Early morning starts with children

[Sacmagique75]

When I was a child in the 90s I used to wake up super early. I’d quietly put the tv on and watch live and kicking for hours until my parents emerged, I did not dare open their closed bedroom door before they woke and came out. Which was never before 9am on a weekend. I certainly didn’t barge in, demanding breakfast at 5:30, crying and whinging until they relented. My two young children have always been early risers but now at the ages of 6 and 4 is it too much to ask that they quietly entertain themselves with tv for an hour rather than demand I get out of bed before 6:30?

DS2 piled everything in his room against the wall and scaled it to get to his gro clock. We now use the lock feature.

Same! Been a game changer

We do iPads in the morning just so we get a sneaky hour. My DH husband and I both take a weekend mornings to have a lay in. I have to take half a nytol to get past 6am as my body kick kicks in but helps us feel refreshed in a weekend if we both get a lovely lay in.

Ugh those early morning wake ups were so brutal. My youngest would wake around 5am daily from around 18 months to school age. It dominated my entire life as I was so exhausted, grumpy and resentful as a result. I just couldn't trust them alone at 4/5 and the youngest was very naughty (on spectrum possibly). I remember my friend with twins (girls) telling me hers would get up and made theie own microwave porridge at aged 6! I was absolutely gobsmacked. My 10 year old couldn't do that now 🤣
I think girls in the whole tenda bit more independent, boys are more needy. Obviously exceptions to the rule.

Baby gates where they need to be and literally everything is completely safe. Mischief impossible. The worst he could do is have toys and books flung about his room.

His room is very minimal and safe. No furniture to climb just his toddler bed, soft rug to play on and baskets of toys. Lamps are on shelves too high to reach.

He can get from his room to our room via an empty, safe hallway with no access to other rooms.

Oh I get how their room can be safe - the whole house though if they are going downstairs and making breakfast? Some posters have said that their 4 year olds are doing that

Though my younger one was 18 months when he could climb over a stair gate so the stair gate thing wouldn't work

Be strict with gro clock

Blue means sleep /quiet

Yellow wake up /play /watch tv on weekends

Dd usually wakes 7.15/730 tho the odd before 7 but knows to be quiet or read books etc

As we have implemented that since she was couple years old

Have friends children up /awake at 530/6 and just no way

Kids are tired and grumpy as are poor parents

And yes 4/5am wakings would be treated as night ones - not to start the day again

My dc are older now but one thing to be a bit cautious about ( child dependent ) is that if you allow iPad/ tv to avoid being woken by early wakers it can reinforce the early waking - we had to put a limit of 6:30/7 for screens to stop him waking up extra early for extra iPad time and then needing to go back to bed at 9 when we needed to get out of the door to rugby.

My DD never woke up early anyway (except on the rare occasion, usually when I had a hangover. How do they know??) so she wasn't a problem, and I've trained DS (4) to stay in his room until his sleep clock wakes up which is 8:30 at weekends (he normally sleeps until 7:30-8:00 but sometimes wakes up much earlier) unless OH takes him downstairs with him earlier when he gets up.
Training him involved rewarding him when he would stay in his room until the clock woke up. He is a pretty compliant child though.

I think girls in the whole tenda bit more independent, boys are more needy. Obviously exceptions to the rule.

If you raise them with those low sexist expectations of course that's how they will turn out. If your 10 year old can't make themselves breakfast (assuming no ND) the parents are at fault, not their sex.

Oh I get how their room can be safe - the whole house though if they are going downstairs and making breakfast? Some posters have said that their 4 year olds are doing that

Though my younger one was 18 months when he could climb over a stair gate so the stair gate thing wouldn't work

We're all on one level so I don't know about going downstairs. I don't think I'd be happy with that. As it is he's right across the hall so we can hear everything. In that case I'd rather stop access to stairs and leave a little packed breakfast in their room to tide them over on a weekend.

Also, extra tall baby gates are a great investment!

@Letsgooodiscooo - we tried the extra tall ones, he is just that good. It did take him a few days to figure those out.

My older one in contrast didn't even realise he could get out of his bed and come and find us till he was almost 5...

Woah! Little monkey!

My lo is 6, his options back in bed and wait for me or watch tv and wait for me.

@Plaidparty

treat yourself to a lie in every so often Hun!

your kids don’t need a “family breakfast” every morning

@ladymaiasura

Go to bed earlier, right… so if kid is getting up at 4.30am or whatever then to go to bed early enough to get enough sleep would mean going at like 9am or something!

an adult does not want to be going to bed at 9am on a Friday or Saturday night! especially if they are going out which shock horror some parents do!

sod going to bed at that time on a weekend!

nowt wrong with kids staying in their rooms and reading, playing or watching tv until a reasonable hour

Parents work hard - they are are allowed to have some things their way and what suits them

My 4yo stays in her room until her gro clock comes on at 6.30am around 75% of the time but she used to come in every morning so it has improved!
My 6yo stays in bed reading until he hears we are all up…
they wouldn’t go downstairs without us though as it’s dark and they think it’s scary !

//fond memories of wackaday Saturday, Timmy Mallett, Michaela Strachan, and Mallett’s mallett//

but then, my parents smacked me. I always lived slightly in fear.

my kids go downstairs and get their breakfast but are good trained permission seekers and I cannot get them out of the habit of saying “please can I go downstairs and watch something and play on the switch”. However, they now know they can’t do that til after 7. Doesn’t stop them being noisy in their own rooms though… and for those of you saying where’s the authority.. if you have a child screaming at you at 5am and nothing works to shut them up and they’re waking up your other children/neighbours, you do what you need to do. Even if in the long term it’s not the best solution.

👏

Girls are more independent because that's what they're expected to be. Boys (and then men) are allowed to have no idea what's going on or how to do anything and need their hands holding because thats what's expected.

It's bollocks. Don't raise knobby men.

Put them to bed later. Then they will get up later (after a few days once their body clocks have ‘reset’ themselves). Honestly I have never understood this about the U.K. Parents put their kids to bed stupidly early (at 7pm or before) and then are surprised when they wake up at 6am or before! Our 4yo goes to sleep between 8pm and 9pm and then we are actually woken at a sane hour at the weekends (between 7.30am and 8am). It’s not rocket science.

It isn’t rocket science but it also isn’t effective for a lot of children. I’m sure it works for some but in my case the later DS goes to bed the earlier he wakes. It’s not that dissimilar to adults really - sometimes the more exhausted I am the more poorly I sleep.

I can never sleep past a certain time either, even if I am very tired. It’s very frustrating. The difference is I don’t wake everyone else up when this happens.

Same OP. I'm one of 6. Never ever went into parent's room! They got up when they pleased and we tiptoed around downstairs. Didn't backchat. Helped around the house. Didn't help ourself to food. Parents weren't even strict! I feel like there is much less respect these days. My 2 DC answer back moan when I ask them to do anything! Wake me in the night, Helped themselves to my things and things they want from the cupboard.

Perhaps she wasn't afraid of them. Perhaps she just respected their need to sleep a bit longer....Learning to respect adults (or anyone else asking for something perfectly normal) is really not a bad thing!

Never accepted it. Once my kids were old enough to know they knew fine well not to wake me up and they still do. I’m not asking for the world I’m just asking for fucking 9am. I always have that lie and I deserve it. Thankfully my kids are good and considerate.

I get the sentiment of this. But then I can’t help but think I’ve had the worst of both worlds - a childhood of obedience and compliance, and an adulthood of jumping to the tune of small children. I’d by lying if I said I didn’t sometimes wish they were just a tiny bit scared of me…

I saw a post similar to this online last week and it verbalised what I've been thinking for years.
They said- no one listened to us as kids and now no one listens to us as adults
We were ruled by our adults as kids and now as adults we are ruled by our kids

Likely doesn't apply to everyone but it hit a nerve here.
I'm 40 (ish)
I wonder if it's our generation.

It's fascinating to unpick