SPEAKER_07: 1:35

Welcome to the show. Roger Sutherland from A Healthy Shift. Good evening, Roger. Thank you for coming in.

SPEAKER_03: 1:42

Good evening to you. What a thrill it is to be back.

SPEAKER_07: 1:45

Well, it's lovely to be back. You were last in studio with me over the Christmas break when Dennis was on holiday. And we got a wonderful reaction to you because we'll get we'll get you to outline a little bit about what you do. But you are essentially you give a lot of good advice with your business, A Healthy Shift. It's over Instagram, LinkedIn. So before we kick off with tonight's topic, tell our audience and our listeners what you do.

SPEAKER_03: 2:11

Thank you very much. Um I'm a 40-year veteran of Victoria Police. I've retired. I retired in August of uh not last year, the year before, and I retired to run my business A Healthy Shift, which I coach shift workers now in emergency services and frontline health or anyone that does shift work to um in health and well-being around shift work because no one educates anyone on how to go about doing shift work. I also do um seminars, webinars into corporate environments to support shift working environments, to reduce their unplanned leave, their um uh their well, there's obviously their sick leave to help their staff to really improve their health, to also um stop the uh what do you call it, the turnover of staff, which is a big problem in shift working environments.

SPEAKER_07: 3:04

I think also shift working and lots of people do shift working. I mean, here we you know, Radio 30W and right throughout the nine Radio Network and Ace Radio, it's 24-7, 365 days a year, and people do different shifts, and quite often they'll be ending a shift, it's a very short turnaround before their next sort of shifts. But of course, paramedics, nurses, police, firefighters, everybody does that. I mean, it it sounds one in five.

SPEAKER_03: 3:33

One in five people are shift workers now.

SPEAKER_07: 3:35

But let me also say, a parent as well, there's a shift work for parents as well when you first have a baby. That's a different way. Wait a minute.

SPEAKER_03: 3:44

I I would argue right through, Caroline. I would argue all the way through.

SPEAKER_07: 3:48

Because from the minute that you have a baby, you don't really ever get asleep in again.

SPEAKER_03: 3:52

Even your 24-year-old, when they're out, you're lying in bed waiting for the door.

SPEAKER_07: 3:56

It is indeed. So what I was going to say, lots of calls this evening. 133 693, or you can send a text through to Roger, 0477-693-693. Last time we had Roger in, he talked about the importance of the light diet, but it wasn't so much about eating, it was about getting lots of fresh sunlight, even if you finish in the morning, if you're finishing at 5am or 6am, staying up with that sun. So what I wanted to do is I wanted to have a bit of a chat to you this evening and turn it around the other way. We'll talk about a couple of other topics. But the um the importance of good sleep. Sleep hygiene. Sleep hygiene, because you're an expert in that, but also it's something that a lot of us don't think about. And I guess it's fair to say that like a lot of people who may um be suffering with sleep apnea until they're actually diagnosed and they realise that they have a problem with sleep apnea, and everyone you meet that that has a CPAP machine goes, I just didn't realise. With this importance of sleep hygiene, a lot of us with the lives that we leave and lead in 2026 for lots of different reasons, through probably no fault of our own's. We're actually conditioned to being in poor sleep habits through a variety of reasons. You could be caring for somebody who is sick, who needs attention, you could be a parent, you could have a child with special needs, whatever it might be, you could be juggling shift work as well. And we get into bad routines with sleep. And I don't just mean falling asleep in front of the television and waking up at two in the morning and going to bed. So perhaps you could help our audience as well with um the importance of a sleep hygiene and perhaps how bad habits can creep in. And if anyone out there is suffering with sleep, give us a ring, 133693.

SPEAKER_03: 5:45

I I'll ask you the question. Do you have a routine that you go through when you are going to bed? When you get home? Like you do you have a routine or is it just to flurry and jump in, fluff the duna and out?

SPEAKER_07: 5:56

I do. I always have a shower at night time and of course in the morning.

SPEAKER_03: 5:59

Hot or cold?

SPEAKER_07: 6:01

Um uh probably warm, warm in the evening and brush my teeth, get ready, take off any makeup or anything, then get into bed and go to sleep.

SPEAKER_03: 6:09

Okay, here's here's what you're doing, right? So by having the warm shower, it's perfect. Hot shower or warm shower before you go to bed is ideal because what it does is it draws the blood to the extremities of the body, and then what it does is as we get out of the shower and the the cool air hits us from that we're wet, it actually then cools us down, which is a signal to the body to go to sleep. That's the first one. You're taking your makeup off, so you're going through a routine and you're smelling your night cream. So, therefore, what's happening is you are programming your brain that this is what we do when we go to sleep. And then, of course, people get into bed, and when you get into bed, they then lie in bed and scroll on their phones until they fall asleep.

SPEAKER_07: 6:52

I don't.

SPEAKER_03: 6:52

No, but majority of people do. And I want to make a point to a lot of people. What they do, adrenaline fueled because they're at work, particularly our shift working communities in frontline health or nursing, uh, front sorry, frontline health or policing, uh, and then what they do is they get home, they go from an adrenaline rush in the car, into bed, scroll on their phone, can't sleep, or fall asleep exhausted, but then they wake up after about an hour, hour and a half. This is because their body is not relaxed and not in a state for sleep. They're still in that fight or flight mode. So the importance of having a proper sleep routine for us to go through, if we were to go through a routine, no matter what shift, no matter what we're doing when we go to bed, and we look at the time now at 7.14, we are now sort of starting to wind down. The sun's starting to go down, we're starting to get to the stage where we should be thinking about our routine for sleep. I would always say, and it's the word of a famous sleep specialist, if you create the environment, your body will take care of the rest.

SPEAKER_07: 7:58

If you create the environment, your body will take care of the rest.

SPEAKER_03: 8:01

Correct. In every way, whether that's nutrition or sleep. So if you actually wind down and tell your body it is safe to go to sleep, it will go to sleep. So what you do is uh an ideal routine would be well, I've got a little hack for you as well. Okay. A really good routine for you is that that hot shower. So take that hot shower so that you're heating the extremities of your body, get out the water cool the air hitting your uh water on your body cools you, and then after you've done that, then you would be putting on your night cream, so you're triggering your body with that smell. And here's my sleep hack a lavender spray, just a little lavender spray around your pillow, around your bed. Lavender is very calming on the nervous system, it also is a trigger to help people to go to sleep as well, and then get into bed, and then we want to do a little bit of four, seven, eight breath work. So we're breathing, we're lying on our back, we're putting one hand on our stomach, and what we're doing is we're breathing in through our nose for four seconds, and we do it through our nose because of the exchange of gases, and then we hold that four seven, and then we purse our lips like we're breathing out through a straw, and we breathe out for a count of eight. If you can get through four or five routines, there you go.

SPEAKER_07: 9:19

You'll be out. There you go. Well, I'd love to know from our listeners 133 693 or you can send us a text, 0477-693-693. Do you actually have a sleep routine? Do you actually do a bit of breath work, like Roger is saying? Are you a shift worker yourself? Are you somebody? Because last time we were on, we had a lot of people that were going back to shift work. Some a fellow was going back to shift work that he hadn't done for 25 years. He was relocated he was relocating, but he was going to commute between Wollongong and Melbourne, I remember. I didn't say what he was doing, but there have you have you gone back there? Have you started off 2026 in a different way? Have you got a new job coming up? Love to hear from you. Or if you've never actually thought about this, and perhaps you're in the car, you're listening on the app, you're at home, and you've suddenly thought, hang on a second, Roger's talking to me. This is what I've been doing. There's no judgment at all. There are great tips from Roger because he gives a lot of lectures and talks on this and really gets you to to prioritize it. Because as you say, the important thing is we make time for everybody else.

SPEAKER_03: 10:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07: 10:27

And we make time for every but not ourselves, do we?

SPEAKER_03: 10:31

No, and we've got to create that environment, let our body feel safe, and then it will sleep and sleep with See, it's not about the length of sleep, it's about the quality of sleep that we're getting while we're getting it.

SPEAKER_07: 10:40

There you go.

SPEAKER_03: 10:41

And if you create that calm and safe environment with your autonomic nervous system in that rest mode, which is why it's called rest and digest, it will sleep right through and you won't wake up.

SPEAKER_07: 10:53

We can see through the glass. Ethan is is taking all this in because he's fabulous. He does a lot of shift work. He's a lovely young man. Don't need to need to go to sleep just yet. Not that you are. We'll let Ethan do his magic now. We'll take a break. 143-693-0477-693-693. We're speaking with Roger Sutherland from A Healthy Shift. We'll be back after this.

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SPEAKER_07: 12:19

And this is Knights on 3AW, right throughout the Ace Radio Network. Lovely to have your company, Caroly Katzambanus, in for Dennis Walter. Now we're speaking with Roger Sutherland from a The Healthy Shift. A little bit of an audio problem here, I've got here. A little bit cutting out, but that's okay. We will go straight to the lines and we'll speak to Ross who wants to ask about shift work. Good evening, Ross. Welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_11: 12:42

Thank you. Good evening. I just want to let you know that you just a truck driver and we sort of do a uh shift for our work. Uh one week I do three trips to Sydney, and uh second week I do two weeks to Sydney. And I leave uh northern approximately three o'clock in the afternoon, and then I should go about one thirty in the morning, and then I dropped out an hour.

SPEAKER_03: 13:16

Well then Roth Ross, tell me, are you still only let it run for five hours, then you have to have a 30-minute break?

SPEAKER_11: 13:33

And then I go to November, have another 15 minutes, and then I have a half an hour of picture before I go back to MPO.

SPEAKER_03: 13:43

Very good. And are you a power napper? Are you someone who can jump in the back or just rock the chair back and have a nap?

SPEAKER_11: 13:50

Uh no, I I'm very much uh used to um this for about 20, 25 years ago.

SPEAKER_03: 13:59

Just keep going, just push on. Ross, you would have seen some changes over your time too with people because companies used to really push their staff, didn't they? Whereas now things are so monitored on the trucks and also drivers are being monitored as well a lot closer by the companies. Is that a is that a fair moment?

SPEAKER_11: 15:49

Yeah, yeah, definitely, yeah, yeah. We're we're we're we're we're we're a shadow by we're all on tracking and everything like that. So uh prisoners we're just watching uh they've got about seven hundred times. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh that's the local like you have and I get a little bit of a Do you think it's better now, or it was better back then? Better now you really needed to do, but still I use it uh you know, getting the wrong things and accidents on the uh still way too much.

SPEAKER_07: 17:01

Yeah, and Ross, do you do you make sure that you drink lots of water and have lots of fruit and and a healthy diet as well? Or are you sort of like grabbing for the sausage rolls and the and the and the fast food? Road stops. The road stops, the road stops.

SPEAKER_11: 17:14

Yeah, well there's not many good road stops anymore, so I actually uh I'm a diabetic, so I take all my food with me. Well done, so they're very good now, aren't they?

SPEAKER_03: 17:28

There's a lot of good uh tools like the the ovens that you can plug into the to keep your food warm as well, they're fantastic. Really good.

SPEAKER_11: 17:36

The microwave is the way to go. It's just way you take your phase of meals and then bang it in there for five minutes and it's really hot, you know. I mean the old days well you you know, you used to stop at every truck stop and uh yeah. Well done, Ross.

SPEAKER_03: 17:51

Good job. Yeah, good job. And thank you for what you do because you're keeping it you're you're carrying the country on your back.

SPEAKER_07: 17:56

Absolutely, and try when you do get a day off or some time to go for a nice long walk or or have a swim. Um Damien, I know you're on the line. Well just get just get do one text, just to be fair, we'll do phone text. Um Michael has texted through 637. Hi, Michael. How long does it take to get your body clock back to normal after three years of working overnights, 11 pm to 7am?

SPEAKER_03: 18:19

I have a a a theory around this that I work with my clients, or I have a method that I do without boring people in great detail. The trick is to stay in line as much as you can, even while you're on nights. So while you're on nights, you're working overnight. But I would treat the sleeps between the nights as naps, like have two naps between, but get up and get that light exposure during the day. So when you finish at seven and then you go home, don't put pressure on yourself to try and sleep for eight hours. Just have a sleep until you wake up, then get up, go out, get some light, get some blue light outside, go about your day, get some exercise by walking, move, get some movement, have a nap before you go back in again. You will find that you will come out of the nights so much quicker because your body hasn't been phase shifted into that full night shift. Yeah. Um, and that's that's just in and a nutshell. But I've been working with clients, I've actually got a hypothesis that I'm getting tested by research at the moment around the way I do it, and it's going to be really interesting.

SPEAKER_07: 19:23

Okay, and Michael, I hear you because often when I fill in, I will often do a 9 30 p.m. till 5 30 a.m. shift and I take some of Roger's tips as well. And you know, one of the things is healthy diet and water and just doing plenty of water. Plenty of water and doing all that. Thank you very much. We'll go to Damien who's on the line. Damien, thank you very much for holding.

SPEAKER_08: 19:42

No, no worries. I was I was just curious about the hot shower. Um I always have a cold shower. Just wondering, is there a difference between cold share in the morning? Cold shower in the morning and at and at night.

SPEAKER_03: 19:55

Cold shower in the morning, hot shower at night. That's what the research tells us. So we have a if you that's if you're a nine to fiver, obviously, but if you're going to bed at night, hot shower so that it brings draws the blood to the extremity and gets you uh and then as it cools, it's a signal to the body to sleep. Whereas the cold shower in the morning wakes you up and gets you going.

SPEAKER_08: 20:18

In a bit of a the reason why I asked, yeah, because I'm I'm I I'm a courier kind of do a lot of lifting, a lot of delivering moving parcels and all that. But I just find like on a hot day like today, a cold shower at night just cools the body down and just feels so much better than a hot shower.

SPEAKER_03: 20:32

Yeah, and and rightly so. And if remember it's what suits you and how it works for you as well. I think that's the best way. And for you, does that work for you, Damien? If it works for you.

SPEAKER_08: 20:43

Yeah, I I I just feel great after college. We do that. Do that. It's perfectly good on the kind of thing.

SPEAKER_07: 20:48

That's lovely. Good on you. Good on you, Damien. That's fantastic. Um, a quick text also from Svehr. Um, the 4-7 breathing technique sounds great. Is there an alternative when using a CPAP?

SPEAKER_03: 21:00

I'm going to research that and come back to you because I don't have the answer for that.

SPEAKER_07: 21:04

That's okay. That's all right. But Svea, thank you very much indeed. We'll we'll get an answer, we'll get an answer for you. And just before we clear a commitment, we've got time, we'll go to Cookie. Good evening, Cookie. Welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_10: 21:17

How are you doing? All right.

SPEAKER_07: 21:18

All right, how are you doing?

SPEAKER_10: 21:50

Yeah, the eating the early sort of food regular at least or you just blow up like a bloody bloat. You can't help it sometimes.

SPEAKER_03: 22:05

Cookie, I I I'm hearing you loud and clear. And if if you wanted to go or if you could, if you went to my website, a healthyshift.com, on there I have a free ebook that people can just download. It's a healthyshift.com, and if you scroll down, you'll see that there's a block there to download my free ebook on the what I call and have coined the phrase circadian fast, and it's about eating in line with the biological day and fasting overnight, which helps people to actually thrive so much better because you're not putting food in while your digestive tract is actually resting. So we misunderstand that because we're awake, we think our body is awake, but even though we are awake, our body is still going through the circadian cycle of rest and digest, which means our body is slowly shutting down, or and it has shut down overnight. And this is why you get that gas and that bloating overnight because you're forcing your body to digest food while it's still asleep. And this is also why we have so much insulin resistance and people gain weight as well.

SPEAKER_07: 23:12

And Cookie, we'll give we'll give just a little disclaimer. You don't need you don't need to share it on radio, but if you've got any underlying health conditions or or diabetes or anything with a doctor, while Roger's got a great book, always just double check advice with your doctor. You might be on certain medications as well. Just take a healthy dose of having a look at Roger's book, but also perhaps check in with your doctor or medical practitioner disclaimer as well. But that's great. But because you're actively aware of that, that that's really good.

SPEAKER_03: 23:38

Yeah, just you're aware that it is impacting on your cookie. So go with here's one. Go with how you, you know, what your gut tells you.

SPEAKER_07: 23:46

There you go. Cookie, thank you very much. With that, we need to clear a commitment. 133 693 is our number. You're on nights here on 3IW and right throughout the Ace Radio Network.

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SPEAKER_07: 24:43

Go on, ring us. More calls after this. And welcome back tonight's here on 3RW and Throughout the Ace Radio Network. 103 693 is our number, 0477 693 693. It's our text link. Caroline Katz and Barnes in for Dennis Walter this evening, and we're speaking with Roger Sutherland, A Healthy Shift, and we're getting lots of tips about shift work and sleep patterns and good sleep hygiene. Lots and lots of calls, plenty of time. The board is open. We'll go to Donna. Good evening, Donna. Welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_09: 25:16

Thank you. Um great show. Um I just wondered if Roger knows a friend in a healthy care organization. Um trying to get balance between obviously are you working at the 25th MIT hospital?

SPEAKER_07: 25:58

Jonathan, what can I just ask, what what what what's the main night shift? So for example, we had Michael who does 11 o'clock at night till seven in the morning. I regularly do nine thirty at night till five thirty in the morning. What is the night shift that is most of concern where where your organization is?

SPEAKER_09: 26:15

Yeah, so probably which areas should do twelve hours, should it be seven to seven? Or um uh ten to six. Sometimes eleven to seven.

SPEAKER_03: 26:35

Yeah, Donna, I uh the point that you've made that I unless I'm misunderstanding, you've asked me it's become very common for people in shift working organizations to start putting flexible working agreements in to not work nights. Is that the point that you're making? A hundred percent. Yeah, this is a massive problem. It's a massive problem because what it's doing is it's putting a lot of pressure on the people who are left to carry the weight of doing those nights. And I will tell you, Donna, you're not alone. This has become a massive problem in this country in particular, and in particular in frontline health.

SPEAKER_07: 27:14

Well, yes, and policing. I mean we have we heard Wayne Gatt the other week. What did he say? He was talking about this, you know, this uh supposed two-day be legislated working from home. And what was his great line that ran all week? You can't drive a Divi Van and a onesie.

SPEAKER_03: 27:28

No, you can't. No, it's a it's a good line, but Donna, it's um I I f f here your frustration that you're still working and other people are riding the gravy train, so to speak.

SPEAKER_09: 27:41

And it seems to be, you know, it understand under fair work the criteria that needs to be met, but this is uh things like um, you know, I get stressed if I work nightship, which is understandable.

SPEAKER_03: 27:56

Yep, but what have you signed up for?

SPEAKER_09: 27:59

Exactly.

SPEAKER_03: 28:00

Don't I'm I'm with you. I used to run um not run them, but I used to take part in the recruit panels for the policing, and we had the question that we had to ask them at the beginning because we had police coming in, and then when they saw their roster and they go, Oh no, no, I can't work night shift. What? Like you you've signed up for policing and you're saying you can't work night shifts. So what they ended up doing was they ended up introducing a specific question. You do understand that you will be working 24-7 shift work, which will incorporate night shifts, afternoon shifts, and day shifts, and they had to agree to that and sign it. Um that's it.

SPEAKER_06: 28:38

So how can we help Donna out? So what what can she do?

SPEAKER_03: 28:41

Well, I I think it's an issue that's got to be raised because it becomes a staffing issue in there, it's got to be raised with their union that it's putting pressure on the people that are left. I think the organisations, we've gone too far in relation to this now, and I think the biggest problem, in my opinion, is workplaces don't have to agree to uh flexible working agreements. It's it's a suggestion, and they don't have to agree to it, but they're terrified to not agree with it. And I think there needs to be a bit of pushback in relation to it. Maybe you could spill the flexible working agreements, make people reapply for them and understand that not everyone's going to get them. And if you don't like it, then you're not gonna have to find another job elsewhere. And I think it's unfair on people that I mean, there's people that have got children or having babies and they get all the agreements. And you've got to remember that there's people, there's women that don't have children, haven't had children at all, that have worked their solid career, 30 years, 35 years in place, never had children, having to carry the night shifts, the afternoon shifts and nights for people that go, Oh, I've had a baby, so I'm gonna be off for 12 months, and then my husband's gonna be off for 12. Who carries the shifts?

SPEAKER_07: 29:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 29:50

This is a massive problem.

SPEAKER_07: 29:52

All right. Well, Donna, hopefully a few tips there from Roger, and you can you can have a look at his website as well. Thank you for ringing. 758, a lovely text. Thank you very much. Evening guys, love this segment. What are the best foods or physical activities to engage in when coming out of a run of night shifts? If you have that gross jet lag feeling, dragging yourself out of bed on your first day of time. Awesome text. Thank you, Roger. Great text, 758, thank you.

SPEAKER_03: 30:18

If you think about this, I want you to think about this as when you travel. Everyone travels and they go to a different time zone. What do we do when we travel in a different time zone? We get up when it gets light, we eat breakfast at breakfast time, and we get out and we're out touring. We're walking, we're out in the daylight. Exactly the same as coming out a night shift. We need to get up as soon as possible. We need to get that daylight, we need to eat at normal times, breakfast, lunch, and dinner time, and we need to just engage in walking exercise outside. What we're doing, and the reason why you've got that awful jet lag feeling is because your body doesn't know where it's at in time and space. Because it can't see.

SPEAKER_07: 30:58

Because what it is, and I I can say that that when you're actually on shift, when you're engaged in the shift, whatever it is. So for example, when I fill in for Gabe Hodson, um Gabrielle Hodson, night shift, you're you're not tired during the shift at all because you're engaged, it's news, there's overseas news, everything. But it is when you get home at six o'clock in the morning that there's that period of time, and then a few nap and things, and then you're waking up at 10 or 11, you don't quite know where you are. So it's not when you're actually on the shift work that the issue is, it's the recovery afterwards outside of. And you almost need to allow yourself that day which no one has, especially if you're then swapping a shift. 043 has just texted through. Good evening to you. Um, my son works in a warehouse. His normal start time is 7:30 a.m. However, if he had to fill in as a van driver, he had to start work at 5 a.m. The next day he ends up with a migraine and on a couple of occasions has had to take the next day off because of vomiting. Have you got any tips?

SPEAKER_03: 32:04

Yeah, dude, this is actually circadian misalignment.

SPEAKER_07: 32:05

We'll leave your name off there, but we'll just say 043.

SPEAKER_03: 32:08

Yep, 043. Thank you. That that is actually severe chaos in his system, circadian misalignment. And this is why I say, and I want to make this point to people, I want you to stop thinking that you've got to get seven to nine hours sleep. I want you to start thinking about quality of sleep and start thinking about a regular routine of sleep as a priority. Now, if you're someone who's on nights, I want you to think of it as naps. So if you're doing your night shift, have a nap, get up, get on with the day, have another nap, do the night. I want people to remember you are not supposed to sleep during the day. You're a human being. You are you are a diurnal creature. You are supposed to sleep.

SPEAKER_07: 32:47

What about the Greek siesta though? When you go to Greece or Europe, they have a rest in the afternoon for two or three hours.

SPEAKER_03: 32:53

Yeah, and they have a they have a siesta in the afternoon, it's a nap, and you notice it's in that post-perannial slumber time between one and three. That is a natural dip in your circadian rhythm. Every person's circadian rhythm dips between that one and three. And if you're female, you will notice that even more, that your circadian rhythm will drop. That you have lunch, and everyone goes, Oh, I've had lunch, all the blood's rushed to my stomach or filter. It's actually a natural dip in your circadian rhythm. So once we know that, you can work through that because then you'll notice that around four, you then fire up, you come really good. And it's time for you to, you know, this is where your peak strength, your cardiovascular strength is up. It's time to go for a run. That's the time to go to the gym. This is it's our circadian rhythm is a clock. It's a rhythm that's running over and over again all the time. So for him, it's circadian chaos. So what we want to do is we want to try and stick as much as we can with the routine.

SPEAKER_07: 33:48

There you go. Well, um, that will hopefully 043 do that as well. We'll just get you to to bring that text up again, Ethan, as well. So, yes, so um her son, the normal is 7:30. Van driver had to start at 5. The next day he ends up with a migraine and he's had to the next day off because of vomiting. Hydration would be so hydration. Hydration would be high.

SPEAKER_03: 34:10

Electrolytes.

SPEAKER_07: 34:10

Electrolytes, that doesn't mean drinking the coke and the and the mother drinks and the and the barockas and all that type of stuff. No, it's water. Water, water, water. Yeah, even a bit of hydrolyte, maybe.

unknown: 34:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07: 34:21

Does that help? Yeah, hydrolytes fantastic.

SPEAKER_03: 34:24

But I would be certainly having something along the lines of a lot of water, and I would be just dropping a hydrolyte tablet. Because the more water we drink, we tend to flush that sodium out of our system. Um, we don't really know what creates migraines, but we do know that um a migraine can be brought on by you know dehydration and problems like that. We want to make sure that this water is going in through our system, more so on night shift because of this digestive tract that's resting.

SPEAKER_07: 34:52

There you go, 043. Hopefully that helps. Well, we're creating a lot of talk back and a lot of interest with this segment. Lisa, we will get to your text after the break. 133 693. Still plenty of time for your calls with Roger Sutherland. 0477-693-693. Any questions you've got about shift work or a good sleep routine as well, or general exercise, he's here ready to take your calls. We'll be back after this. So you just need to play this song any time of the day or night, and I spring up. That's my favourite song in the whole world. September. There we go. All right, so Lisa has texted through. Hi, Carolie Roger, team great show. Roger, my neighbour, is a FIFO worker.

SPEAKER_03: 35:36

Fly and fly out.

SPEAKER_07: 35:37

Fly and fly out, very common in Western Australia. He flies home after being on night shift at 10 a.m. The first thing he does is have a couple of beers and then goes to bed. What are your thoughts on this, please?

SPEAKER_03: 35:50

Well, first of all, I'm going to put a disclaimer on this. I don't drink anymore and I gave up alcohol. So I just want to say this comes from a very good place. I will tell you this categorically: alcohol, while it is a relaxant, it severely creates chaos in our system for sleep. And it doesn't help you sleep at all. In fact, it it is shown that it impacts very, very heavily on sleep. Now, I can understand he comes home and he just wants to chill and have a couple of beers. He's a fire, he's been away for a week. 12 days straight, he's been on nights, he's come home, he wants to put the feet up, and he just wants to do him because he's been at the beck and call of everybody else for seven days. So he comes home and he goes, This is about me. I'm gonna have a couple of beers. But what he doesn't realise is he'd be better off going to sleep and then waking up and then having a couple of beers. But you know what? He wouldn't feel like it then.

SPEAKER_07: 36:41

Yeah, well, that's because he'd feel so awful.

SPEAKER_03: 36:43

That's it. And that's the goal, because it would actually impact heavily. He'd be better off coming home, having a nap on the plane on the way back, and then having the beers, but staying up, going out for a walk, going out and doing things, staying up, and then going to bed earlier that night and having a solid good night's sleep. That would be the best way for him to go. Um, I I would highly, highly discourage. I know a lot of shift workers, especially in emergency services, will have alcohol to relax them, to put a rule a line between the shift and home, and then will try and sleep, and they go to sleep, but it causes so many problems for your salute.

SPEAKER_07: 37:22

Okay, there we go. Hopefully that helps. Good tips to pass on to your neighbour and get him to get him to look up Roger on um on Google and on the internet, because of course of your website. Now, DMAC has texted in and he said, My belief is pressure on something in your head causes migraine headaches, qualified by having after severe ones for 10 years. I went through a windscreen and a 100 mile an hour crash. Mile an hour crash. So he might be from the UK because 100 miles per hour is more than 100 Ks per hour, broke the frontal bone in half, fractured the skull in two places, never had a migraine again 60 years later.

SPEAKER_03: 37:57

That's incredible. Went through a windscreen, but he's never had a migraine since that the crash fixed the migraines.

SPEAKER_07: 38:03

Yeah, well, that could be a bit of a tongue-in-cheek, DMAC, if you've just texted through. Now listen, we've spoken about lots of tip for sleep and still plenty of time for calls. 133 693 or 0477693693. But we know that you prioritise your exercise, you you make an effort to do swimming and things like that. But you said something interesting to me just before we came on air before about what's happened to your swimming and gym membership.

SPEAKER_03: 38:27

Yeah, well, I'm actually recovering um from PTSD anxiety and depression, and part of my recovery has been um obviously I heard psychology and psychiatry all the way through. The thing that's helped me more than anything is that circadian alignment. Getting up, getting out, getting the light and exercising early. Now that might be just walking, or it has lately, since December, has been swimming. And I've been swimming five, six days a week and swimming 1500 metres, and I've been out early as the sun's coming up and doing my laps, and my recovery's been fantastic. And the insurer has just stopped my uh gym swim pool membership, which they were paying for as part of my recovery, but they have literally just stopped that saying that you have stabilised, so now we're not paying for it anymore.

SPEAKER_07: 39:17

Okay.

SPEAKER_03: 39:18

So now, how do you reckon that impacted on my mental health?

SPEAKER_07: 39:21

Probably not too good.

SPEAKER_03: 39:22

Yeah, I haven't been haven't been well at all the last few days. In fact, it makes me quite emotional to think about it because I've done really well managing it myself, doing something on my own, swimming laps with the black line of meditation, going up and down the pool, sorting out life problems in my own head, doing it for me, and now they've taken that off me. Now, don't get me wrong, it's selfish. I could go and pay for that and do that myself.

SPEAKER_07: 39:45

Yes, I was going to say.

SPEAKER_03: 39:46

I can absolutely do that, right? No problems. And I don't have a problem with that. But they're paying for the recovery. They're paying, and I was told on the phone that because I said you'll continue to pay for psychology and they're going to pay for the psychology, which I I I didn't tell you. Since I've been doing the swimming, I haven't been going to psychology because I don't need it.

SPEAKER_07: 40:06

I guess in a way, if you put the big nasty hat on of the insurance company. They're saying we've done our job. Yes, they're saying we've done our job, we've given you the tools to try and get you through for the rest of life as well, yep, off you go.

SPEAKER_06: 40:19

Yep.

SPEAKER_07: 40:20

Um so in a way, I understand them doing it. Is it is it fair no? Because it's always a bit of a shock. But I guess in a way, you are a living, breathing, walking example to everybody else listening to this show that just with those support structures in place, it's what you're doing regularly. And it's really good. Not everyone, as you know, um, and you're certainly not advocating it, but not everybody can perhaps swim or do it every day. But what you're also demonstrating is by realizing that it has helped you and by making it part of your routine, whether it's every day or twice a week or three times a week, that's really important because you're actually putting you first, because we know as a police officer from Vic Pole, you've put I've given enough of everybody else. Yeah, yeah. So, in a way, it's good. Now we've got to clear a quick commitment and we'll be back after this. We're on nights on 3AW here in Melbourne and right across Victoria throughout the Ace Radio Network. Just before we go to news coming up at eight o'clock. Roger, thank you very, very much for giving up your time so generously this evening for the listeners as well. Some great questions and topics, and if nothing else, you've got people actually thinking about the prioritizing of sleep as well.

SPEAKER_03: 41:31

Yeah, we just want people thinking about it. Quickly, our CPAP man, if you would email me directly please, um, and the email address is on the website and I will um get back to you in relation to how to support you with a CPAP machine.

SPEAKER_07: 41:44

Lisa has just said with the neighbour with the beers and the FIFO, um can you repeat your website again just really quickly?

SPEAKER_03: 41:50

A healthyshift.com. A healthyshift all one word.com. I'd love to communicate with you through that.

SPEAKER_07: 41:56

And we'd love to have you back on nights next time we're uh able to do so. Thank you very much and have a wonderful weekend. News is next at 8 o'clock, and after then, we're talking cheese.

SPEAKER_01: 42:10

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