I got about 5 last night. I prefer 8, but it doesn’t always happen. Mostly I function on about 7. How much are you getting?
Nothing changes your sleep habits like bringing home a baby. A new study of 1000 UK parents (source) has revealed that parents miss out on an average of SIX MONTHS SLEEP during the first two years of their child’s life! The study also showed that roughly ten percent of parents manage on as little as two and a half hours uninterrupted sleep per night, and that almost two thirds of parents with kids under two get by on just three and a quarter hours of sleep per night.
Those statistics make my five hours sleep last night seem ok. The truth is though that while it’s an improvement on two or three hours sleep, five hours still isn’t enough. Sometimes as parents we don’t have a choice. Last night I had one sick child tossing and turning and really unsettled until midnight. Once she was finally asleep I could get some rest myself. Of course, the other child was awake and coughing at five am. (Oh, and the sick husband slept like a log.) That’s an unusual night in our household though, and not the norm.
A normal night in our house involves a regular routine that sees children into bed by 7pm. That means the kids are able to have a full twelve hours sleep if they need it, though they both usually have around eleven. It also means that my husband and I have a good block of time in the evenings. We have time to catch up with each other as well as time to do our own work, and we can still get to bed by 10:30(ish) pm. That’s our norm, but it doesn’t take much for the “norm” to get out of whack. All it takes is a week of sickness, or a teething child, or a 4yr old who accidentally falls asleep in the car in the afternoon to disrupt things.
When our norm is out of whack, and my sleep is interrupted, I know I don’t function at my best. I am more likely to snap at the kids. I am more likely to overreact about something my husband says or does. I am less patient with everyone. I sigh too much. The problem is that a sleep deficit can build up over time, and it can only be replenished by... sleep! Once upon a time, in a life before children, a lazy Saturday sleep-in did the job. I don’t know about you, but in our house these days a sleep-in is 7:30am! That leaves me with two options really. Option 1 = do less stuff and go to bed earlier. Option 2 = have a daytime rest myself when the little one is asleep and the big one is at kindy. Of course, I could do both...
Are you getting enough? I’d love to hear how many hours you average a night, and how you manage when you haven’t had enough.
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Catherine Oehlman is a SAHM currently being raised by a terrific toddler and a curious crawler. Her background in primary education, love of the mothering journey and compulsion for writing collide on her SquiggleMum blog. Cath encourages other parents from all walks of life to maximise the time they spend with their children.
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