Skip to main content

Are Your Suffering From Parenting Sleep Deprivation as a Parent?

Are you suffering from parenting sleep deprivation?

The power of sleep

suffering from parenting sleep deprivation, parenting sleep, parenting tips, calm parenting

Parenting is always a rush with little time for good quality sleep

We are all in a rush. We rush to work. We rush to get our kids to school. We rush to social outings. We are in a rush to grow up and so on. Life seems to be spent in a perpetual hurry. We have loads of things on our to-do lists daily and in order to fit it all in, the one thing we usually sacrifice is sleep. 

We are all guilty of it from time to time. Sleep can feel like the easiest part of our lives to give up, in order to get through our daily checklists and feel as though we are succeeding in our pursuit of good parenting. But, of course this is at a huge cost to our mental, physical and emotional wellbeing.

There is a difference emotionally between deciding to reduce your sleep and someone else (e.g. a snoring partner, a wakeful child, a noisy animal that wants to be fed at 5am every day) making that decision for you. When you are in control, there is less anger and bitterness associated with the sleep debt. Even a waking baby can drive parents to distraction – despite understanding that the baby is of course not deliberately trying to deprive you of sleep. Your ability to cope with sleep deprivation is also dependent on how well you are able to catch up on sleep and on you total sleep debt.

So how much sleep is enough?

On average, adults need between 7 and 9 hours of sleep per night. However, you may function well on as little as 6 hours sleep, or may require 10 hours of sleep to be at the top of your game. Most people have a sense of how much sleep they need in order to feel alert and functioning at their best – the average being 8 hours of sleep per night.

Sings of Sleep Deprivation

According to WebMD too little sleep may cause/influence:
  • Memory problems 
  • Lowered reaction time
  • Depression (e.g. postnatal depression) 
  • A weakening of your immune system, increasing your chance of becoming sick 
  • The perception of pain 
The accumulation of repeated sleep deprivation results in a sleep debt which is only temporarily masked by coffee. When you are really tired, that coffee hit won’t do the trick – you need to repay the sleep debt in order to be able to function at a suitable and safe level again. If you continue to push through your sleep deprivation, you can end up with depression, so it’s important to catch up on your sleep at the next available opportunity. 

Do whatever you can to regain your sleep. For example:

  • take a quick nap with your child 
  • eat dinner an hour earlier to allow your food to digest & give you a better night’s sleep 
  • give yourself permission to have the night off & go to bed earlier 
  • ask someone to give you a hand so you can have a rest 
  • ask for an extension on a work project or class project so you can catch up on sleep 
  • speak to your doctor about a herbal sleep aid
  • drink a sleep tea before bed
  • listen to some relaxing music to help you fall asleep soundly

Plan to make sleep a priority

You know yourself better than anyone, so if you really are sleep deprived, make a commitment to clear your sleep debt and see how much more positive, clear and vibrant your life becomes.

Lizzie O'Halloran, BBSc, MASR, NLP Prac
Author, Counsellor

  Discover Help For Mums FREE Positive Parenting Solutions

Positive Parenting FREE Video Series


Positive parenting solutions

Calm Parenting FREE Starter Course


Positive parenting solutions

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How Parenting Affects Child Development?

How Parenting Affects Child Development Parenting and Child Development Parents want the best for their children, so it makes sense that as a parent you want to do your best to support your child to develop to meet their full potential.  Parenting Research shows us that parenting plays a pivotal role in child development, particularly when it comes to academic performance, self esteem and overall happiness. Core aspects of child development The  'Parenting Matters: Supporting Parents of Children Ages 0-8 (2016) paper identifies the following core areas of child development 1. Physical health and safety Receiving care that leads to normative standards for growth and physical development. 2. Emotional wellbeing and Behavioural competence Receiving care that leads to a healthy sense of self, an ability to cope with stress and the ability to regulate emotions accordingly. 3. Social competence Receiving care that supports children to be able to develop and maintain posit...
Post a Comment
Read more

Five Ways To Reduce Stress at Work in Motherhood

Five Ways To reduce stress at work in Motherhood It's easy to say "just relax", but when you're feeling overwhelmed and don't know where to run first. This is when you need a few quick fixes to get you back on track as quickly as possible.  Below are a number of quick and easy ways to reduce stress whilst you're at work. 1) Write things down Often the feeling of being overwhelmed comes from having too much in your mind and hence relying on your memory to get you through. The worst part of neglecting to write things down is that your mind continuously reviews your list of tasks and in turn increases your anxiety over "all the things you still have to do".  Take 5 minute to write down everything that's racing through your mind. It doesn't matter how small. The idea is to get these thoughts out of your mind and on to a notepad where you can refer to them later. 2) Take a break You might think you don't have time t...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Truth About Parenting No-one Ever Tells You

Becoming a New Parent is Often Terrifying Parenting takes time and needs to be adaptable to the needs of your child. As a parent you have a huge impact on your child's health and happiness. However, modern day life leads to a great deal of stress, particularly as parents are often feeling judged by others if their children are not behaving perfectly in public. One of the major problems with society is that there are so many different theories on parenting. For instance one expert will state children are meant to cry a certain amount per day, whilst another will say leaving a child to cry is detrimental. As parents, you have decide which theory sits best with you and then you need to be able to cope with the consequences of being judged, should you encounter someone in public who disagrees with your parenting methods. No-one really teaches parents how to be good parents A lot of this comes with trial and error and with choosing one parenting skill over the other. At the end ...
Post a Comment
Read more