Sleep Deprivation in New Moms

Rachel Royce: Sleep deprivation started with me, when I was actually in hospital. When I had my second child, he unfortunately had to go in Intensive Care. And I thought great, I will get some sleep, which is horrible, but not really. I mean, he was born a bit early, so they put him in an incubator. He was fine. I felt great, I will get some sleep. But then I didn't realize, they had put me in a shared room, and the other women's baby was crying whole night, and by the second night I was so fed up, I stopped at the corridor of this hospital, going to nurse, just find me a cupboard, I want to sleep, I was desperate. I think it's a worse thing, isn't it? Cheryl Baker: I have twins -- with mine, I was thinking, well it would be fine, because they will both wake up at the same time, and I will feed them at the same time and then they go to sleep at the same time. And didn't do any of that. Ingrid Tarrant: They were completely out of sync. Cheryl Baker: Oh! Yeah. completely. Ingrid Tarrant: And couldn't you try and get them into sink though, keep one up longer and wake one up earlier. Cheryl Baker: I tried, but they have their own idea of when they want to wake up. And Steve, God Bless him, my husband, he was good. He was good. But it was, I had to breastfeed one and then he would do the other one with a bottle, but imagine -- do you find this, man can sleep through by a baby, they don't hear it. Ingrid Tarrant: But I think it's a selective hearing, isn't it? I mean, I can sleep through he puts his alarm, but my alarm will wake me up, because it's not important. I don't need to do that. So, when they know that you are the one that's going to get up and whatever, they can switch off, and equally you could. If they said, if you are bottle feeding and he said, I will do the feeds tonight and everything, you would not wake up. Mara Lee: Oh! I don't know, because I used to wake up when used to I hear my kids' dummies drop. And then in the next few minutes, he just did -- and I figured out. I have been getting -- I became such a light sleeper and I think that was just awful. Female Speaker: But how long for? In sort of very early days you are to wake up that drop and stuff. Mara Lee: Well, I guess, I mean, but I think at that point when you are worried about it, you also so fatigued that you do conquer that, I mean, I think for a good year after each of my kids was born. Rachel Royce: And how did it effect you, did you get really irritable? Mara Lee: I felt like I would never sleep again. And I had that awful feeling of why didn't anyone tell me -- that generic -- sleep goes out the window, I didn't realize that it meant, that every two hours, or every half an hour or every -- Cheryl Baker: You just don't know. Mara Lee: That there is no block of sleep that you ever get to repay for all of those nocturnal -- Ingrid Tarrant: But did you not find while you were pregnant, that your body was preparing for sleep deprivation because I did, because I wasn't sleeping as well. So by the time the babies were born, or baby, I only had one at a time, not like you. But again, I was kind of prepared, because I haven't been sleeping well. Obviously you have got this great big bump and you are waking up. You can't get comfortable so you are almost getting to that sort of mode that you are compensating a little bit, that when you have your child, it's not such a shock, I didn't find it such a huge shock at all. Mara Lee: To a degree, but I think that the killer is, that there is no point at which the kids go home, back to their real parents. Imagine they are out there, somewhere knowing what to do with them, you don't have that thing where, you can just pop them away and then just recoup and get that big block of sleep and I think, yes it prepares and you have got, you are going to the loo every three hours when you are pregnant, but when the baby arrives there is just no time that you can actually reclaim for yourself. Ingrid Tarrant: There is, we just don't take it. Because when I had my first child my mother, who did it the very traditional way. She had us, she was in hospital for two weeks, when sometimes that would be two hours, you have a baby and you are out. She had two weeks to get into the system, into the routine, to get used to the idea of having baby and I was looked after, really looked after. So, that immediately put on a good cause. And she was saying, actually it's ridiculous, you can't come out of hospital so quick, you should relax, sleep when the baby sleeps and do whatever you've got to do with the baby. Rachel Royce: I think, that's fair, isn't it? You have got to get almost in the same pattern as the baby, sleep them with them in the day. Ingrid Tarrant: Exactly! So, we don't need to suffer sleep deprivation really. Cheryl Baker: But after six weeks of giving birth, I went back to work. So, there was sleep deprivation all night and working all day. I felt sick and tired. Ingrid Tarrant: But there is a choice. That's what I am saying, we don't have to. Cheryl Baker: No, one month would be far too soon. Rachel Royce: But did you find your babies adopted a different sleeping pattern because you were at work? Because I have read that some babies would wake up in the night more, if their mother works, because they want their breast milk or whatever or they want to be with them. And actually, some mothers can get a really good pattern of sleep going, go back to work and then it reverses and the baby is sort of wake up during the night to see you or that didn't happen? Cheryl Baker: I don't know. I don't know. Ingrid Tarrant: Were you breastfeeding or both? Cheryl Baker: No. I breastfed up to six weeks. No I am lying, up to 12 weeks, and I weaned them off because I was working, I was doing 'Record Breakers' and I remember one particular time, they were doing a tug of war 'Record Breaker', we were in the middle of a field and I had all the pads in; just in case, in my bra, and a baby cried and of course -- Rachel Royce: What happened to me, walking in a supermarket, and you hear somebody else’s baby cry and your breast just starts leaking -- breastfeeding is also, that’s something they don’t tell you about, isn’t it beforehand? Cheryl Baker: You just don’t know. I have no idea. I thought, when I had a baby, it was all going to be natural and lovely and I would know exactly what to do and I knew nothing. Mara Lee: because at the end of the day after caring for my love one, I’d go to bed and I’d sleep until morning, and I can’t believe how naïve that was that I didn’t understand that it was the 24X7 and as you say, you’ve got to regain your sleep cycles and survive on little droplets along the way, instead of that big -- Ingrid Tarrant: Catnaps. They are catnaps. Cheryl Baker: Certainly. Rachel Royce: With my first baby, I made a really bad mistake, because my mother said, oh! Don’t worry babies sleep all day. So, I thought, the baby had to be asleep all day and if he was awake, I would panic. I’m pushing around the bed for him to sleep and like most of time, he was asleep and I used to walk to these mother and toddler groups and my baby would be sleep. And I would say, oh! It would be so nice to him awake one day, and I’m going like shh! She is sleeping. Then I was surprised that he woke me up at night. Mara Lee: There is another thing, the more sleep they get during the day, the better they sleep during the night. Rachel Royce: Oh, It’s not true. Mara Lee: It’s not true. Ingrid Tarrant: Well, I am not so sure. My son is the laziest thing and he sleeps too much. Don't you find that on a holiday, that you can just sleep and sleep and sleep, all the day in the sun and then you get up and think, oh! That was exhausting, or whatever. But going back to sleep deprivation, actually it’s not just for us, the sleep deprivation is for children for as well. I think, we deprive babies of sleep because when we are running around and it's like with working, where so many young moms are going back to work, and they don’t have a routine at all. In fact, I am out of the door. If you have got other children, of course, that's immediately going to effect them because when you’re got to get them to school, the baby is asleep, to have the 6 o’ clock feed. But you’ve got to take our children to school at 8 o’ clock or whatever. Wake up the baby, it's going to be disturbed and woken. It was both ways, as a matter of fact, so everybody’s routine goes out the window. Rachel Royce: A lot of them fall asleep in the car, I mean that's the classic, if you can't get your baby asleep and they are screaming, you just put them in the car and go for a nice long drive. Cheryl Baker: Definitely it worked. With mine as well, when one woke up and started crying, they would always, she would always woke her sister up and she would start crying and then you’d have two crying babies, I was just trying to get them back to sleep. The amount of time, she was walking up and down singing, humming, singing little songs that my momma taught me. Ingrid Tarrant: At least you can sing. Mara Lee: Actually, when we’re driving on this really long road, I’m trying to get my little boy asleep. I think I was putting myself to sleep, the eyelids are heavy, it’s actually quite dangerous, I think too. If you go for something long. Rachel Royce: Oh! Yeah and you are tired yourself. Mara Lee: And you’re so desperate to get this. I remember I would jump in the car, I would have no sleep all night and all the day with this thing absolutely beside myself, I’m going out of my head and driving with this poor little kid, an unfit mother with one eyelid. Rachel Royce: What’s about the theory of leaving them to cry themselves to sleep? Did any one of you do that, like just putting them -- Ingrid Tarrant: I did. If I knew, yes. Because my first child, he started to cry at 6 o’ clock. I can guarantee at 6 o’ clock every evening, there would be this crying session. Now I don’t know if this is true, it's a bit like, it is a bit of a mystery and it was sort of clearing the lungs, they did that, it was exercising lungs or whatever. I thought this is really bizarre, it’s so routine. I used to just check, he is not wet, he is not hungry, he is not in pain, so do all the sort of like soothing that, you are alright! Da! Da! Da! Put him down and let him cry for 15 minutes. I think the thing is you make a lot on your own, but if you are always there, the minute they cry, you will pick them up or whatever, they know, they are so clever, instinctively, they can’t tell you this is how they’re doing it. I want to cuddle, I’ll cry, and she'll pick me up, they will never stop crying. Rachel Royce: There are theories on that, aren't there? Because some women say, I always pick them up and cuddle them. And I wasn't great, once I was done with 'At The Bottom of the Garden' you can cry for a bit, because you are meant to be asleep, you are a baby. Ingrid Tarrant: I agree with you. I think that’s the way to do it. Because they are cute like that. It will be that and then actually then later on, when you have other children, that child would be small, that's what my sister had with her first one. Straight away, they were that two doting parents, and sort of, and immediately sort of there was something, a cry or falling over, both parents would go to her. Mara Lee: I think, it's contentious, there are two schools of thoughts now. Control crying and get them into a routine or do attachment parenting or whatever it’s called and you respond to every demands and then psychologically they are not damaged but we all know that in reality, sometimes it just ain't going to happen that you can attend to every cry and they need their sleep, don't they? So, I think you choose what you want to choose and that works for the whole family basically.