the world turned upside down

[nottsbl]

This was the tune played by the british army bands after the final british surrender to the yanks, as they filed down after the negotiated end of hostilities (brits kept personal arms etc). It reflected the feeling, after a century of victory against the french and various colonials, that any defeat for the British was unnatural.

I've often felt the same thing (world turned upside down) on a personal scale since I retired. I sometimes find myself (as now) staying up all night and sleeping all day. This doesn't bother me particularly, I'm just curious: do others experience this? And is insomnia part of aging? In one sense, not working is fantastic. In another, I'm unmoored.

 

[kelper]

I've been retired from the sea for three years. Never had sleep problems at work but now I wake at 2am or 5am and then just light sleep until 7am when I get up. If I feel tired I have an afternoon nap. I go to bed around 10pm, maybe that's too early.

 

[An Ankoù]

Never had trouble sleeping and still don't. When I was working I'd hit the sack around 10 and get up at 5 or 6 to do the things I wanted to before work. Only difference is that now I get up at 7.30. Must get back to my old regime as there's still loads I want to do.
I know I've paid for it all my working life both as self-employed and an employee, but I still can't get used to getting a pension credited to my account without having gone out to work!!! (Not the same as a month's proper pay, for sure, but no mortgage to fork out for or kids to feed, either).

 

[Dutto]

I've always reckoned that working at sea on Home Trade with a "Four On, Four Off and a Dog Watch" schedule was what trained me to sleep on demand and to minimise the length of time that I slept.

I'm seldom in bed before 2am and always up and about by 9am. That may be an "age thing", but if it is then it only applies for men! SWMBO (slightly older than me) naps through TV (even Emmerdale and Corrie) for four hours and then goes to bed for eight hours sleep! (This includes the time that she says I woke her up! i.e. The time I went to bed and couldn't get off to sleep because of her snoring!)

BTW, remember that bed is a dangerous place to be!

About 95% of people die in a bed ...

... and as a young man I discovered that being in someone else's bed could be really dangerous!

 

[user 23602]

Bed at 23:30 and up at 05:00. The joys of full time education, full time work and 2 children. I envy you.

 

[DavieC]

Bed at 23:30 and up at 05:00. The joys of full time education, full time work and 2 children. I envy you.

Full time education and full time work,man,thats one heavy schedule!How do you find time for brewing???:hat:

 

[Gunge]

I work full time, 3 rotating shifts and there is nowhere enough time to do the stuff I have to do... and I kip for 3 hours max per 24. Fact.

 

[dad_of_jon]

yup kids have left 1 is well planted in his new life so not much chance of boomeranging back mortgage paid and able to retire soon, my shift means I only work on half the days in a year. I'm looking to cut down my shift to only working 2 days in a row. (Which would mean dropping from 36 to a 28 hour week on average.) The pension is going to cover retirement. I think I'll keep my hand in a job if poss but I find sleepings always been a PITA for me, never a good nights sleep, although coming off a night shift I do get a solid 3 - 3.5 hours from 7:30am.

 

[user 23602]

Full time education and full time work,man,thats one heavy schedule!How do you find time for brewing???:hat:

Saturday mornings are usually my brew days and the girls enjoy it, so they tend to help... It's a bonus when your hobby can turn into father/daughters days haha. But both the wife and I are in full time University whilst working full time.

 

[DavieC]

Cant fault ya @Robinson Brew Co.
Again, hats off to you:hat:

 

[GerritT]

I worked nightshifts (5 days, weekend, 5 nights, weekend) some decades ago, it taught me to fall asleep within 10 minutes. Also taught me to get out of bed before the alarm went off, still happy about that.

 

[stz]

The older I get the less I seem to need sleep. Sleep anytime from 10pm onwards, usually by 11:30. Usually up around 5am, sometimes 6am. Can't lay in on the weekends, once I'm awake I'm awake and up, occasionally manage to sleep in until 7-7:30 if I've been up until past midnight. When I was younger I'd quite happily linger in bed until lunchtime.

I do worry about getting institutionalised by work. I think men suffer for it. You have something to moan about. You never need to think about what you are doing with yourself. People congratulate you for it and if you are alright at it you get a great deal back, purpose, pride, sense of satisfaction and so on. When retirement hits ... OP uses a great word. Unmoored. I feel women are generally better at maintaining relationships and connections and potentially find it a bit easier, not many men want to seem like they are asking for something or need help with something. I can see now as everybody I know is getting short of time to do stuff they tend to have utilitarian relationships. I hang out with people, but when one of us needs a hand, we have to have a worthy purpose in order to give up precious time. Simply spending time together? Not productive enough to qualify for some of that precious free time.

Hopefully we never lose the passion for learning and part of it is learning how to deal with changes in circumstances. I see that statistically retirement kills a lot of men off in short order. Others move somewhere warm, drink and smoke themselves to death, walk the dog until its legs drop off to keep busy, become obsessive curtain twitchers. I don't know what the future holds for me!

 

[Popey]

Generally, I don't have too much trouble sleeping, though I get the odd night where I'm restless and fret about things. This morning for instance, at 2:30 I was worrying about a forthcoming 10k swim for which I haven't really trained for a variety of reasons. The situation wasn't helped when one of the dogs decided he needed a cuddle as I was just dropping off!

I'm 59 with plans of retiring in the immediate future as I am still enjoying the stimulation of work. I'm lucky in that I have a challenging job that by and large I really enjoy. I'm a project manager who's recently started a 2-year contract with the MOD. My wife "retired" several years ago and spends her time looking after the house, our two (soon to be three) dogs and sewing.
I started brewing this year as a way of learning a new hobby which will keep me interested and stimulated when I do decide to retire. I love the thought of learning the science and techniques to make high quality beer as I am a bit of a nerd. The swimming should keep me reasonably fit and I must admit that the prospect of more time to do more open water swimming is tempting. I can't think of anything worse than sitting around doing nothing. I may even start cycling again. Who knows?

 

[LesTom]

I work full time, 3 rotating shifts and there is nowhere enough time to do the stuff I have to do... and I kip for 3 hours max per 24. Fact.

Yep, same as me although I get approx. 4 hours sleep, still f**ked though

 

[LED_ZEP]

When I'm not working (I often get four days off in a row) I get slowly more and more nocturnal till I'm back at work,. This means that after my first day back at work I've often gone 36ish hours with no sleep.

 

[MyQul]

I'm in my 40's (so no where near retirement age, although I wish I could retire). I've never had a problem falling asleep, Im usually out like a light. I often wake in the night for a very short while before falling back to sleep. I then usually get up at 5am-6am.
For most of my life I never really could get up before about 7am-8am but back in the spring I started a low carbohydrate/no sugar diet (this is the difficult bit for me as I have an extremely sweet tooth and keep 'falling off the wagon' - Mmm chocolate hobnobs ), a side effect of this diet seems to be I need less sleep, can get up earlier and dont feel groggy in the mornings when I do get up.
I work part time and have done for years, as I'd rather have lots of free time and be poor than have lots of money and be time poor. I'm one of the worlds idlers and can spend hours pottering/loafing about ( yesterday I sat on the bench outside a shop on lambs conduit st drinking coffee, sunbathing and people watching for two hours). @stz worries about getting instutionalised by work, I don't think that would ever happen to me, as despite working part time, I'm always trying thinking of ways I can work even less

 

[Dutto]

I once worked what was called "The Continental Shift System" for nearly four years.

The rotation between mornings, afternoons, nights and days off was so bad that you felt that you were either at work, getting ready for work or just finished work; in other words your whole life revolved around "work" rather than "leisure" or "home".

It was (and still is) a terrible system that is proven to shorten lives!

We managed to persuade Management that a "12hrs on - 12hrs off" would be a better system and it was put to the vote.

With the exception of ONE man, everyone voted for the "12 on - 12 off" system. The defaulter's reasoning was that because he had five daughters and a wife at home he had no "leisure" time and was therefore grateful of any shift system that got him out of the house and revolved around "work" rather than "home".

I still feel sorry for the lad!

 

[foxy]

I loved the 12 hour shift, 3 days on, 2 days off, 2 days on 3 days off, for two years I took my holidays as 8 hour per day off, increasing my time off until they twigged. It was costing them a fortune to cover my shifts.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

I used to to do two weeks days followed by two on nights and found each shift change hard work for the first couple of days, i didn't have any problems sleeping during the day and have always found 6 hours is plenty but do enjoy a long sleep in on a Sunday. (probably helped by the skinful Saturday night)

 

[Clint]

I do 4 on 4 off....it sounds good but it's nearer 3 off as your first day,if you can wake up .. rephrase. .get up is nearly gone. My night shifts are surrounded by around 4 hours sleep each...people around me have never grasped the concept of night shifts...I'm beginning to dislike them...after 20 years I need a rest but finding a way out isnt easy...