(no subject)

[icarus]

wildernessguru is on his third straight week of work, 21 days without a day off.

You heard that right. He's had no weekends, no Saturdays, no Sundays off for three weeks while the yard is slammed.

They think they might get Memorial Day off.

I've taken over all the household stuff except the shopping. I'm getting really worried. He's so tired. When he gets home he barely has energy to eat. I'm going to shove a bowl of spagetti into his hands as soon as he's home so he can eat it on the way to the bed. He's just... a walking zombie. And they're putting in nine-hour days, too.

I mean, it's all at union wages and the overtime is a lot. This summer he'll probably have months off. But it doesn't matter. It's not worth it.

Can you believe that before unions life used to like this for everyone? Only with less money and 12-hour days?

Comments

[bruinsfan.livejournal.com]

Yikes! I hope he gets a break soon. I basically ruined my health in 2004 with a 3-month crunch schedule like that (much longer daily hours, but it didn't involve much physical labor as I gather Wildernessguru's job does) and it's taken me all this time to dig back out of the hole. I trust you're making sure he gets as much sleep as possible?

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

Three months? That's nuts. Are you okay now? What were the effects? Just worn out, or anything in particular?

He's not getting enough sleep. He's pretty disciplined about going to bed but sometimes he wants more of a life and stays up to watch the Sopranos. It (hopefully) will be over soon, and (hopefully) they'll at least get Memorial Day off. It's stupid to pay the wages to have all these exhausted men work Memorial Day. The company will have to lay out 60 grand for work that just won't be worth it, when everyone will do a better job if they can get some time off.

Icarus

[bruinsfan.livejournal.com]

Three months? That's nuts. Are you okay now? What were the effects? Just worn out, or anything in particular?
I gained 40 pounds in 8 weeks, and had some sort of blood pressure incident that made me swell up like the Michelin Man and get so physically feeble for a week that I could barely function. (And it was qualitatively weird weakness—flus and exhaustion make you too tired to expend much effort, but I found that lifting a 50 lb. weight made my muscles strain and hurt like I was picking up something four times the size.)

I'm OK now, though on blood pressure meds and likely will be for the forseeable future. But I've gotten myself back into shape similar to what I was before all the overtime (still somewhat overweight, but active and healthy feeling).

I don't know how much of a part mental stress played in the whole ordeal, but exhaustion and lack of sleep were definitely major causes on the physical side. And I got less sleep than I could have even given the crazy schedule because I still wanted to read, or watch TV, or socialize with friends in my off hours. If WG is open to unsolicited advice I'd recommend making 8 hours sleep a night minimum (and 9 or 10 would be better) his first priority before doing recreational things that are mentally relaxing, at least until the weekends come back.

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm OK now, though on blood pressure meds and likely will be for the forseeable future.

Jesus.

If WG is open to unsolicited advice I'd recommend making 8 hours sleep a night minimum (and 9 or 10 would be better) his first priority before doing recreational things that are mentally relaxing, at least until the weekends come back.

I'll pass that along, because he hasn't been getting enough sleep. I think that it helps that it's physical labor (in a sense) because he's so worn out that even when he tries to make himself stay up, he can't. He nods off.

It's 7pm and he's out like a light at the moment. :(

The good news is -- they all got Memorial Day off. And not only that, they were given the option to take tomorrow off, too.

Thank god.

Icarus