If you’re a parent, you’re probably willing to argue that people have no idea what sleep-deprivation is until they’ve had kids.
Nothing compares to waking up in the middle of the night, against your will, to feed a small human. NOTHING is more utterly exhausting than spending hours trying to put that little person to sleep, and having them wake you up with their cries in the early hours of the morning. And absolutely nothing is as mentally draining as trying to get things done while your baby is down, and then regretting it because that was your only chance to sleep.
Recently, Buzzfeed asked their community to share the weirdest things they’d done as sleep-deprived parents, and they were predictably hilarious.
One mum shared, “I walked out to my car and strapped my son into his car seat before I realised I didn’t have pants on.”
Oh.
Another confessed, “I was so tired I forgot our son’s name. I gestured to the monitor and asked my husband, ‘How’s what’s-his-face doing?'”
Whatever, he probably knew what you meant.
One mum said, “I kept trying to open the front door of my house by pressing the unlock button of my car key.”
It would seem, from the tone of her story, that it didn’t work.
Being sleep-deprived is in no way funny at the time. Being over-tired makes many mums do things they regret. Like putting a nappy in the fridge, and a bottle in the bin.
But let’s be honest. These fails are really, really funny in retrospect.