrap for today. If you got anything out of that podcast. I know it was long we're up to 34 minutes but please I would be ever so grateful if you were just rated. And, on Apple, if you've got the opportunity, give it five stars and just write a few lines so that somebody else that's scrolling looking for a podcast can read and learn what you've learnt from this podcast, or any of my other podcasts as well, because, just like you, they will scroll through looking.
Speaker 1All right Now, fellow shift workers, your health, and in particular, your physical health, must be a non-negotiable. It's the foundation that allows you to excel in your career and enjoy life beyond the workplace. Remember this is about having more energy to do the things that you love outside of your shift working life. By taking these evidence based steps, you won't just be surviving, you'll be thriving. So keep pushing forward and remember I'm here to support you every step of the way. Stay committed to nourishing your body and prioritizing your wellbeing and, as always, please remember, be patient, be kind to yourself as you navigate the challenges of shift work and prioritize your mental health and well being. Thank you for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe so you get notified whenever a new episode is released. It would also be ever so helpful if you could leave a rating and review on the app you're currently listening on. If you want to know more about me or work with me, you can go to a healthy shift dot com. I'll catch you on the next one.