According to this Canadian study, a mom with several children would have more fragmented sleep, while the dad would sleep (almost) like a dormouse.
Having a child is an incredible source of happiness, but being a parent also has a few less rosy sides. Once the baby is there, parents sometimes tend to become overprotective, constantly worrying about their offspring. A permanent stress that would impact the sleep of parents, more precisely that of mothers with several children.
This is the rather astonishing observation made by researchers at McGill University in Canada. It seems that moms with multiple children have more fragmented sleep than moms with one child. For this study, 111 parents including 54 couples and three solo mothers participated in the work of doctoral student Samantha Kenny, under the supervision of Professor Marie-Hélène Pennestri.
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Tracks to dig
The stress of parenting would weigh heavily in the balance. “When you are a parent, you sleep, but you are on the alert (…) It adds stress which can affect the perception of the quality (of sleep). We sleep, but we don't know for how long ”, says the researcher.
However, one of the researchers specifies that this study should be taken with a grain of salt, as it is a factor that they may “Hardly to measure”. “Moms can have a hard time sleeping for a number of reasons, but of course one of the assumptions is that there are many children who might need to be attended to. This would be specified in future studies”, Says Marie-Hélène Pennestri.
Dads wouldn't have a problem sleeping
The study states that fathers are not impacted by lack of sleep. The researchers explain this by the fact that 96% of the dads who took part in this study, worked during the day, unlike the moms (but where did they get their panel?). It is therefore possible that these parents made the decision, within the couple, that only the mother takes care of the baby during the night or, the mother perhaps takes care of the children during the week and the dad, the weekend.
However, it is important to have an equitable sharing of tasks in the couple to avoid one of the parents being too busy compared to the other. What if when you are at home you take over with the children so that your other half can tackle a book or go for a walk? If your partner is taking care of the children, feel free to do the rest of the household chores to relieve her.
Quick tip: doing it without being asked is even better!