Earlier to bed now, or just rip off the bandaid?
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Anonymous
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School starts in 10 days. At this age, not sure if we start implementing a strict schedule in regards to sleep/wake time in preparation for school, or just rip off the bandaid when it’s time to go back.
Pros and cons of each at this age? My friend who also has a tween and a young teen said she’s forcing it starting Monday, but our other friend with older kids said her kids have always adjusted just fine the day of. |
Anonymous
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It takes 6 weeks to adjust to a new routine, ie, have your body wake naturally at the expected time each day. So, it doesn't really matter at this point. Use this opportunity for leverage: lay out the options to your teens, tell them they can choose, and then remind them how wonderful you are the next time they complain about you.
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Anonymous
| We live in a county that started back this week and we just ripped off the bandaid. They couldn’t go to sleep earlier and trying to wake them early during their last week of vacation seemed wrong. We had a rule this week that they could not nap after school because they needed to go to bed earlier and that helped get them regulated again. |
Anonymous
| we didn't follow through with a plan to start winding down at the beginning of August. Now with 10 days to go, we'll let it go this weekend and Monday move bedtime up incrementally each night until we inevitably rip off the bandaid. |
Anonymous
| Rip off the bandaid. Let the kids be kids and enjoy summer. They will adjust. |
Anonymous
| Another rip off the bandaid person. My kid is having fun and it gets crazy soon enough. |
Anonymous
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Sleep physicians will tell you that it’s very detrimental to health just to add an extra hour or two of sleep for a lie in on the weekend, after later than usual nights - the issue being that the sleep schedule should be the same continuously for optimal health.
Letting kids stay up all hours and sleep all day in summer is not really a good thing any way you slice it. Consider keeping them on a healthy sleep schedule during vacations and summer breaks going forward, it might teach them not to go off the rails once they leave your home as semi adults. |
Anonymous
| I make my kids start adjusting 2 weeks before because they are absolutely feral sleepers in the summer. |
Anonymous
Curious as to whether you have/had any actual teens, and how you get them to go to sleep at 9:30 PM and wake up at 5:30 AM, year round. |
Anonymous
+2 The first 2 days of school the kids were easy to ease up bc they were excited. Then it's Labor Day weekend so you can easily adjust a bit more then. |
Anonymous
| We just rip the bandaid. But my kids are only shifted by 60-90 minutes. |
Anonymous
| We keep our routine year round. Makes it easier. Kid is in MS. Might get harder in HS but she is already starting to understand how important her sleep is so hopefully will be relatively easy. |
Anonymous
| We keep our routine year round, barring the two-ish weeks when we travel on vacation. Usually have to be back mid-August so that means the kids have at least two weeks to readjust to their normal routine. |
Anonymous
| Another rip off the bandaid. My kids start Monday and have been trying to maximize end of summer sleepovers and we are fine with it. I’m a teacher and I also rip off the bandaid for me, with staying up way too late watching tv during those last days of summer before the teacher work days. |
Anonymous
| 21:12 - ages are middle and high school |