'I'm a new mum. Here's what no one told me about the sleepless nights.'

If you have recently welcomed a tiny, screaming version of yourself into the world, you'll know what it means to be exhausted. Not just tired, not just sleepy, but bone-tired, running-on-fumes, about-to-collapse exhausted.

Expectant parents often hear the same advice from those already in the trenches: "Get plenty of sleep now!" they say, with an evil laugh. As if sleep is something that can be stored up for future use, like canned goods for the apocalypse. 

When I was pregnant and enjoying some lovely, uninterrupted rest, I thought a lot about how I would cope with being woken up multiple times per night. As someone who is about as friendly as a Bondi cafe worker on limited sleep, I was nervous.

Watch: How to sleep again in four simple steps. Story continues below.

As it turns out, waking up wasn’t the problem.

Once my little girl arrived, it began. At all hours of the night, I would leap out of bed like a firefighter at the station when I heard her cry. My heart racing, I would take her out of her bassinet, feed her, change her, re-swaddle her and put her back down. She, fortunately, would go back to sleep straight away. I, unfortunately, would not.

After each feed, I’d return to my post and lie wide awake, desperately willing myself to go back to sleep before the next cry - and failing most of the time. Yes, everyone tells you about the wake-ups, but no one tells you how hard it can be getting back to sleep.

Of course, if you’re a champion sleeper who could catch some z's while listening to a brass band play in a tornado, this might not be a big problem for you. For me - both an anxious person AND a light sleeper who can hear a leaf rustle two towns away - it’s torture. Either way, multiple studies have shown that hearing a baby cry can cause a rise in levels of cortisol - the hormone associated with stress. So even if you’re a snooze master, the transition from emergency responder to deep sleeper can be tougher than making it from breakfast to naptime without three coffees.

Now, if you read 2,000 articles about how to get back to sleep (as I have at 3am while trying to do just that...), you're going to see the same advice.

"Sleep with your phone in another room," is always at the top of the list. 

Cool, thanks for that, but I’m a millennial mum. That phone is my source of all the world’s information, my "is this normal!?" question-answering device, and - most importantly - the baby monitor, which is now an app. So excuse me if I'm not quite ready to sever that (charger?) cord just yet.

Next up is usually "try some calming breathing techniques."

Ha! Breathing techniques? Hold my double-shot while I double-over laughing. Breathing techniques are great, but an anxious, ruminating new mother needs something far more distracting. If she didn’t successfully use breathing techniques during labour, she’s definitely not using them now.

Ok, so what can you do if you’re suffering from insomnia when you desperately need rest? Here are some practical tips I use every night (that actually work):

1. Do not touch that phone.

It’s fine to sleep next to it and it’s okay to look at it to check that your baby is breathing, but DO NOT start scrolling TikTok (or, you know, read The Wall Street Journal). You’re tempted, I know, but don’t do it.

2. Do not calculate how much sleep you have/haven't had.

"If I fall asleep now, I'll get in a solid four hours." Sound familiar? I have lost many, many hours of sleep to this form of torture. 

When you’ve experienced major sleep deprivation (the kind that makes you burst into tears for no reason), it’s natural to fear missing sleep and agonise over exactly how much you've had. This is actually known as "sleep anxiety" and it’s a cruel trap. Instead, we have to trick our minds. To do that, we need to...

3. Flip the script.

In much the same way as we now tell kids, "you don't have to eat that" (as opposed to what we all heard growing up - "You have to eat it, it's yummy!"), we want to tell our brains that no sleep is ok. What? No sleep is… ok!? I know, hear me out. 

We need a no-pressure approach that reduces our sleep anxiety. Instead of lying there thinking, "Go to sleep! Sleep! Sleep!" I tell myself, "It's ok; rest is as good as sleep. Just relax your body and try to rest." Or, something a sleep expert once told me, "Even just 15 more minutes will do you good." This one is particularly helpful at 4:30am when you’re dreading seeing a glimpse of the sun coming up. 

I also remind myself that I have survived every awful no-sleep day before and I can do it again. "It’s ok if you don’t sleep" is the general vibe. Instantly, the pressure and stress come down - and you’d be amazed at how often you can drift off to sleep from there.

4. Play Scattegories.

Now that we've relieved some of that pressure, you might want something to replace those racing thoughts. One thing I do is play Scattegories in my head. It’s distracting enough to silence anxious rumination (better than counting sheep or breathing techniques) but also boring enough to put you to sleep. 

All you do is choose a category and list things from A to Z. Famous actors, countries, things you eat for breakfast - whatever you like. I have never made it past "T".

Listen to This Glorious Mess, Mamamia's weekly parenting podcast. Story continues after audio.

5. Don't look for holes in the fence.

It must be said: 3am is a dark time for worriers. Much has been written about what a vulnerable hour this is and how anxious thoughts have a nasty way of surfacing at this time, when we are unable to distract ourselves like we during the daylight hours. 

I recently heard the phrase "don't look for holes in the fence" and it really resonated. As humans, we build our lives like metaphorical houses. We have the house, the garden, the fence, etc. Anxious thoughts will naturally seek out those "holes in the fence" as a way of trying to protect us. Many 3am thoughts are like this. Simply say to yourself, "It's ok, we don't need to look for holes in the fence right now."

6. Stay in the present.

As an anxious, phone-addicted 30-something, I'm sure you can guess how much success I’ve had with meditation and mindfulness. About as much as I’ve had resisting croissants at the local bakery - none. But mindfulness is really just about staying in the present moment. 

Middle of the night thoughts are always about either the past or the future. When you have a baby, you are constantly assessing past events and thinking about what to do next. So when I can’t sleep, I remind myself that “nothing is wrong in this moment. I am safe, I am in my bed. I just have to lay here.” I then use grounding techniques with my senses - what can I see? What can I feel? What can I hear? Sure enough, it works.

If all of this doesn’t help, and your under-eye bags are bigger than Louis Vuitton trunks, there’s always coffee - the official parenting beverage sponsor. Just pace your cups out so you don’t end up speaking in tongues by 2pm.

Chloe O’Toole is the Head of Marketing for Talent, and founder of Matching Meals.

Feature Image: Supplied.

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