Does your spouse work shift work? When I was at work in the ER I did shift work, but I’m off work right now due to illness. My husband has always done shift work as well since he’s worked at the hospital.

What bothers me about his shifts is that he doesn’t always write down the schedule ahead of time. It’s not like we have tons of plans to make, but it would certainly be easier to book doctors appointments, plan meals and figure out other things if he’d write his darn schedule down!

Normally he works 7:30 to 3:30, 10 to 6 pm or 12 noon until 8 pm shifts. Most of the time he’ll be on the same shift throughout the whole week. So once I know his schedule that week it’s not too bad. It still doesn’t help with planning future events, but at least I know what’s happening that week.

This week his schedule is totally different. When did he tell me of the change? Sunday evening! This week he’s covering for a senior co-worker who’s on holidays so he’s working from 3:30 pm until 11:30 pm. Since he’s worked in the OR recovery area he’s never worked that late a shift.

I don’t mind that he’s working this shift. I’m sure he likes it compared to all the 7:30 am shifts that he worked when he had to get up at 5:30 just to get ready. I just wish I’d known. I think it’s actually a pretty boring shift. Last night he when they didn’t have patients he was going over all the Folded Brochures just to pass the time. Tidying them up and so on.

There’s only the two of us at home too. So when one of us works in the evening a meal needs to be planned that can be eaten alone and also easily reheated for the person who’s been working late. Even better, I like to make a meal that can be heated at work for Chris so that he doesn’t end up eating a full dinner really late at night.

His not telling me of his shift change didn’t allow me to make something decent for him to take to work with him last night. However after he left for work I got busy making a very easy yet delicious meat sauce. I made a huge pot of it. I always end up freezing some since there’s too much and also I like having a few easy things stored in the freezer for quick meals.

I let my sauce simmer for close to three hours. By the time it was done I was starving! I made spaghetti to have with the meat sauce and yum. It was delicious. Chris had some spaghetti and meat sauce when he came home from work and loved it too.

So now, thanks to the big batch of spaghetti sauce that I made we’ve got some quick and easy meals that Chris can take to work or that I’m happy to eat alone.

So, back to my initial question. Does your spouse work shift work? Do they let you know of schedule changes in advance? Or is your spouse like mine making you guess at the schedule all the time?