History Main / SleepDeprivation

--> '''Getrude''': Why would you even HAVE something like that?!
---> '''Sam''': I don't KNOW, I haven't slept in four days!!

** Homer gets a second job in the episode where Lisa gets a pony. He works days (his old power plant job) and nights (his new job in the Kwik-E-Mart). He gets no sleep and is absolutely exhausted.
** In one "Treehouse of Horror" segment, the kids try to stay awake as long as possible. If they fall asleep, Willy kills them. It's rather desperate attempt because they know they can't stay awake forever.

** In one episode, there is a new airport in the Evergreen Terrace. The whole family can't sleep and are in poor shape physically as a result.
** Marge can't sleep well when Homer starts snoring.
** Maggie is crying non-stop in one episode when they try to take away her dummy. Cue the whole family looking like zombies without their sleep.

Characters who can't sleep or haven't slept well become irritable, fatigued, absentminded, sick, crazy, careless, desperate, proud of the accomplishment... It depends how serious the situation is and how it is played. It can be played for laughs, for drama or horror. Those who can't sleep will often have ExhaustedEyeBags and the situation might lead to them looking SeriouslyScruffy, even after just one sleepless night, though it's more common to show after a longer period of sleeplessness.

* Noisy inconsiderate neighbours who want to party the whole damn night... or worse, {{ahem}}, [[RightThroughTheWall partying in the bedroom]].
* [[HellIsThatNoise Never-ending noise]] (airport, train station, traffic, construction site) -- typical plot is that a new building is being built in a peaceful neighbourhood.
* CountryMouse is visiting a big city and the noise level is too much at night and too different from their normal environment; likewise CityMouse in the country can find the silence or the different ''kind'' of noise too weird.
* Emergencies. Sudden serious and potentially dangerous situations which need immediate action to deal with them.
* Burning the midnight oil. Typical for over-worked or poor-planning students before tests or examinations; writers who are suddenly inspired or need to meet the deadline; night owls who want to work at night, but are forced to wake up early as well and so on.
* Stressful jobs: Cops, doctors and others sometimes must prolong their shifts. In business, characters must deal with last-minute orders or important accounts.
* Military, maritime and space settings often show enlisted personnel doing their turn at the night watch (sentries or guard duty). A cliche of these scenes is to show them battling sleepiness. If you've never seen the character until their watch, they may be a RedShirt who ends up dead.
* Terror. They are afraid of a lethal threat (robber, monster, alien, etc) which they believe will attack during the night, so they must keep watch until morning.
* Anxiety. They feel nervous or worried over something which prevents them from falling asleep.
* They have to keep thinking about a specific thing, trying to figure out something. Or perhaps they have just seen ''something'' and need BrainBleach.
* Self-imposed scientific or artistic experiment.
* Crying babies and sick children who need their parents' care and help.
* The character's spouse starts snoring.
* They will watch just one last video... Just this one. And this one. How is it so late? Or so early in the morning?
* They're [[JustForFun/TVTropesWillRuinYourLife on TV Tropes all night.]]
* ... and more!

!!Related tropes and subtropes:

* In the ''Literature/ClariceBean'' book "Don't Look Now", Clarice gets very nervy and literally loses sleep over her worries.

* In ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13473286/1/Gaz-Taster-of-PTSD Gaz, Taster of PTSD]]'', Gaz suffers from this as a result of [[PlaguedByNightmares recurring nightmares]]. The lack of decent sleep, and her [[TherapyIsForTheWeak refusal to talk out her root issues]], causes her to start having SanitySlippage [[spoiler: until she has a breakdown. After a brief stay in a mental hospital, she starts getting better]].

* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randy_Gardner_(record_holder) Randy Gardner]] holds the world record for going 264 consecutive sleepless hours without using stimulants. DoNotTryThisAtHome. Literature/GuinnessWorldRecords no longer keep records for sleep deprivation out of concern for the ill effects.

* In [[https://www.topherpayne.com/love-you-forever this]] alternate ending to ''Literature/LoveYouForever'', the man is rewritten as only pretending to be asleep when his mother goes into his room at night and rocks him in her arms, and it leaving him tired at work.

* Never-ending noise (airport, train station, traffic, construction site) -- typical plot is that a new building is being built in a peaceful neighbourhood.

Characters who can't sleep or haven't slept well become irritable, fatigued, absentminded, sick, crazy, careless, desperate, proud of the accomplishment... It depends how seriously the situation is and how it is played. It can be played for laughs, for drama or horror. Those who can't sleep will often have ExhaustedEyeBags and the situation might lead to them looking SeriouslyScruffy, even after just one sleepless night, though it's more common to show after a longer period of sleeplessness.

Characters who can't sleep or haven't slept well become irritable, fatigued, absentminded, sick, crazy, careless, desperate, proud of the accomplishment... It depends how serious the situation is and how it is played. It can be played for laughs, for drama or horror. Those who can't sleep will often have ExhaustedEyeBags and the situation might lead to them looking SeriouslyScruffy, even after just one sleepless night, though it's more common to show after a longer period of sleeplessness.