Night Shifts and cal counting

I work at Montreal's 911 call center; which means, 24h/24h service, and....horrible night shifts as soon as school ends :(  I work at night from December 21st to December 26th....and I'm clued as how to count calories. 

Night shifts are 10h45pm to 6h54am.  I used to eat all night long to keep me awake (can't sleep while on a call!!!), and to pass time...  I'll  bring books and all my drawing stuff to keep me busy, but I still doubt I'll be able to kill the '' bad eating habit ''.

I'm in need of advices :(  And, how to count my calories?  Since...my '' day '' will be during night...

I started a night shift holiday gig a couple weeks ago as well, but it's 11:30pm to 8am, with overtime running to 9am. Luckily, it's physical work doing billing of photos, lifting and sorting heavy sacs (who knew that people still print so many still?!), so I'm burning quite a few calories.

However, since I'm sleeping during the daytime, and to keep in sync with my husband, who's got a regular day job, I eat supper as usual before going to work.

Then I eat a "lunch", as regular in type of food and calories as I would during lunch during the day, during the meal break at around 1:30am or 2:00am, along with fresh fruit for snacks during breaks.

When I get home, I have my regular breakfast, since it's cereal and juice, as usual, and isn't too heavy, before going to bed.

This way, I only have one meal time-shifted to the evening. I count my calories the same way, listing the middle of the night meal as "lunch".

My only problem is that I have to bump up the amount I'm eating, as my deficit is getting too high, as determined by my hunger, lack of energy, and increase weight loss rate. I don't want to get more than a 500 calorie deficit per day and risk pushing my metabolism into starvation mode (there's lots of good information on this site about the downside of doing that while trying to lose weight).

Good luck with the night shift! I remember call center work, and ugh, I prefer what I'm doing, despite it being more mindless and much more physical. At least I can wear my iPod and listen to music and podcasts.

I work 6p-6am at a hospital..(so times are approx.)

here's a typical 'workday'for me- I wake up around 1:00 p.m.- and treat that as my 'breakfast' time....I usually have a snack around 4, and 'dinner' around 8 or 9... and then about 1 I have another snack...  I drink lots of water at work which has helped with my hunger ( I used to eat all night too!)

I don't know if that's a good way, but it's been working for me. On my days off, I just flop everything the opposite way. (like eatings meals where they should be:)

 hope this helps you and good luck!