A recent article in The Atlantic featured sleep researcher Amanda Lamp, PhD, an assistant professor in the Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine Department of Translational Medicine and Physiology and core faculty member of the Sleep and Performance Research Center.
Titled “Why Am I So Tired?”, the article explores its titular question and the science behind why many parents of young children—especially mothers—experience constant fatigue even if they manage to get eight hours of sleep a night.
Lamp notes one contributing factor is the “enormous” mental load working mothers carry as they juggle multiple types of tasks without the same family or community support enjoyed by parents in pre-industrial times.
“Our brains are not built to deal with this onslaught of information,” Lamp says in the article.
She recommends at least 10 minutes of “wakeful rest” a day to combat this, letting the mind wander during a mindless task such as folding laundry or going for a walk without the cognitive demand of listening to a podcast, making your mental shopping list, or any other distraction.