What age to stop a bedtime? 12? 13? 16?

[Coldwine75]

Just curious, my 17 yr old would sit up all night watching Youtube / Streamers etc , I told her to get her lights out by 11.30- midnight on her college days weekends no time. I think I 'advised' a bedtime until 18 , what are others doing? I worry as dd gets very tired and hard to get going in the mornings.

17 yr old self regulates and goes to bed 10 - 10:30 during the week.

14 yr old can't self regulate so laptop and mobile phone is removed at 9 pm and charged in our room. In bed 9:30 - 10 am. Otherwise, she would be on her tech until the early hours of the morning. We're far from being the only parents to do this!

Both have to get up at 6:30 and out the door at 7:15 to catch bus for school.

Believe it or not I had a bedtime of 9pm up to starting work aged 18! My parents were weird
As you can imagine I have no such rules with my own children, 14 yr old goes up when he's ready and sleeps when he's ready. No issues with getting up for school. 11 yr old goes up around 8.30/9pm and again goes to sleep when she is ready. Neither of them are over tired so I'm happy.

In our house we didn't enforce anything after the start of secondary, but the kids still went really early. They just headed up to read and then would switch off.

None of us stay up very late, and by sixth form they were choosing to go to bed by 10-ish anyway. I think our house is just really boring.

So I have no advice as I don't know what I would do - but I would probably turn the wifi off if I thought they were not regulating themselves at all.

I’m a mean one, electronics off at 7.30, 11&13yr old have a bedtime of 9.30 - 11yr old is enforced as she gets moody, 13yr old not so much but he just goes to bed at the same time as her for a quiet life (so she doesn’t moan) as he’s a softie.

DD is 17, she is still awake at midnight. She’s always tired the next day but old enough to make her own decisions on this. I’m imagining when she joins the Navy next year she won’t be up at midnight.

DD, nearly 14, needs unite a lot of sleep so her bedtime is 9pm on school nights. We do see a difference in behaviour if she falls asleep later.

The whole family has a no electronics upstairs rule as we think it distracts from sleep, for everyone. DD brings her phone and laptop down when she goes up and I can’t see a reason to change it. Especially as some of her friends seem to have an unlimited timeframe for texting and I don’t want her woken up or checking her phone at midnight. And setting it on night time is the same as bringing it down.

Currently pregnant but will weigh on my (significantly younger) siblings. Neither can self-regulate, neither has a bedtime. 10 y/o is encouraged to sleep at 11:30-12, up at 7:30. 12 y/o is bed whenever, up at 6:50. Both constantly exhausted.

I had a bedtime until late teens, of around 11 I think. I don't quite agree about self-regulation because I instead just got into a habit. Staying up late doesn't have an appeal once you're past a certain age.

I think bedtime kept for too long is 1000x better than removed too soon.

We had a bedroom time up to the end of GCSEs, not a bed time, from the the middle of junior school they could stay awake as long as they wanted and had plenty of books and art materials in their rooms but no tech other than a radio in their rooms.

I have memories of childhood insomnia and not being allowed to get up and do anything to help me settle and I didn't want that for them.

We are lucky enough that both children had a room of their own I know it must be difficult if they share.

While DSS is still in sixth form he has to be in bed by 11. All he does late at night is game anyway, and it's impossible for him to do so without keeping me and DP awake - so even when he is 18 he will still be turning the computer off when we come up to bed (he can read/watch something of course).

So he is 17.18 and has a bedtime?

@PugInTheHouse

I forgot to say though, on MN this is a really weird topic, many posters on previous threads like this say 930 lights out and phones removed at 17/18, it's honestly bizarre and certainly not my experience on RL.

To be fair we have to take DSS's phone off him because he just takes the piss staying up all night texting his mates. If he got up for college it'd be fine but he doesn't. Once he's 18 (Aug) he can keep it and stay up all night if he wants to, but while he's still a child and in education if he can't act sensibly he can't have it.

@Coldwine75

So he is 17.18 and has a bedtime?

Even at 18 it's not acceptable to be keeping other members of the household awake at night. I don't give my partner a bedtime but I wouldn't tolerate him keeping me awake with his gaming at 3am either. I'm a person not a doormat.

Keeping people awake at night gaming is not ok at any age but totally different issue from enforcing a bed time for a 17 yo. I am a bit torn about if they weren't getting up for college but then again at 17 both my parents were out at work and college didn't always start at 9 so they would never know if I got up or not so it was down to me. I still think I would let them get on with it at that point to an extent, even if that involved getting his tired backside up and out of bed for college.

No phones for anyone after 9.15pm (13&16) DC relax, read, draw and put themselves to bed when they are ready but it is always before 10pm. It has worked for us. I do come up at 9.45pm to ensure dd13 is tucked in, and I kiss them both goodnight. Everyone is generally asleep by 10/10.15pm, as we all have early starts.

I definitely don't want them to feel tired all day and enjoy their lives not been exhausted. DD16 can already regulate phone use and so no real issues there. We also do not use phones in the evenings, tonight being the exception as dh is out walking the dog later than usual.

If you can set up a very good system early on, early nights, gadgets always downstairs then by the time they get older, it is just automatic.

I wouldn't be putting my dd16 to bed, and from around 14/15 it is been a choice for her within reason (ie before we go to bed at 10ish)

I was at boarding school so 10:30 bedtime until 18

Teens need to be well rested. I’d insist on a sensible bedtime until she leaves home.

Instilling the values of sleep being important, prioritised and key to a good and healthy life starts in early childhood. You can't be really active, switched on and academically on form if you are exhausted. So getting a good routine early on, do not bend to pressure and be focused on why you care so much about sleep is key to a happy life. You can't be happy if you are permanently shattered, kids included, it will begin to show in their friendships, attainment and behaviour.

It depends on the child. They do need to learn to self-regulate and take responsibility for their own tiredness. I think I was starting to say, around 15, that it might be better not to stay up too late given they had to get up early next day. Now that dd is 16, I leave her to it.

We started letting them do their own thing by 11 although prior to that nothing was ever particularly strongly enforced and weekends had always been a free for all . Like everything if you tell someone they can stay up until midnight / 1am the novelty wears off very quickly and they go to bed at a reasonable hour so that they don’t feel knackered all day . i never had bedtimes growing up and i suppose that influenced how we dealt with our children.

Depends on her day. If she's had a lot of exercise and homework and a big dinner she's in bed by 9.30 on her own back. If it's the weekend she's still usually in bed by 10.30 and will read a book until she passes out. She 14 and a half.

My 14 year old is gadgets down by half 9 and at 10 I say go brush your teeth and get into bed. That literally takes 30 mins so bed is more like half 10 if not later depending how long they are being.

Fri and sat is more like midnight or whenever I go to bed.

If your DC is still living under your roof then I’d ensure lights off/screens away when you yourself go to bed, or by 11pm at the latest. They can’t do well at their studies if they’re tired. If they can’t self regulate their time on devices then you need to be the parent and insist on a sensible switch off and bed down time.

Dc aged 14 goes to bed at 10pm, maybe later on the weekend. I take all devices out of the room at that time and they accept it as they would be tempted to be on them half the night.

@VestaTilley

If your DC is still living under your roof then I’d ensure lights off/screens away when you yourself go to bed, or by 11pm at the latest. They can’t do well at their studies if they’re tired. If they can’t self regulate their time on devices then you need to be the parent and insist on a sensible switch off and bed down time.

To what age though? 16? 18?

12 year old usually in her own room for 9:30 but we let her self regulate her sleep, a good skill to have as they get older