A news item in the paper couple days back reported a woman in Alappuzha (my home district in Kerala)
causing the death of her kid by spinning the infant in the washing machine. The reason she gave for doing
so was interesting - since the birth of the kid, she did not get to sleep properly !!!
While the report mentions her to be slightly mentally challenged, the reason she gave cannot be ignored as
trivial. Humans need sleep as much as they need food and lack of sleep can have disastrous consequences.
I still remember the drive back from Velankanni to Chennai few months ago, when I was so sleepy that I
could not stay awake at the wheel. I am only a few hundred kms from Chennai, but sleep had so tightly
overpowered me that I could not stay awake. I would stop the car, wash my face with cold water, have a
cigarette/coffee, but as soon as I got behind the wheel, I would feel sleepy in the next few minutes. It took
innumerable such pit-stops before I reached Chennai and heaved a huge sigh of relief.
Now that was just because I had limited sleep for the past 2 days. Now imagine going without proper sleep
for a year. And add to it the routine of managing a household, taking care of an infant and making sure the
elder one is got readied for school every weekday at 7:45AM ? I can't even imagine myself doing all that,
without a proper night's sleep.
As Ishaan turned 1 year old on 22nd August, it marked a year of little or no sleep for Sheena. Unlike Aman,
who used to sleep like a baby (literally), Ishaan seems to revel in limited sleep. In the year past, we have
never seen him sleep for hours like kids his age would normally do. Apart from the fact that getting him to
sleep at night was an ordeal in itself, almost no night went by without him waking up crying atleast 5-6 times,
which means Sheena has to get up, feed him and get him back to sleep. And by the time she does manage to
catch a few winks, the 5AM alarm would go off as a signal for her to start the day so that she can get things
ready for Aman to catch his 7:35AM school-bus.
Last Saturday night was a sleepless one for both of us in the train to Chennai as Ishaan was crying all night.
For some strange reason, a night in an a/c train sets off this fever in him and this added to his crying. At
home, I would maybe wake up a couple times at most and give Sheena some moral support and then go to
sleep. But in the train, since the crying would be disturbing for others, I also stayed awake for most of the
night, helping her by taking Ishaan out of the a/c area and trying to put him to sleep.
Sunday night was no different though now we are at home in Chennai. The fever which had subsided during
the day, reared up at night and though I did manage a few hours of sleep, it was way below my usual quota,
leaving me tired during the day at work. All this for just 2 nights of lost sleep. Gave me a new perspective
into what Sheena must have been going through for the last 1 year and still not even chiding the kid.
I am sure I would have flipped my lid on day 2 itself. Which explains why God felt men could not be entrusted with child-rearing. :-)
