So this is what tired feels like
The trap here is that we use the word ‘tired’. Everyone knows what ‘tired’ feels like. It makes you feel a bit unmotivated and lazy and like you can’t wait to fall into bed.
But parents aren’t ‘tired’. Parents wish they were tired. What parents feel is a whole different word that doesn’t actually exist.
Parents are one closed eye away from sleep at all times. But they’re not lying down in bed; they’re walking through the shops, strapping their babies into car seats, trying to hold conversations, all while their bodies are tutting and sighing, putting up the ‘closed’ sign and tapping their feet waiting for home time.
What do you call it when your eyelids feel like sandpaper, grinding off the outer layers of your eyeballs? Or when your brain is just cottonwool pulsing inside your forehead? When people ask if you’re okay and all you hear is ‘apple fairy ottoman’ and you can taste the couch in your mouth and walking feels dangerous?
Exhausted? Weary? Drained? Nope, none of them sound quite right.
You’re a husk. A shell. A barely animated corpse, incapable of processing how tired you are but pretty sure you’re on the brink of death.
What do you expect when you’ve had a total of 42 minutes of broken sleep in four weeks?
Because ‘sleep like a baby’ doesn’t mean what you think it does.
Somewhere along the line, people have become confused and believe that to ‘sleep like a baby’ means ‘to sleep soundly and contentedly’. But anyone who’s ever had a baby will know this is not a thing.
Babies sleep fitfully, sometimes in bursts as short as ten minutes at a time, and they sound like they’re being choked while they do it.
Babies are the loudest sleepers, which makes it really bloody annoying when they’re in a bassinet next to your bed all night and you’d really like to go to sleep but your body is now in mum-mode, which means you wake up at the slightest sound, ever-alert for feeds and emergencies.
So while your baby snorkels away next to you, you lie awake and try to find it cute but instead just silently rage at your partner who seemingly doesn’t worry about emergencies in the middle of the night because he is the one sleeping ‘like a baby’. Actually, he’s ‘sleeping like a father’.
New mums tally up their minutes of sleep with the accuracy of a government tax auditor. Every minute gained and lost will be accounted for. And in that mental spreadsheet there’s a hidden column tallying up the minutes of sleep their partner is getting. It never balances out.
The bone-aching exhaustion affects every part of your life. It can make you angry, weepy, moody and spiteful. People getting more sleep than you are sitting ducks. The mere suggestion that someone else might be tired will send a new mum into a mind-melting rage.
‘YOU are tired? YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT TIRED IS, MOFO. I slept for fourteen minutes last night. I fell asleep on the toilet this morning. I WALKED STRAIGHT INTO A WALL AND I DIDN’T EVEN CARE BECAUSE I GOT TO CLOSE MY EYES FOR A FEW SECONDS. Tell me again how tired you are.’
New parents spend a lot of time trying to spot the baby’s tired signs. This is a set of jerky movements, ear-pulls and hieroglyphs that let you know they need to be put down for a nap. Spoiler alert: if they’re awake, they’re tired. Put them to bed.
But everyone is so focused on how much sleep the baby is getting no one notices that mum is standing there wearing gumboots and a shower cap, brushing her teeth with a candle and obsessively staring at her jerking infant and trying to decide if he’s tired or trying to communicate through modern dance.
Here’s a guide to a mother’s tired signs that your loved ones might find useful. Feel free to distribute.
If you spot a mother stifling a yawn, it’s likely she’s had a night of broken sleep. She’s going to need plenty of caffeine to survive the day. Hand that mum a coffee.
Note: it’s safe to assume that every mother with a baby is this tired as a default. If she is not this tired, she has a unicorn baby. Or she’s on the good drugs. Either way, good on her.
If you are trying to talk to a mother and she is giving you the wide-eyed fake smile, it’s likely she is very tired. She thinks if she opens her eyes really wide she might trick herself into feeling awake.
Please don’t be offended if you need to repeat yourself eight times before she responds with a noncommittal ‘Mmmm’. She’s trying her very best to look interested in you and it’s drawing precious energy away from her brain. Be patient.
Mum has had a rough night and she’s in a mood. There’s nothing more to say. She hates life today. Nothing will fix it except a four-hour nap. Fussing and whining can be expected.
Note: the resting bitch face is not necessarily directed at anyone in particular. Mother Teresa would cop a bit of attitude if she walked in the door right now. Although she probably deserves it because WE GET IT TESS, YOU’RE PERFECT. I’M TRYING, OKAY?
When a baby starts to grizzle, it’s time to put her to bed. When a mother starts to grizzle, it’s best to step back and let her go. She hates anyone and everyone who looks at her, speaks to her or drives near her. This may be coupled with jerky movements and incoherent screeching.
It is likely she will be shovelling old Easter eggs into her mouth because she needs sugar like she needs air and she doesn’t even care if the chocolate is all chalky and white. STOP STARING.
Do not try to reason with her or argue with her and for the love of god DO NOT tell her to ‘calm down’ or ‘relax’. If you think this is okay to do, you deserve everything you get.
As we all know, crying = overtired. A crying mother has tipped over into self-pity and the world is her enemy.
That sad ad on TV? Tears.
Husband taking toast from her plate? Sobbing.
Poonami just as she’s walking out the door? Whimpering.
Trying to unlock the car but accidentally hitting the lock button over and over again? Wailing. And swearing.
Tread carefully because being too nice to her could bring her undone completely. Ignore the tears in her eyes and keep talking to her like she’s completely sane.
This shell of a woman is one slow blink away from unconsciousness. She cannot respond to your questions. She can’t even muster the energy to cry. She can only stare into space. All her energy is being poured into remaining upright and keeping her eyes somewhere near her baby in the hopes she may be able to react before he chokes on his rattle.
Don’t take it personally if she shows no enthusiasm for anything you are saying. If she’s making eye contact, take it as a sign of interest; she just has no energy to arrange the rest of her face into a socially acceptable expression.