Why wouldn’t my mother allow me to nap when I was sick?

[Anonymous]

I’m currently sick and being lazy, napping. I always feel guilty when I do, even when my husband sweetly tucks me in, brings me tea in bed, etc. Napping is normal and healthy when sick. So why didn’t my mother allow it?

When I would come home from school sick and would want to nap, my mother would get angry and tell me, “You’re not going to just nap all evening.” Not because I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night, not because there were things to do, just… because. So I would get up and watch TV, or read, or sit in the living room. All idle things. But I couldn’t nap.

I’ve always wondered what her motivation was. I wasn’t missing homework or work/chores or extracurriculars. She just wouldn’t allow napping, but gave no reasons. I would ask her, but I cannot. So as I lay and ponder, I thought I’d ask here. Does anyone know?

[Anonymous]

Control freak narcissist.

Did she also make you clean your plate or else sit at the table by yourself in front of cold food?

[Anonymous]

She was raised by an unloving parent

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:She was raised by an unloving parent

This is true, she was. But she was otherwise very loving to me, at times to the point of enmeshment.

[Anonymous]

Let it go. Let it go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Control freak narcissist.

Did she also make you clean your plate or else sit at the table by yourself in front of cold food?

She did not do this, but she had disordered eating.

[Anonymous]

There’s no logical reason. I encourage my kids to sleep as much as their bodies need when sick. It’s part of the healing process. I am spending today sick in bed and have been snoozing on and off.

[Anonymous]

Because she's one of those people who cannot imagine that others have different proclivities than she does. My mother is the same. She's stick-thin and has no appetite, so she thinks everyone who is overweight is a terrible person. She never sleeps during the day, so she thinks everyone who takes naps is a terrible person. And so on, for everything.

I moved away in my teens and never looked back, OP. And I don't treat my kids like that!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:She was raised by an unloving parent

This is true, she was. But she was otherwise very loving to me, at times to the point of enmeshment.

So was my mother. She seesawed between being really loving and caring to doing things like not letting me nap or relax. She was damaged by her mother OP.

[Anonymous]

Probably at some point you fell asleep in the car or something as a baby, and didn’t go to sleep “on time” that night. Or she heard friends talking about afternoon naps = not getting good sleep at night.

Does she have anxiety, by any chance?

I’m sorry, OP, I hope you take great naps whenever you want to, especially when you are feeling sick! Let those naps heal you in more ways than one.

[Anonymous]

If she is still alive, ask her.

[Anonymous]

It is highly likely that it because you wont sleep in the night, you probably argued that you would and she was too tired to keep explaining that you wont.

[Anonymous]

She might well have been told that daytime napping would harm your recovery because you wouldn’t be able to sleep at night or something like that.

People have all sorts of false ideas about illness. Did she also think you get sick from getting cold or wet? “Put on a jacket, you’ll catch your death of cold!”

I had an uncle who wouldn’t drink ice water because he thought it might give you a heart attack.

I doubt it was because she was being mean. She must have heard that was bad somewhere.

[Anonymous]

I hate the fact that everyone jumps to the conclusion that your mom was a bad person. My guess is that she had some experience--a childhood friend, a family story, or just something she read about--involving someone who went to bed sick and never woke up or was much more critically sick than they seemed. Keeping you awake might have been her way of keeping an eye on you without saying, "I'm afraid if you go to bed, you'll die."
A kid in my hometown died of meningitis during a nap. My mom didn't keep us from napping, but she was always asking us to move our necks around to see if they were stiff. I did the same with my kids, probably never gave them an explanation, and they probably thought it was a weird request.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I hate the fact that everyone jumps to the conclusion that your mom was a bad person. My guess is that she had some experience--a childhood friend, a family story, or just something she read about--involving someone who went to bed sick and never woke up or was much more critically sick than they seemed. Keeping you awake might have been her way of keeping an eye on you without saying, "I'm afraid if you go to bed, you'll die."
A kid in my hometown died of meningitis during a nap. My mom didn't keep us from napping, but she was always asking us to move our necks around to see if they were stiff. I did the same with my kids, probably never gave them an explanation, and they probably thought it was a weird request.

Agreed. There may be a weird reason like this. Or maybe just worry about you being up all night and too tired to function in the morning.