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If sleep is so important. Why didn’t we evolve to have our newborns and toddlers not destroy our sleep? Are parents sacrificed for the well being of the kiddos?

If sleep is so important. Why didn’t we evolve to have our newborns and toddlers not destroy our sleep? Are parents sacrificed for the well being of the kiddos? sleep deprived and frustrated father

Pimpus 7y ago
Our lives no longer resemble our natural state so the premise of this question is nonsensical.
cesnja 7y ago
From natural selection perspective, at that point you've already passed on your genes and now your most important mission is to ensure those genes get passed along. Your own wellbeing is not important.
- emerongi 7y ago
  Of course it is important, a newborn is not able to survive for years to come without parental support. If terrible sleep reduces the parent's survival or its ability to protect the child by a big enough percentage, I'd imagine there would be an evolutional pressure there.
Smaug123 7y ago
Note that humans are helpless for an incredibly long period of time (compare with horses, who can run almost as soon as they hit the ground). It looks like nature has offloaded a lot of the normal work from the child to the parents, in the case of humans; we're very much an evolutionary oddity in this regard. Interesting factoid from the fascinating Legal Systems Very Different From Ours: the Kaale (a Gypsy tribe in Finland) don't recognise the parent-child relationship at all, because reproduction is ritually unclean; the facts of reproduction cannot be admitted. Instead, a mother leaves the tribe to bear her baby, and returns with it, whereupon the baby becomes the entire kin-group's responsibility. Sounds to me like a good way to let parents have some sleep, by batching up the group's children!
koonsolo 7y ago
Hey I feel you. A lot of people might not like my answer, but here it goes. I have a 2,5 month old daughter, and my wife breastfeeds her. During the night, I don't wake up because she immediately gives her milk when she wakes up. There are a few things evolution gave us for support (correct me if these 'facts' are wrong): - When women breastfeed, they get some hormone that can put them into REM sleep way faster. - Men are not as sensitive for sounds during their sleep as women. So evolution wise, this was probably mainly a mothers sacrifice. This lets the other, more physically strong parent (when that was still important) function at 100%. In these modern times, work is divided and so both parents divide all family and money work, and so also share the sacrifice of sleep deprivation.
- dm3 7y ago
  Not sure why people wouldn't like this answer. We've had great success with this approach and co-sleeping even after the breastfeeding period. Would be interested to hear negative experiences.
  - koonsolo 7y ago
    I was afraid of the "women should take care of the family" argument.
- surfsvammel 7y ago
  We do this as well. Well, we try. But I sleep more light than my wife. So it is always me waking up first anyway. With our first child, I slept in another room altogether to get the sleep needed for work. With two small ones it’s much harder. I either get woken up by a karate heel-kick to my nose or just the horrible feeling of a wet bed.
- jakebellacera 7y ago
  I'm in a very similar situation right now: my daughter is 2.5 months old and my wife breastfeeds. And while the first month was rough for both of us; ironically, I feel like I've been sleeping better than I have in years during the last month. Probably because I know that I need to sleep to perform my best when I work so I can provide for my family.
mrweasel 7y ago
I actually thought about that exact same thing last year when my daughter was born. As frustrating as not getting enough sleep is, what irritated me more is that apparent lack of ANY evolutionary advantage to sleep depriving your parents.
croo 7y ago
The whole family living with you and helping you out,just rest when the baby is with someone else. Oh you live in the 21th century? Sorry :( At least the kid won't die from starvation and diseases. So that's good. But you have to go to work 40-60 hour every week away from your beloveds to a place where sleep is forbidden. So that's bad.
WA 7y ago
Yeah, and now take: reduced immune system from sleep deprivation + a lot more exposure to viruses from kindergarten = why parents of young children get sick so often.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

If sleep is so important. Why didn’t we evolve to have our newborns and toddlers not destroy our sleep? Are parents sacrificed for the well being of the kiddos? sleep deprived and frustrated father

Pimpus 7y ago

Our lives no longer resemble our natural state so the premise of this question is nonsensical.

cesnja 7y ago

From natural selection perspective, at that point you've already passed on your genes and now your most important mission is to ensure those genes get passed along. Your own wellbeing is not important.

emerongi 7y ago
Of course it is important, a newborn is not able to survive for years to come without parental support. If terrible sleep reduces the parent's survival or its ability to protect the child by a big enough percentage, I'd imagine there would be an evolutional pressure there.

Smaug123 7y ago

Note that humans are helpless for an incredibly long period of time (compare with horses, who can run almost as soon as they hit the ground). It looks like nature has offloaded a lot of the normal work from the child to the parents, in the case of humans; we're very much an evolutionary oddity in this regard. Interesting factoid from the fascinating Legal Systems Very Different From Ours: the Kaale (a Gypsy tribe in Finland) don't recognise the parent-child relationship at all, because reproduction is ritually unclean; the facts of reproduction cannot be admitted. Instead, a mother leaves the tribe to bear her baby, and returns with it, whereupon the baby becomes the entire kin-group's responsibility. Sounds to me like a good way to let parents have some sleep, by batching up the group's children!

koonsolo 7y ago

Hey I feel you. A lot of people might not like my answer, but here it goes. I have a 2,5 month old daughter, and my wife breastfeeds her. During the night, I don't wake up because she immediately gives her milk when she wakes up. There are a few things evolution gave us for support (correct me if these 'facts' are wrong): - When women breastfeed, they get some hormone that can put them into REM sleep way faster. - Men are not as sensitive for sounds during their sleep as women. So evolution wise, this was probably mainly a mothers sacrifice. This lets the other, more physically strong parent (when that was still important) function at 100%. In these modern times, work is divided and so both parents divide all family and money work, and so also share the sacrifice of sleep deprivation.

dm3 7y ago
Not sure why people wouldn't like this answer. We've had great success with this approach and co-sleeping even after the breastfeeding period. Would be interested to hear negative experiences.
- koonsolo 7y ago
  I was afraid of the "women should take care of the family" argument.
surfsvammel 7y ago
We do this as well. Well, we try. But I sleep more light than my wife. So it is always me waking up first anyway. With our first child, I slept in another room altogether to get the sleep needed for work. With two small ones it’s much harder. I either get woken up by a karate heel-kick to my nose or just the horrible feeling of a wet bed.
jakebellacera 7y ago
I'm in a very similar situation right now: my daughter is 2.5 months old and my wife breastfeeds. And while the first month was rough for both of us; ironically, I feel like I've been sleeping better than I have in years during the last month. Probably because I know that I need to sleep to perform my best when I work so I can provide for my family.

mrweasel 7y ago

I actually thought about that exact same thing last year when my daughter was born. As frustrating as not getting enough sleep is, what irritated me more is that apparent lack of ANY evolutionary advantage to sleep depriving your parents.

croo 7y ago

The whole family living with you and helping you out,just rest when the baby is with someone else. Oh you live in the 21th century? Sorry :( At least the kid won't die from starvation and diseases. So that's good. But you have to go to work 40-60 hour every week away from your beloveds to a place where sleep is forbidden. So that's bad.

WA 7y ago

Yeah, and now take: reduced immune system from sleep deprivation + a lot more exposure to viruses from kindergarten = why parents of young children get sick so often.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]