Natural night owls who struggle a bit with night time driving

I've also been told that if I get an early start like that, I'll be able to pull off into the truck stops while there is still parking in the afternoons. Win/Win for this morning guy. We will see. Getting up at 3 AM each morning to take a walk, handle the SSS, then commute for a workday is different than getting behind that big steering wheel. But I'm looking forward to it.

 

Ah yessss... the ole flip flop aroonie.
No.... not the shower shoe aka lady slipper - no no. We're talking about that sudden turning of your sleep schedule upside down, for whatever reason?

It's a killer! Not in the literal sense mind you although, you might wish it were when you suddenly find yourself driving on the wrong side of the sun....

In my younger days. I was able to handle it better than now in the twilight of my years.

I have no advise on how to handle it other than.... suck it up! Do the best you can to get enough sleep until you can turn it back around. Be very careful to stop and nap when the sandman starts to tuggin'.... and finally, welcome to truckin'...

 

I found that a 30 minute nap works wonders for me. I also listened to audiobooks. If you don't want to pay for them and you have unlimited data on your phone, you can find many on YouTube that people have uploaded. If you have a friend or family member drives nights, you can chat with them on the phone. The trick is to keep you mind occupied. This works for me.

 

One upside to being tired from not getting any real sleep yesterday is today I'm off and I'm awake during the day since I was able to sleep like the dead for like six hours when I got home from work this morning.

 

Lots of good tips in the comments above for new drivers.
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I suppose that new drivers - especially OTR drivers will find many things to get used to. The whole industry is loaded with all kinds of things to learn and adapt to. I remember when I went OTR back in the early 70's, there was kind of a culture shock and some of it was very nice and some of it was not so great. Without getting into specifics, the whole idea of being far away from home and forced to lay over in truck stop, for the weekend was to me, the hardest thing to adapt to, and very expensive. There was a sense of loneliness and separation anxiety that this homeboy had to overcome. Being stuck anywhere/anytime just annoyed the heck out if me. Getting enough sleep was rarely a problem unless I was running illegal and trying to get somewhere for whatever reason but especially when I was headed home. I pushed my limits all the time and slept crashed over the steering wheel exhausted from pushing too hard but at the same time not wanting to sleep more than a couple of hours... I just wanted to go-go-go and get home!!! ... Immature perhaps but regardless, my "homing pidgeon mentality" was something (looking back now) that I should have handled better. It was a source of much anxiety and I was poorly equipped to handle it, much less recognize just how miserable it made me.

So, I guess the point to my rambling is this. Recognize the things that you are in control of. ELD will dictate your life. And, there will be times when you are at the mercy of a dispatcher or a shipper/receiver and have to deal with situations that seem senseless or unfair... So, keeping your truck neat and clean and organized will give you a sense of home away from home...and the cooler and calmer and more comfortable that you can make yourself during difficult times will help you more than anything else.

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I’ve been driving at night the past week or so, it’s definitely nice not having any traffic to worry about; visited the “biggest truck stop in the world” yesterday morning (or maybe it was the day before, hell I can’t keep track anymore), was too tired to care and didn’t get any souvenirs other than urine on my leather boots; I drank 2 cups of coffee and it finally helped me feel as though I wasn’t going to bounce my head off the steering wheel and blow my air horn lol

 

And yearly retirement in a hospital from a heart attack !

 

Power naps

I set the timer on my phone for 20 minutes

 

Power naps are your friend.

I try my best to drive daytime hours this morning I was up at 2 am and drove till 8 am. Got real tired about 630 so I pulled in a rest area. 30 minutes of glorious nap later and I was ok to continue.

I drove those hours because I have a 10 pm unload in Harrisburg and a 2 am pickup in Elizabeth nj tonight. This will give me enough time on my clock to roll out of Elizabeth in the early morning hours and get over to the ta in western jersey where I should be able to find a spot after 4 am to snooze again and complete the 8 hour portion of an 8/2 split before I hit the road.

I’m sure there will be a nap or two taken tonight too.

if I do this run without doing it this way I don’t always have hours to get out of Elizabeth. And that is not an area you want to be looking for parking at 3am.

Happily though there is lots of time on this run and I’ll switch back to being solar powered tomorrow night.