The Restless Nights of Parenting: 'As My Kids Learned to Sleep, I Unlearned'

Homer Simpson may have three children, but he sleeps like a baby. Sure, the father of the family from the cult animated series isn't a paragon of parenting, but when it comes to getting a good night's sleep, he's a champion. Watching him snore his heart out on the couch while Bart gets up to mischief, Lisa plays the saxophone, and little Maggie and her irremovable red pacifier staggers around the living room, you can see that the Simpson kids haven't dented the patriarch's sleep capital at all. The world's most famous donut eater can fall asleep anywhere—he suffers from narcolepsy and nods off while driving and at work—but more importantly, he manages to doze off without being consumed by worry that something might happen to his children. Americans describe this state of bliss as a dad nap . Escape from the chaos of home to take a restorative nap, a dream of a sweet madman?

For most people with children, sleeping is an activity that is at best complicated, at worst forgotten. A survey commissioned by the health app May in 2024 shows that three-quarters of parents of very young children experience sleep problems. 66% of them rate their exhaustion level at 7 out of 10. Crying from hunger, full diapers, nightmares: the needs of babies and toddlers have a direct impact on their parents' sleep. So far, nothing too surprising...

You have 85.99% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.