Sleep.
We spend so many of our parenting years obsessing over that five-letter word, from how little we get of it to how independently children do it. Once you get into a rhythm, you feel like you've won the lottery — and for one snoring dad, he thought he hit the jackpot.
The dad is a self-proclaimed extremely loud snorer.
So loud he could even wake up his father who was such a deep sleeper that when his mother was in labor, she had to wake him up by throwing a soaked towel on him.
That's pretty loud. And 10 years ago when his son was just a wee baby, it was pretty bad.
"We had my son sleeping in the same room as my wife & I, that's where the crib fit, and we didn't have to rely on a baby monitor," the dad wrote. "Our kid didn't mind it, he was close to Mommy & Daddy. My wife & I didn't mind it, we both woke up when it was night feeding time. He got used to Daddy snoring."
It evolved to where the baby didn't just not mind his snoring, he ended up needing it.
"This was great! On the weekends, when the little Golfball needed a nap, I got to take a nap, too! He slept better when he could hear Daddy snore."
Only as time went on, his wife noticed something disturbing about his sleep patterns.
When he was loudly snoring, he stopped breathing while he slept.
"If you stop more than 5 times per hour, you are diagnosed with sleep apnea. I was stopping 60 times per hour, and my O2 sat would sometimes drop down to 70% or so. Needless to say, I was prescribed a CPAP machine."
Although it was great news for the dad's health, it wasn't great news for the baby.
"Now my kid had problems with sleeping, because Daddy didn't snore so loud," he confessed.
His CPAP machine was an irritating white noise to the kid, who would prefer to hear his dad's loud and labored heavy breathing.
Evidently, it was a fitful few months to get him used to sleeping again without dad's snores.
Although everyone who read about this was cracking up, a few actually had helpful suggestions.
Our favorite? The guy who found an hour-long YouTube video of a person snoring for any parents who are in a similar situation.
Listen, when it comes to sleep, the rule is to do what works for you and your family. And if that means snoring compilations, so be it.
