Help! 6yo bedtime taking too long!

[northlondonnotislington]

We’ve somehow got into a phase where bedtime is taking aaaaages. My DS is strong willed and stubborn and dislikes going to bed! But he’s a ball of energy and needs his sleep!

Lately he’s been falling asleep around 8.30pm - as in that’s when his eyes close. However prior to that we read 2 story books and sing a couple of songs. The bath comes before that and boy oh boy between the bathroom bits, bath, getting into pjs and stories he will try EVERYTHING to delay and distract from getting things done. It was getting to the stage that we weren’t ready for lights out till 9, or even after so then I tried really hard to make the bath routine part much quicker but to no avail. The quicker I tried to make it the harder it was! So then I tried allowing longer for the bathroom routine. In the heatwave he was having a lukewarm bath and I let him play for ages with bath toys hoping it would cool him down whilst also getting the last of his energy out of his system. But this has meant literally running the bath a 6.30pm! Giving due warning that bath is in 30/15/10 mins, then getting him upstairs by about 7, then toilet (ages) bath (won’t get out till last drop of water gone) pj’s / teeth etc (find as many distractions and things he can) until finally stories and lights out at 8.30pm.

Can anyone relate to this drama and do you have any tips? I realise he’s got far too much leverage here and seems to rule the roost at bedtime! At the same time bedtime battles are to be avoided if I want a calm end to the day and good sleep for us all. Would love to hear anyone else’s solutions if their child is similar.

He 100% definitely needs to be asleep by 8.30 and when that happens he will wake around 7am for school.

Could be have his bath after school/before tea? Wanting his tea might be an incentive to get him out of the bath. Or shower instead of bath and no toys, except on Fri and Sat?

I feel your pain, we’ve only just got on top of bedtimes, wasn’t quite experiencing what you’re going through, ours was defiance, stalling tactics, tantrums, but we’ve just about figured out an overly complicated system that works, my DS is nearly 5.

We use one of the “bedtime routine” wooden boards, it has list of tasks he has to complete prior to bed, he gets to slide the tab to “yes” when he’s completed the task (bought it from Etsy) we go upstairs he says to Alexa “start a 1 hour countdown Alexa” that way it makes it a bit of race as well: he needs to tidy his room, brush his teeth, have a shower, get into his pyjamas, have a wee, and had his 4 books read to him (we’ve negotiated down from 5!!) trying to get it to 3.

If he goes 2 weeks with no issues he’s allowed to either pick the take away on the Saturday night or a treat like cinema, soft play etc.

Nice idea but can’t see that working with DS. He’s also a picky eater and dinner holds no incentives for him sadly. (Another bugbear 😫)

Thanks @WarmHarewe had similar when he was a toddler but he would view that as babyish now I fear. We do a sticker chart of he can get into pjs in 60 seconds which results in a prize when full up, but still the rest of the time it’s one thing after another!

I’d take this lengthy routine over hours of screen time!

Remove toys and start bath later. Condense everything. A shower can be quick. Why does he need to be up at 7 am? What are you doing in the morning? I’d let him play much longer by running around if he’s energetic.

Yes I anticipate I’ve only got another 6 months of this before he decides that’s “for babies” 🙈

He doesn't need a bath every night - a quick shower will cut down a lot of time. I think you need to be firmer - if he takes ages going to the loo, brushing teeth and getting pj's on, warn him that he won't have time for stories or singing. And stick to it! So if he's in bed by 7.30, he can have stories but if he messes about, no stories, just a kiss and a hug goodnight and lights out!

He's 6, you're the parent so take charge!

Do you want him in bed earlier? Or are you happy with 8:30pm, but you want the process over with more quickly so you can start around 7:30/8 instead?

If the latter I would try explaining to him that he can have more time to play in the evening if he keeps the bedtime routine quick. Make him understand that bedtime taking two hours means he goes up at 6:30pm whereas if he could do bedtime in 45 minutes he can play downstairs until 7:45pm.

Yes, when you explained it like that it made perfect sense! Let me try spelling this out to him!

I agree with PP - if he is mucking about/wasting time, then that means there is no longer time for 2 songs/2 stories etc. He needs to know there are consequences for being silly.