My DH made an interesting point last night. He said people assume they would wake up if XYZ happened or they assume the dog would bark. But how do you really know?
I am typically a light sleeper and wake up to every little cough or my middle child talking in his sleep. I complain that, once awake, I can't go back to sleep and I wake up easily. HOWEVER, there have definitely been times when I have slept through something when my DH just happened to be awake and he knows I have not even stirred. How would I know what I have slept through unless there is a witness or evidence?
Second, we have dogs who bark. They are annoying they bark so much - at other dogs, cars, people walking, leaves blowing across the yard, etc. But a few weeks ago our house got TPed and neither dog made a sound. We've been making fun of them for it. BUT, as my DH pointed out last night, how do we know they didn't bark? Just because we didn't wake up? I assume I would wake up if they were barking, just like I assumed they would bark if someone were in our yard in the middle of the night. But one of those things did not happen. I have been blaming the dogs, but how do I know?
It just made me wonder about how sure people are that they would wake up. There aren't a lot of cases where parents have slept through an abduction, but it has happened in some cases where there is now no doubt. It makes me feel bad for any parent living under suspicion whose only "crime" is that they didn't wake up.