regarding clock/radio alarm and getting up times?

[SoMuchToBits]

Dh and I have one ds aged 12. During the school term weekdays, ds needs to leave the house at about 7.45 am to catch his bus to school. I set my alarm for 6.30 and get up between 6.30 and 6.45. I can then be up to make sure ds is up, and that he has had breakfast/got everything for school etc. Ds sets his alarm for 6.30 and again for 7, and if he hasn't surfaced by 7 I wake him up. Dh sets his clock radio for 6.30 and it burbles away for about 15 minutes, then switches itself off. He doesn't usually get up until at least 7.30, often later, but in term times I don't mind this, as I am getting up anyway.

In holiday times, unless we have anything specific where we need to get up early, ds and I prefer to get up later (after 8 if possible). Dh still gets up after 7.30, often after 8. Ds and I don't set our alarms until 8 or so, but dh still has his clock radio coming on at 6.30. This wakes me up, and I find it difficult to get to sleep again, and it has also woken ds up some days (even though he isin a different room).

Today I asked if dh would mind not setting his alarm so early in holiday weeks. He thinks I am being unreasonable as he likes to listen to the radio in the mornings, even though it comes on at least an hour before he will be getting up. When I asked him if he though I was being unreasonable in asking him to change the time it comes on in school holiday weeks, he said he thought I was being very controlling.

What do you all think?

[NotAnotherPackedLunch]

He's being a selfish git.
It sounds more like he is the controlling one, waking you up even when he doesn't plan on getting up himself.
If someone continued to knowingly wake me up like this I would regard it as a serious red flag, especially if they tried to turn it back on me by the accusation of being controlling.

[DiscoDonkey]

He's being knob

[timidviper]

I would be livid if my DH had an alarm going for an hour and waking me in the holidays. YANBU

[HollyBerryBush]

You only need X hours of sleep. Over or under sleeping upsets your body clock. Getting up at the same time every day is far more beneficial.

But I would bludgeon him if anyone put a radio on for an hour unless they were downstairs stacking the dishwasher and making themselves generally useful

I don't understand the concept of lolloping about in bed for a lay in and dozing.

[AmandaPayneAteTooMuchChocolate]

He's being a knob.

It's fine to want to listen to the radio in the morning, but if others are sleeping you do it in another room. It's not that hard. It's a bit of simple consideration.

If you want to lie in bed and listen to the radio, you wait until others who sleep in the room are up.

My husband used to (before children in the room broke the habit) like to fall asleep to the radio. I didn't sleep until it goes off. We compromised that it went for 15 minutes. Harder at the other end though, to come up with a good compromise.

[SoMuchToBits]

To clarify, the radio isn't going for an hour. It goes for about 15 mins then switches itself off. But by then it has woken me up too much to go back to sleep. Dh manages to go back to sleep again though until he actually gets up.

I wouldn't ming him having the radio come on if he actually then got up within about 15 mins, but it's a bit annoyng when he then doesn't get up for quite a while.

Holly, I get what you mean about getting up at the same time of day being beneficial, but ds's leaving-the-house-time during term times means I have to get up earlier than I would choose to. This means that I am usually short of sleep. Yes, I could go to bed earlier, but whenever I do, I find I toss and turn and can't get to sleep. Sadly, I seem to be naturally more of an owl than a lark.

[AmandaPayneAteTooMuchChocolate]

So he's not even lying in bed listening to the radio all that time? He's having 15 minutes of radio and then a 45 minute nap?

That is even less defensible.

[HollyBerryBush]

In the holidays I get up far earlier, usually around 4am - that's 'my' time - I do all the house work by 8am. the children usually surface about midday!

Its utter bliss

I cant wait for it to kick in warmer so I can be having my coffee on the terrace as the birds start a dawn chorus and I'll have 2 loads of washing on the line before going to work.

[Idocrazythings]

I would get the scissors and cut the plug off the electrical cord. No I wouldn't really but I'd like to if my DH did that. YANBU.

[manticlimactic]

But if he set the alarm later he'd still get to listen to the radio. Tell him if he wants to listen to the radio then get up and listen to it downstairs.

Controlling indeed .

[dreamingbohemian]

Sorry, I'm kinda distracted by Holly getting up at 4 am to do the laundry. 4 am!!!

OP YANBU

Your husband is bonkers

[VermicularCanister]

I like to listen to the radio at times when DH would rather be asleep. I have one of these.

YANBU, by the way.

[SheepShearing]

He needs headphones.

[WhereYouLeftIt]

"he said he thought I was being very controlling."

Well I think you are being very reasonable and very very restrained because I'd have shoved his radio where the sun don't shine by now - he is being incredibly selfish and inconsiderate.

To compare your DH with mine - he gets up half an hour before me. He mostly wakes up before the radio switches on, in which case - HE SWITCHES IT OFF. So I get to sleep on, undisturbed, until my own alarm goes off. Because he is considerate of others, unlike, unfortunately, your not-so-dear husband.

[SoMuchToBits]

Oh. Maybe IANBU after all! Who would have thought it.

He made it so much sound as if I was being the unreasonable person in all of this. I may well be. But possibly not.

[BackforGood]

No, YAdefinitelyNBU - he is.
In our house, whichever one of us is getting up earlier than the other one (holidays, weekends, etc., or odd days when one has to get up earlier than the other) has their alarm go off for a couple of seconds, then tip toes out to the bathroom where (the previous night) they've left all clothes etc they need, so the other can sleep in peace. It's just a little bit of consideration.

[TigerSwallowtail]

Yanbu, he can still listen to the radio if he sets it for a later time during the holidays. He's being very inconsiderate.

[zipzap]

I know how you feel - dh likes his alarm to come on and wake him up 30-60 minutes before he needs to get up, it takes the radio jabbering at him for that long for him to wake up to a point of being able to get up.

Me - I wake up within moments of the radio going off. But I like to set my snooze button to wake me up 5-10 minutes before we need to get up. But because dh has woken me up nearly an hour earlier, by the time it goes off I'm usually just drifting off into a really deep sleep because I actually do need to sleep through until the time I need to wake up - like you I'm a night owl and don't fall asleep early if I go to bed early (she says realising it's already gone midnight and I hadn't noticed). End result is that I always lose out on sleep because for most of the time we have to get up to get the dc to school - and so dh has to put his alarm on in order to get up for that.

And it's no good saying I should get up then - I've tried that, it's horrible. I'm really tired at that point - awake but tired. It all just doesn't work for my natural timings and it's horrible. DS2 was a really bad sleeper - waking up several times a night for several years, so I got used to dealing with that, but this is now really beginning to take its toll.

But having said all that - definitely think your dh is being unreasonable if he listens then falls asleep again.

WOuld he check if you were to change his alarm during the holidays to a nicer time for y ou - is it that he doesn't know how to or can't be bothered?

Or how about saying that you'll have one day his way, one day your way as a compromise so that you both feel hard done by every other day but get one day that works for you. He would be incredibly unreasonable if he wouldn't agree to that (or one week each if that's easier) as he is then basically saying that he is more important than you the whole time, that you do not have equal rights to a good wake up but he gets his good wake up every day.

[Iaintdunnuffink]

Yanbu

We usually all get up at 6am, the alarm goes off, we listen to a song, get up, get kids up. I don't usually work during the school holidays and the alarm still goes off at 6. My husband wakes, then gets up!

[SoMuchToBits]

Well, this morning, he actually needed to get up that early, as he had to travel somewhere else for work, so I didn't mind that it went off. He seemed to have turned the volume down too, which helped, as I only just woke up and went back to sleep again, unlike yesterday when it was really loud!