Are UK parents obsessed with getting their kids to bed early?

[RosieLeaLovesTea]

Am I the only one that thinks UK parents are obsessed with getting their kids to bed early? I see posts of 7pm/7.30pm, some as early as 6pm.

I work full time and don’t get home until 6.30pm. We don’t eat until 7pm. So generally 9pm is bedtime. Plus it means that if we do go out at weekends our kids are used to going to bed a bit later.

No one on here has whinged about early wake ups. Most have explained that early wake ups are necessary anyway due to work/nursery.

Mine sleeps 7-7 which is perfect for him in getting the 12 hours he needs and to be able to get him to nursery for 8.

Well, for my husband and myself it means having some alone time in the evenings as we have no family nearby and never get a break otherwise. I'm also a SAHM for now so I see them plenty, I guess it would be different if I was at work all day. Also, I do have to get them up most mornings so never had the early start problem. God bless blackout blinds 🤣

What makes those five hours feel looooooooooong?

@RantyMcGee
Do you think that maybe the experience of fleeing a war zone with perhaps only the clothes on her back and a small token of her former life might contribute to the sleeping issues of a Ukrainian child, moreso than watching a movie on British TV?

What do you see as the benefit of doing the opposite of having children fit in with what the adults are doing? Do you think that being child-focused virtually all the hours children are awake is good for children, and if so, why?

Do posters here who are aghast at the thought of children going to bed at 9 think that families are all merrily playing noughts and crosses or Operation or reading board books to the children all evening?

To be fair, one of the accusations levelled at people who put their children to bed earlier is that they don’t want to spend quality time with their children, so presumably those people are doing child-focused things or at least things together with their children. One poster even talks about reading and playing games together in that time! It’s not so far fetched an assumption.

I'm Spanish myself and when I talk to my friends about bedtimes etc they are all always really surprised/judgey about our UK early bedtimes.
I had a friend who emigrated here as a nurse and used to keep her kid (9 months old then!) awake until she went to bed around 11pm, even though they all had to be up at 6 for nursery/work. So odd.

I'm struggling to keep up - if you put your kids to bed, do you not want to spend time with them or do you spend too much time interacting with them? Or both?

7-7 when mine were very little and had to be up for nursery. They were always ready for bed by this time as very active in the day and would be up early regardless of how late they went to bed.

The duality of Mumsnet. Us women will never get it right so why bother!

Yes I agree. I don't understand it.

There is no way my DD would sleep for 12hrs straight. Not all kids need so much sleep.

But some do and it isn’t selfish to accommodate that as several people have said.

No on all counts:

Said child never slept in her own bed, including pre-war. But I did feel I couldn’t watch a documentary about serial killers while she was up and pottering about. I work with traumatised children every day so I do understand the impact of trauma.

And no, as I said I work with children and young people every day. I believe Anglo parenting is far too child centric, and children need to be bored and left alone to play as well as interact with other children without parents hovering over them. But equally my children going to bed early doesn’t mean I never spend quality time with them - which is the accusation levelled at us on here.
And having had the opportunity to compare side by side, I think Anglo parenting is too child centric and Ukrainian (or the example we had) was far too hands off (we were left to supervise their and our children 95% of the time, the child was left alone at 3 yrs old while mum went to work back in Ukraine and she was dragged to everything mum went to. I think we need a balance as with everything in life.

On the sleep question though, I think teaching children a good sleep routine while they are young goes some way to helping them develop good sleep habits which they will have for the rest of their lives. For my children that means making sure they have enough sleep and time to unwind (especially for the introvert) prior to going to sleep.

As a SAHM putting ds to bed early meant I got an evening to myself/with DH who I hadn't seen all day. DS needed the sleep and woke up at 6:30am no matter what time he went to bed.

I'm always shocked at how late kids go to bed on the continent, people there don't seem to realise that kids need a lot more sleep than adults.

@SouthLondonMum22 I didn't say it was. I was refuting the implication that all young children need at least 12 hours sleep per night. Some may do, of course. But that is a lot of sleep & many kids don't need that much.

I’m genuinely interested in the posters whose children are asleep until 8.

Are they at school?
How long do they have to get ready and wake up?
Do they get driven to school?
What breakfasts do they have?

@WonderingWanda we have to leave the house at about the same time as you. My young DC go to bed about 9pm earliest (the older one more like 10pm). They are not chronically overtired, they just don't need as much sleep as others.

DD wakes at 8ish but we are only about 10 mins from school. We wfh so can get her there for 9am (no breakfast club). We are often late but she manages to have cereal or something. Like I said before we would rather get things earlier but it always slides back. DD likely autistic & very hard to get her to wind down.

DD usually asleep between 9.30- 10pm so she does get 10 or so hours. I am not in the least smug about any of this btw. Like I say I get very judged for this 🙈.

My older two always went to bed around 8/ 8:30. They go bed now around 9 (9 and 11).

baby goes to bed around 6:30 / 7:30 as this seems to be his natural pattern. He seems to sleep later than when I was putting him down with me around 9 ish!

@GrinAndVomit we can usually do an 8am wake up - school is two mins walk away and DC dont have to be in until 9am. So that gives us 45mins to get ready which is plenty for us.

That’s exactly it. All kids are different.

In theory on days I WFH and take the children to school for 8.50 they could get up at 8.00 and have enough time for getting dressed, teeth, breakfast etc as we live a five minute walk from school. But in reality my early riser is usually awake by 6.00 (having gone to sleep at 21.00) and the others will be up by 7.15

The Italians and Spanish love having their children up late... they are sometimes asleep with their face on the table/restaurant rather than taken to bed.

I need a childfree evening after a long day with the children. We love our adult only time - no more arguing or kids being silly. . We start bedtime routine at 6:30 and usually asleep by 7:15. Plus my kids are awake by 6am no matter what time they go to sleep so it's better for them to go bed earlier as they are happier during the day ☺️