Maybe my "career" as an OTR truck driver should soon end. Maybe God has something else for me to do. Maybe I should just "tough it out" and continue my current employment. I do not know what is best. I will pray about it.

What has brought me to this point is this:

1. Two days ago, I drove with only two hours sleep in order to deliver a "very hot load" to a company in Edison, N.J. ... after being awake since 5:00 A.M. the previous day. This is not the first time something like this has happened to me. It seems like this type of thing happens every other week or so. I feel I had no alternative than to deliver "on time" .... or, be penalized with a "service failure" on my employment record with this company. Thank God the two-hour nap, coffee, and my guardian angel ... which helped me to drive safely to Edison.
2. I have had four or five "home time" breaks since last November. My current employer allows one day off for every week on the road. Each break was for three or four days, justified by at least a month on the road between breaks. It seems that the load assignments (one or two) immediately prior to my break .... take me hundreds of miles AWAY from my home-time destination, and I have to really drive long hours in order to make it home on the day I am to begin hometime. I feel the company is intentionally making it difficult for me (maybe all of their drivers) to take a home-time break. Also, I have had to use a half-day or a day of my home time to take the truck in to a company shop for maintenance and repairs. I think this is unfair and abuses the driver .... taking away from their earned home time.
3. The company recruiter, during pre-employment telephone calls, told me that I should average 2,500 miles each week. Since November, I have had maybe three weeks in which I drove 2,500 practical miles. Most weeks, my "practical miles" (miles paid to drive) are around 1,200. This shortfall in paid miles each week results in my net pay being a dollar or two above minimum wage .... when you consider the number of hours I work during those 1,200 miles. I have been told by my dispatchers that I do a good job for them, that they have no complaints with my job performance. I feel I have been lied to.
4. I repeatedly receive load assignments that are late even before I start driving; meaning, the pick-up date and time occurred several hours, a day, prior to the load being assigned to me. And, there is never an adjustment made in the delivery date/time, to compensate for the load being assigned "late" to me.
5. About once every ten days, I receive a load assignment which requires me to "flip-flop" my work-sleep schedule. I have difficulty changing from being a "day-time driver" to being a "night-time driver." I have trouble taking naps when my body wants to be awake, and staying awake when my body wants to sleep.
6. I have had to compromise my honesty and integrity in order to have daily driver logs/documents that will pass DOT scrutiny and guidelines. I do not like this situation!
7. And, as I write this, I received (at 22:15) a QualComm message for a Pre-Assignment of a load that should be picked up by 22:53 tonight .... which is five hours past the end of my 14-hour (DOT-mandated maximum) work day! I declined the pre-assignment.