To have my 2 yo watch 5 hours of TV?

[Cbeebiesismybestfriend]

God that sounds so bad written down.

He goes through stages of waking at 5 and it usually lasts around a week then reverts to half six again, not sure why.

I don’t know what to do with him at this time other than let him watch TV! Then he has another hour or so at the end of the day

Do others do the same?

Well, being completely honest it is more than that when he wakes really early.

So this morning he did wake at 515 and I ended up downstairs with him and Mr Tumble while it was pitch black outside! Then I put CBeebies on at 6. He sort of flit in and out of various programmes until 730, then came upstairs with me while I showered and dressed. He then watched Justin’s House which I think is about half an hour. TV went off at 9.

So the jury for the prosecution say - he still watched two and a half hours, that’s far too much.

The jury for the defence say - but it’s not every day, he wasn’t watching for maybe an hour of that time, he does lots of other varied activities the rest of the time.

Even I don’t know if I’m BU or not now all I know is I was most bleary eyed this morning!

I think that much TV first thing in a morning is too much. It could actual reinforce him wanting to get up at that time if he has the stimulation of wright lights and TV to look forward to.

It is so hard at that age with early wake ups, I know very well. I used to take a flask of coffee up with me at night, leave it on my bedside table and pour it first thing in morning, then bring a stack of books into bed with me and read books to DD in bed. Or I would sometimes run myself a bath first thing and lie in it in the dawn light with my DD playing "wash mummy" for a bit - she did enjoy that and I got to gather my thoughts before the day began. Or I'd set up a load of toys / random objects to "discover" downstairs the night before so that at least when we got up the thinking part of "what on earth shall we do at this time" was already done.

He's only 22 months old, that's way too much TV, I wouldn't have any at that age. Could you invest in some new toys, try a rental scheme, library books..anything is better than so much screen time for such a small child...

You could also put him to bed later, 7 is very early and that might help too..

It doesn’t make any difference if he goes to bed later. He doesn’t wake so early every day, it just seems like every so often he’ll have four or five days where he wakes around 5, then he goes back to around 630, which always feels a comparative lie in!

My son is about the same age. I'm quite relaxed in lots of ways (I think!) but mine only has about half an hour of TV in the morning and then it goes off until about 4pm when we sit down with a snack for half an hour or so, mainly because I need a rest then! He'll have a little bit of night garden before bed too.

He doesn't fully watch it when it's on for longer than about 10 mins really though, unless he's ill.

We listen to music a lot or the radio and he has toy boxes in every room so can always find something to do - maybe an option instead of TV? While I'm getting dressed he comes upstairs with me and we put Mr Tumble on Alexa while he dances a bit and runs around and I can do my make up for 5 mins! 5 hours a day sounds like a huge amount. Its so hard when you're knackered though.

Like many others, I think it is far too much TV. Children need to develop their imagination and way of understanding the world without being 'fed' things, or being entertained all the time.

If you cannot see a way of avoiding that much entertainment input, I'd try to switch to radio as much as possible. Although it's also being 'fed' stuff, at least it'll produce own visual images. There are excellent children's radio programmes that don't get as much attention as they should actually.

Entertaining 2 y/os is hard work if they don’t have an older sibling - I think that was my least favourite phase of parenthood.
Thankfully we have / had a late to bad, late waking up pattern so morning telly never needed to be that long. I still never want to hear a coco melon song again for as long as I live

Would love to hear about the radio programmes anniesbike!

Start with the many hundreds of hours on BBC radio for example.
www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/category/childrens

Can recommend the reading of We're going on a bear hunt :-)

Thanks Annie, I'm in Ireland so wouldn't naturally think of the BBC but I'll take a look, thank you! I remember a fabulous afternoon radio programme growing up that I'd listen to after school with my Mum ♥

Sounds like he has a good balance of
Other stuff

So, its ok.

Dont feel guilty. You gotta do what you gotta do to survive