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.

We have blackout blinds and blackout curtains in the nursery. It is definitely not light in there come 7pm! 😂

Mine was out playing in summer, while I watered the garden and caught up on jobs. Inside with lego or similar in winter, while I was wrapped in a quilt with a coffee and a library book. Lone parent, working class, no wine or charades!

There's been judgement both ways, and many people assuming that children are not getting enough sleep or the parents are not getting any time to themselves.

Some judgement both ways but the earlier bedtime judgements seem to be much more emotive with the language used or the implications that those parents clearly just either don't enjoy spending time with their children and/or can't wait to get rid of them come 7pm.

I think we need better blinds 🤣🤣🤣

According to the child and adult mental health service, NHS, sleep requirements are age dependent. 3-6 need 10-12 hours, 7-12 need 10-11, 12-18 is 8-9. So it's a case of basic maths, factoring in your household wake up time. Mine need to be up before 8 to get to school on time, both under 6, bedtime at 7.30, asleep by 8-8.15 and awake again 7.30. When they stay up later they simply get less sleep, they don't stay in bed later, so it makes perfect sense for them to go early.

It depends on the child my son sleeps from 7.30 to 7. He has a cousin the same age who sleeps from 10 to 6.

Really? I'm part of a culture that has kids at weddings, but I didn't want to because mine was a classy one at a vineyard. How does that work then? Have I betrayed my "culture"? 🙄🤣 Some of these comments 😳🥴

If you are right then that likely comes from parents feeling defensive. It's more difficult when your family routines or children's sleep needs don't fit with the local norms and you have been getting judgemental comments in real life.

I don't get the time with children thing, you will get the same amount of time, just in the morning. Unless children are waking an hour before parents or something.

Maybe not, but when people have to use breakfast and after school clubs, then the same people want alone time or an adult evening, when do they actually see their children? Weekends? It’s not about having them 24/7 but why have children and then complain when you have to spend more than a couple of hours with them!

I find this deeply offensive. Dd has always needed a lot of sleep and I was frequently in tears when she fell asleep in the car on the way back from nursery @ 6:15 as I knew I wouldn't see her till the following morning. Keeping her awake so I could spend time with her would have been as selfish as waking her up at 5:30 before I left for work. Her need for enough sleep trumped my need for her company.

Keeping DS1 up in the evenings basically means spending the evening with a grumpy child who is then even grumpier the next morning. I don't enjoy it, no, but that's because he needs to go to sleep, not because I hate my child.

I get plenty of time with my kids, I dropped a day of work to see them more, I get lovely mornings and weekends and bedtimes.

I did work pt too, this was when Dd was 3 or 4 I worked 3 days a week.

Genuinely, take no notice of these posters. This thread has some of the most self righteous, unthinking, arsehole comments I’ve seen on any thread.

I think maybe it’s just hard to empathise with people of a different chronotype to ours. I often think how lucky we are that our kids are night owls like we are - our kids are still as lively as crickets at 9:30 but that works fine for us. DD9’s best school friend is usually asleep by 7pm but she gets up around 6 every day and I just cannot imagine being jolly enough to entertain a child at that time in the morning!

How is it hard to empathise?

How you feel about your child in the morning is how we feel about ours in the evening.
How we feel in the morning about our early risers is how you feel in the evening about your night owls.
It’s exactly the same just one is before school and one is after school.

Do you generally struggle with empathy?

I don't find it difficult at all to understand that different people have different sleep needs and routines.

Perhaps it goes alongside your chronotype given the horrible judgemental comments in this thread are almost exclusively from people who put their children to bed late

This is a bit much PP..

We should also consider that children who have been to breakfast club from 7:30am, the a school day, then after-school club until 530-6pm are likely quite knackered from the long day and might NEED to go to bed at 7:30pm as a result!

And IME, people don't just shove kids in wraparound care everyday because they are tired of parenting. They do it in order to work. They probably feel bad enough about not being able to see their kids as much as they'd like without judgement from other parents asking 'when do they actually see their children'?

I honestly don't care when people put their kids to bed. Mine go at 7:30pm because by that point they are tired out and grouchy. The toddler grabs his blanky and actually asks to go to bed at 7pm!

Oh wow sorry, I didn’t realise I was being offensive there! I just meant that as a night owl I’m fine with my kids being up late but would struggle with them in the morning - whereas if you’re a morning person then obviously it’s the other way round for you so I can see why you’d find it harder to find the energy for your kids in the evening. Genuinely no judgement meant at all!!

I'm a night owl more than a morning person but I'd still rather they weren't up late as after a full day of being "on" as a parent, I'm ready for some time to just be myself.

Sorry - I thought that what you’ve just said was implied in what I said (I don’t mind my kids being up late but I’d struggle with them being up early, whereas others are fine with their kids being up early but would have a hard time with them being up late) but obviously I should have stated that more clearly!

I honestly don’t think I am being horribly judgemental here. I’m just saying our situation is fine for us but I’d have a hard time if my kids were early risers. I’m not sure where the judgement is there…?

That’s fair. I don’t think you were being awful in what I replied to. It was just a general “how is it difficult to empathise when parents are saying they have the exact same feelings about their children just at different times of the day?”

There have been some horrific posts on here and I think you’re just bearing the brunt of being on the tail end of them.

So I apologise if I was overly prickly

I wasn’t referring to your situation? I said when the same people then also want alone time/adult evenings - which isn’t what you said?

My kids go to bed at 7.30. Both wake up between 5.30 and 6 no matter what time they go to bed. They need to be up just after 6 anyway to get ready for the day and be off to nursery but even when they've not been to bed from gone 11 they're still the ones waking me up. I finish work around 3 and I don't know any other parents that aren't home until 6.30 so I think myself and the families I know all eat earlier and probably start the day earlier so naturally the kids get tired earlier.