New Driver, Getting Exhausted With Trainer

Welcome to Flatbed.

 

Riding with the trainer is the most difficult portion of getting the CDL. You have no control over your day. You have to work according to a schedule someone else decides for you. It's hard to sleep in a moving truck, etc. Just get through it and your life will get much easier in your solo truck. When you are solo you can shower daily, etc. Stay focused on the goal, getting finished with training. No. Matter. What. Do not give up before you have your solo truck.

 

If you are taking melatonin for the first time, start with small dose. I started at 1mg, but I'm 150 pounds. If you take a dose larger than needed the side effects are nightmares and sweating while you sleep. I would not start with more than a 5mg dose, and you can buy a cheap pill splitter at walmart, It works. So does diphenhydramine which the ingredient in many anti-allergy medications, tylenol PM, over the counter sleep tablets, Benadryl. There is a liquid product, a brand name is Zzzzyguil. It;s like Nyquil, but without the cold medicine.

Once you take melatonin long enough, you may not be able to sleep without it. The melatonin tablets supply far more melatonin than your body's melatonin producing mechanism. Your body will notice you have plenty of melatonin, from the tablet, and turn off your natural melatonin maker. It's similar to how your body would react if you started taking steroids. Your natural steroid makers shrink.

 

After working 14 hours you are only prohibited from driving until after you get 10 hours in sleeper/off-duty. You can work 168 hours per week, non-stop, if you or the company want.

 

My doctor started me with Melatonin 60 mg.
Took that for two months; one bottle lasts two months.
Then dropped to the 10 mg.
That worked for me.
~
Melatonin 60 - Scientific Health Solutions

 

@tscottme
Here's the other you posted; yeah, I take this also.
3-pack for $16.00 at Sam's Club

 

You need to tell safety about this kind of practice,

Especially with coil loads, it is a disaster in waiting

Also i thought flatbeding was banking hours,

 

Yes. I like the generic store brand from Kroger. It is about half the price of the brand name.

 

I had my trainer take over driving. I'll feel fine after a shower and a solid 6-7 hours of sleep, but waking up after 4 hours of mediocre sleep in a steel mill parking lot on an empty stomach, still filthy from the work the day before, to go and do 5 shuttle runs loading shotgun coils in near 90 degree heat is not healthy or safe. I'm almost done with training and I will note it to the training supervisors but I know my trainer will say good things about my work ethic, my driving and my performance, so I don't want to throw away two weeks of good training while I'm in the home stretch.

 

Ehhh true. I was thinking about that after I posted. Still a #### thing to do to a trainee.