Dad’s viral TikTok hilariously nails every parent’s anxiety when little kids sleep in

One of the best parts of watching a viral TikTok is that moment when the video immediately reels you in and leaves you feeling 100% seen and understood. Well, that moment is about to happen to every parent who has ever had one of their tiny children sleep in a tad later than usual.

Because every single one of us has the exact same thought process, and this dad totally nails it in this viral TikTok. On one hand, you’re soaking up every second of enjoying your coffee in silence and calm. It’s heavenly. But on the other hand… ARE THEY OKAY? ARE THEY ALIVE? WHY ARE THEY SLEEPING IN LIKE THIS?!

In case you were ever wondering if that kind of anxiety spiral only happened to you, the answer is no. You are not alone. We’re all in this illogical place of panic together!

“Do y’all ever wake up and your kids aren’t awake, and it’s the normal time they’d be awake, and you’re like ‘Oh my gosh, how are they still asleep?'” he asks. “And you’re kind of enjoying the peace and quiet, and then you’re like ‘Oh, are they alive?’ But you’re like, ‘Oh this is so nice, I do want them to be alive but I’m really enjoying them not being awake right now.”

And really, that feeling of duality goes beyond your kids sleeping in. It happens when they’re with the sitter, or at Grandma’s house, or anywhere except right in front of you demanding every last ounce of your patience and energy.

It’s also not unlike that feeling you get during nap time when you want to enjoy the peace and quiet for a couple of hours, but also feel like you should be doing All The Things. Because when you become a parent, you never know how to truly, fully, and deeply relax again. You also never regain 100% of your own agency again, because that belongs to the tiny humans we’re responsible for keeping alive and safe.

“So you have this mixed feeling of, like, ‘I’m kinda okay with this right now and I hope they’re okay, but I’m not going to check on this and see if they’re alive because I don’t want to mess up this silence,” dad Justin concludes in his viral TikTok.

This happens to me more often than not, because I’m awake before my children 90% of the time. If they sleep in suspiciously longer than usual, I will either tiptoe as quietly as I can to go check on them (and ruin everything) or I’ll fish out the busted baby monitor from the junk drawer and quickly peek in on my toddler to make sure she’s breathing.

If all of the above sounds like you, mama, congratulations—you’ve found your people.

A version of this story was originally published on March 2, 2022. It has been updated.