A 52-year-old single father navigates nighttime feedings, air-raid sirens, and sleepless nights with his five-month-old daughter Sara during the war in Israel—
Wars are usually described in numbers: missiles launched, targets struck, operations planned. For civilians, war is measured in something much smaller — hours of sleep.
Or rather, the lack of them.
When Parenthood Meets War
I am a 52-year-old Israeli single father raising a five-month-old daughter named Sara. She was born after a long and complicated surrogacy process, and like most babies her age she has a fairly predictable nightly routine: a bath, a bottle of formula and then a few precious hours of sleep before the next feeding.
Until recently, that routine mostly worked.
Parenthood already turns nights into fragments of sleep. You measure time not in hours but in feedings, pacifiers and the occasional cry from the crib. Over the past five months I learned to adapt. You sleep when you can and function when you must.
Then the war expanded.
In Israel, when air-raid sirens sound, civilians have only seconds to reach a safe room. At the beginning of the war, Sara and I moved temporarily to my parents’ apartment because it has one. It seemed like the practical decision.
One recent night reminded me how strange wartime parenthood can be.
A Routine That Began Like Any Other
Around seven in the evening, after her bath, Sara drank only half of the formula she normally finishes before bedtime. Parents quickly notice these small irregularities, because they usually mean the night ahead will not go as planned.
Still, I followed our usual routine. I played the lullaby she knows and laid her down to sleep. Within minutes she drifted off.
For a moment I allowed myself a small fantasy: perhaps tonight I would actually get some rest.
The illusion lasted only a short time.
Noise outside the building woke Sara. A gentle pat and a few quiet words were enough to calm her, and she fell asleep again. Encouraged, I tried to sleep as well.
The First Siren of the Night
Around 10 p.m., the first siren of the night sounded.
For a split second my mind raced through small calculations: Had she eaten enough? Would she wake up crying?
I picked her up and hurried to the safe room.
Fortunately, Sara used the interruption to finish the rest of the feeding she had skipped earlier. Afterward she fell asleep again, calm and undisturbed.
I did not.
Instead I drifted in and out of a light half-sleep.
Between Sirens and Exhaustion
Around 1 a.m., another siren sounded.
Once again I picked Sara up and carried her to the safe room.
By the early morning hours the exhaustion had accumulated. In a few hours I was supposed to get up for work, and I was trying to figure out how to keep going after five months of barely sleeping.
Still, you take rest wherever you can find it.
Even ten minutes of sleep on the bus on the way to work can feel like half a night.
At 5:30 a.m., another siren sounded.
I picked Sara up again and hurried with her to the safe room.
After that I gave up trying to sleep, got dressed for work, drank tea with a few biscuits and said goodbye to Sara before leaving the apartment.
The One Person Who Doesn’t Understand the War
Through all of this, she remains blissfully unaware of the reality around her.
For Sara, the occasional trips to the safe room are simply another part of the nightly routine. Lights turn on, adults talk and attention suddenly focuses on her. If anything, she might even find it entertaining.
Perhaps that is the only real comfort in this situation: she is still too young to understand what war is.
What Resilience Really Means
Reading the morning news, one often hears about the resilience of Israel’s civilian population. Looking around, it is hard to disagree. People wake up after nights like this and still go to work, send children to school and continue with their lives.
Resilience does not mean the absence of exhaustion or fear.
It simply means continuing anyway.
A Hope Worth Holding Onto
Like every parent, I allow myself one hope that may or may not be realistic: that by the time Sara grows up, nights like this will belong to history rather than everyday life.
Perhaps that hope is an illusion.
But for a tired father holding his daughter between sirens, it is an illusion worth keeping. his daughter between sirens, it is an illusion worth keeping.
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