gender differences in sleep disturbances

An interesting new piece of research showing yet another area where moms are putting in more than their share – in getting up in the middle of the night to care for children.

I wonder how much of this discrepancy is due to breastfeeding. While breastfeeding, the burden is pretty much on the mom to deal with middle-of-the-night feedings, either by getting up, or by pumping enough milk so that dad can give a bottle in the night. Dad can get up to change the diaper before the feeding (for me, that was a big help) but still, dad’s sleep disturbance will be 10-15 minutes and mom’s will probably be 15-60. At what point does a well-rested mother, who can be a better parent during the day and/or better breadwinner for her family outweigh the benefits of breastfeeding?

Assuming both parents are equally capable of meeting the child’s need, an author advises, “For parents of young children, the best approach might be discussions and negotiations about whose turn it is to get up with the baby tonight."

I have to thank Mark for introducing the idea of earplugs. It seemed a bit cruel to me at first, to tune out the sounds of your baby’s crying. However, it forced us to decide each evening, who gets to wear earplugs? The person with the earplugs in is allowed to sleep. The person without the earplugs is the one who gets up. So the decision as to who is responsible is made every night before we go to bed. We were lucky to not have to deal with much in the way of sleep disturbances after the first few months – but taking turns and having a schedule definitely helped us get through the initial period.

How do you decide who gets up in your house?

The Division of Labor

This is an interesting article, and Blue Milk summarizes it so well, I don’t have to.

Women still have a way to go in getting more leisure and less work. Though I found the finding that those with the most rigid divisions of labor have the least stress interesting. Sometimes I feel we are unusual with our hour by hour division of childcare duty and our regular negotiations over household chores. These divisions are instigated by me, because I don’t particularly see why I should spend more time than my husband on drudgery, or less time on leisure.

It doesn’t quite work, as he still seems to get more leisure time than me. Part of it is due to him prioritizing leisure (while I prioritize work), part of it is due to lower standards. But we do what we can. The fact that I have a toddler, a job, and can get regular sleep and time to myself is pretty successful in my book.
How does the division of work, childcare, leisure work in your household? Do you feel satisfied with the balance?