To not get why people put their DC to bed early

[RogerThatOver]

...when it's unnecessary?

I get that if you all have to be up and out for 7.30 then they'd need to be in bed early.

But my SIL has 3 DC under 5, none at school and no plans to return to work at any point. Her DC are in bed for 6pm. That means being stuck in the house from 4pm every day which I would hate. They get up at 5/5.30 which she complains about endlessly but what does she expect if they go to bed so early? They can't go on days out because the DC are tired by lunch time and have to be home to nap, they don't do family parties or weddings because the DC cannot travel after 3pm and need to be home to wind down for bed by 4pm.

I also have 3 DC under 5. Mine go to bed at 9 and get up at around 8, sometimes later at the weekend. We can have full days out, if there's a party or wedding they can happily stay up until midnight. We can go to the park til bedtime in the summer and never need to rush home. They have an older sibling at school and are all ready on time to take her at 8.30 so their bedtime won't need major adjustment when they start school.

SIL and MIL are both very judgey about my DC's bedtime with SIL saying at the weekend that my DC must be 'chronically overtired' because they were still dancing at a family party at midnight. The hours of sleep they get are actually no different but IMO a later bedtime means my DC can do more in life. SIL admits she spends every morning drinking coffee with the kids watching tv until 10 because she's so tired, then if they go out they need to be home for naps by 12. She doesn't seem happy with the way things are but so many people seem to think it's just the way things must be with young DC.

AIBU to not understand the obsession with early bedtimes, coupled with complaints about early rises?

"In the same way kids can be trained to go to bed before 7.30."

Ha ha ha. You have no idea how hard we tried to get DD to sleep earlier. Even when she started school 8.30 was the earliest she would sleep. She just was never tired, no matter how much running around or physical exercise she did. She only needed about 9 - 10 hours sleep a night.

I think 6:30 is too early, but 9pm is far too late!

Mine went to bed at 7:30 to 8pm, which was a good time for them - and for me and DH, to have some time together.

Lots of 5 and 6 year olds at school say they are up after 9pm...and these are the ones who are almost comatose at their tables by morning break!

Can you explain the reason's you struggled?

Well I can’t speak for anyone else, but here is why we struggled....

We tried

• putting to bed later
• putting to bed earlier
• no nap
• early nap
• late nap

Amongst other things.

All bedtime changes were done gradually, in increments. Persevered with each tactic for a few weeks. She still woke up between 5 and 5.30am, every single. We moved house 3 times in that period, and she did it at every house.

One day, when I had given up all hope, she slept until 6.30am. She’s woken up at 6:30am every day since. Until this week when I tried to prepare for the clock change by gradually pushing bedtime later, and she’s started waking half an hour earlier.

picklemepopcorn As I said, it is totally illogical to insist that they have an inbuilt clock and know what time it is when they are toddlers. The fact that all your children did the same thing makes it even more likely that the early awakening was due to their environment (e.g. consistently going to bed early or something waking them up early).
I'm not "arguing against your experience" that they woke up early. I'm arguing against your explanation of why they woke up early because it doesn't make sense.

And throughout all the above, DD1 happily slept until 7.30-8am ish! For 6 months of it they shared a room.

DS1 wakes up at 6:30 (if he's up before 6 he's sent back to his room, after 6 he's allowed into the living room to watch TV and we stay in bed!)

He's 7, his little brother is 4, they go to bed between 7:30 and 8, although he could tolerate going an hour later and it would probably push his waking up to more like 7am - but then his brother would be disturbed with him going to bed and it wouldn't work out.

They can both stay up to more like 9 on special occasions - but it really takes its toll the next day.

I don't think they've ever slept past 8am. Lie-ins just aren't in them.

Kids are people. People are different.

SO much a better mum than them.

Oh shut up. People who let their kids stay up later are no better or worse than those of us who put our kids to bed earlier. Honestly what a load of tosh.

Not sure why some posters are implying putting kids to bed early results in a ‘battle’, mine happily go up to start their bedtime routine at 6:30 with no trouble.

I have never battled to get my children into bed. Usually upstairs at 6.30ish, bath, pyjamas, couple of stories and they roll over and go to sleep:

Roomster you clearly don’t understand circadian rhythm then.

If you flew to Australia obviously it would adjust as all the external cues of sunlight, temperature changes, external noise like birdsong in the morning etc would be screaming YOUR CLOCK IS WRONG.

Circadian rhythm in plants can be artificially manipulated if you keep them in internal rooms, no exposure natural sunlight, temperature closely controlled etc.

No one does that with their toddlers.

Yes you can provide sleep cues with a bedtime routine etc but you can’t adjust their circadian clock. Not if you are exposing them to the outside world every day. Which hopefully you are.

My 3 year old is begging to go to bed at 4pm, sometimes all day! it's never a battle to get him to bed at 6.30. It's actually a battle to keep him awake till then. But despite his tiredness, he never sleeps later than 6am. We've tried naps and no naps, later and earlier bed times. Nothing makes any difference. If he was left to his own devices he'd wake at 4am and then sleep for 3 hours about 11-2 then sleep again at 8-9pm. But the best compromise we can do is 6.30-6 and then keeping him awake all day.

I get that it's nice for them to get up later which means you having a bit of a lie in too but I think it's more appealing to have them in bed around 7.30ish because then you've got time to yourself and it's heaven. Couldn't be doing with bedtime routines starting at 9pm

I think 1-5 year old kids around 7-7.30 is best bedtime. But if your child is waking at 5.30 , they are probably going to bed too early. Until school age, do what suits you as long as they get enough sleep. It is a different matter when they go to school: if they go to bed too early (and , thus, get up too early) they will be exhausted at school. Equally, if they go to bed too late, they will not get enough sleep and, therefore, be exhausted.

Roomster you clearly don’t understand circadian rhythm then.

You are the one who doesn't understand circadian rhythm if you think it is set in stone and wake up/sleep time can't be adjusted.

If you flew to Australia obviously it would adjust as all the external cues of sunlight, temperature changes, external noise like birdsong in the morning etc would be screaming YOUR CLOCK IS WRONG.

Temperature, sunlight etc changes to some extent with the seasons in the UK and yet you are arguing that a toddler will wake up at the same no matter what is happening in the environment.

Yes you can provide sleep cues with a bedtime routine etc but you can’t adjust their circadian clock. Not if you are exposing them to the outside world every day. Which hopefully you are.

They are not outside all day long. When asleep you can prevent sunlight getting into their room..

Agree with all the others on here saying do what works best for your kids - every kid is different with sleep - even I have discovered that after having my first (who is only 5 months old). However I am curious OP - do your kids not nap during the day then? Every routine I have seen on any website has kids up to about 3/4 having a nap during the day still, and most have the naps happening at lunchtime or afternoon - so when you say you go out for “whole days” do your kids not sleep at all? Genuine question from a FTM who doesn’t know that much!! :-)

SJN71 both mine dropped their nap completely before they were 2.

I think you should probably MYOB. If your children don't go to bed before 21.00 then you possibly can't be going out much at night or it would be tricky for a babysitter. So you probably shouldn't be judging your SIL forbnot being able to do much during the day.

I’m with your SIL (except ours were 7pm). I like my evenings to myself. My brother has similar aged children to us and had routine like your - his worked for him, ours worked for us! My youngest are 7 and 8 now and I still aim for 7.30 but will keep them up for special occasion or if on Holiday etc. When we go abroad they stay up late but then HAVE to have nap in afternoon or they are total shits!

My twins (13 months) wake up at 5-5:30 al regardless of anything else. They will not go back to sleep. They refuse to take more than one nap during the day and one of them will sometimes skip that. By the time they've finished dinner they're passing out in their high chairs some nights. Believe me, I do not want to get up at sodding 5am every bloody day. BELIEVE ME. There was a night where they'd had a later nap and I figured here was my change, I'd push their bedtime back to 7:30pm! Except that night they woke up every hour instead of every 2-3 hours, still woke up at 5am, still refused to nap and were basically poster boys for demonic possession the next day.

Now I just go with the flow - why torture myself? Maybe have some empathy and think she's not choosing to inconvenience herself?

its good for their health to sleep 12 hours
Neither DD have ever slept 12 hours and they are 4 and 7. I'm with op as everyone I know who has such early bedtimes for their DC complain about bedtime struggles, night waking and early rising but don't seem to make the connection. It's all very well saying whatever works, but it doesn't appear to be working in these cases. Ive always been relaxed about bed times and my DC are great sleepers but I've accepted that they just don't need as much I'd been led to believe. Very busy and active 4yo goes to bed around 8 and 7yo around 9. They get up at 6.45 am weekdays. Weekends stay up later and wake around 8. Never tired or cranky and a late night doesn't end in disaster the next day. I do feel never having rigid bedtimes has contributed to this!

If that works for SOL fine. 6 pm seems just a bit early , 7 a bit more reasonable especially for the oldest. 9 pm seems late though but obviously fits in with your lifestyle. Some kids are early risers no matter what bedtime and some can keep going until late at night, just like adults.

Booboo again, you're talking as though the early bedtimes are the cause rather than a result of a problem. And you say your kids are good sleepers? Maybe just appreciate that this isn't something you have to be too worried about?

Roomster read my post properly. My birth children woke early. My foster children needed to be woken for school. Same family routines and structure.

With the F.C. , they went to bed earlier every night until they were ready in the mornings- that was how I worked out how much sleep they needed, and encouraged them to get ready in a timely way.

DS1 suddenly started sleeping in at about 14- he now sleeps like the dead and doesn’t get up till lunchtime left to his own devices. Days when he starts work early are quite hard for him.
DS2 at 17 can occasionally sleep in till 8, but tends to be up well before that.

DH can sleep in at the weekend, I can’t. Come 5am I’m wide awake. If I don’t wake up til 7 then I feel I’ve had a real lie in. I find it inconvenient and have tried making my bedtime later every day, but sadly at 5am my eyes pop open. I just end up exhausted. The only t8me I sleep in is if I’ve been awake for a couple of hours in the middle of the night.

Don’t let your theoretical knowledge lead you to disparage someone else's experience. It may well be illogical, but it’s true.

I would love to have a ‘sleep routine’ with my 2 year old. He goes to bed anytime between 7pm and 11pm and wakes up between 5am and 8am if left to his own devices (as in not woken up for nursery). Some days he naps - he has up to 2 hours at nursery but not always at the weekend. We go out and stay late at parties sometimes and mostly he’s good but sometimes has a tired meltdown.

There is no guarantee of anything with a toddler. Good luck and well done to anyone who does have a routine!

Indy they are good sleepers yes, but actually they aren't if they are out to bed at earlier times. They'd mess about, wake in the night get up at the crack of dawn of i did put them to bed at 7pm. (I've done it on occasion and it happens every time)

(Don't know where the word Indy came from) 🤔