AIBU to think a 10pm bedtime and 6am start is relatively normal in your 40s?

[Alwayschillyatnight]

A recent ex found it a real issue that i would go to bed between 9.30 and 10.30 (this is going upstairs to bed, not going to sleep. That takes a while longer!) and then regularly get up around 6-7am.
Twice a week i had to commute into London, about 90 minutes, so i would have to be up by 6 on that days immaterial. The rest of the week it just suited me to keep to that routine. I like being up early and going to bed a bit earlier stops me late night snacking.

The ex, a man in his mid 40s, without children stated categorically (and dont get me started on his always thinking he was right) that "most people our age wouldn't go to bed that early and get up early".

I believe he is skewed by his own - responsibility-free life and his ex wife who was also nocturnal in tendencies.

Personally everybody else i know my age generally keeps similar hours to me , except on rare occasions when you might stay up late to socialise and then regret it the next day!

So who is being unreasonable? This has been bugging me for weeks, despite the fact he is now an ex!

YABU - you live like a nun, he is right. Lighten up and stay up late.
YANBU - you are right and he is living like a teenager because he can and assuming its normal.

"all those 90s / noughties processed diet substitutes have been proven to make one fatter anyway. "

Not true. The evidence isn't conclusive about diet drinks and skimmed milk is not a 'processed diet substitute'.

He sounds like a twat.
well rid.

I agree. People have different routines and requirements. I don't think age is particularly relevant.

9.30pm would be an early (ish) night for me (I’m 62 and still work FT). We’re usually upstairs in bed between 10-10.30 and asleep before 11pm. My alarm goes off anywhere between 5.30-6.30am depending on if it’s a WFH day or office day. I do feel it though if I’m not asleep until 11pm and up at 5.30am - 6.5 hrs is not really enough.

I think YABU to say going to bed ‘early’ (and 10.00pm isn’t early in my books…) is living like a nun. Or that one should ‘lighten up’ and go to bed later.
Or that going to bed late is living like a teenager.

If you need that much sleep, you do.
If someone needs less sleep, they do.
Why trying to fit your own physiology and sleep needs into a nice little box just to ‘look like the norm’, whatever that norm is?

fwiw, the most important of sleep is deep sleep. This happens at the start of the night and going to be early (at least asleep before midnight) helps with that….

I do this as well. The rest of the house is still in bed, while I’m up doing my own thing.

This reminds me of the Hozier song Too Sweet! So I am 45 and the best bedtime for me is 10.30pm and I get up around 6.30 as at work for 8

Glad he’s your ex! He sounds like an overbearing bellend!!

Urgh he sounds like a complete bellend if he literally cannot imagine someone having a different time schedule to him. The world doesnt revolve around him and his habits.

I go to bed and get up at the same time as you, OP, and it's completely normal in my social circle (most of us go to the gym early before work). The gym is always full of people that early so it cant be that "unusual" 🙄

I wake up naturally 6.30/7am and go to bed about 11, sleep by midnight.

I don't know what friends do but I suspect similar to you given the time texting stops. I don't understand how you have any type of evening, what time do you get home from work?

Everyone needs sufficient rest so if getting up time is fixed bedtime has to be adjusted to suit. I obviously don't need much sleep.

It is way to early for me, I wouldn’t be able to sleep and it wouldn’t feel like I’d had much of an evening with DH if if I went to bed at that time. Thankfully we’re both a bit similar. But I don’t think there’s any right or wrong in it. Sounds about right that he is an ex!

During the week, bed 10/10.30, up around 7am (usually awake before my 7am alarm goes off). Weekends and holidays, I'll stay up as late as I want/need, and wake up at whatever time that naturally happens.

I think what you do is absolutely fine, as long as you're not restricting your social plans or activities at weekends by blindly sticking to an unneccessarily rigid bed 9.30 up at 6 routine.

For most of my life I've gone to bed whenever, though on the earlier side, and got up at 6.00.a.m. or earlier to mark pupils' work. I felt calm and neutral then, nothing had happened to piss me off.
It's only changed recently. Now in my 70s I need the light to motivate me, and have to sleep with curtains open. It's getting to spring here in Melbourne, so the mornings are fab.
My late DH wasn't as late to bed or quite as early to rise as me, but we synched well.

No-one is wrong or right - just horses for courses....it's just that as you found out you and your ex are running different races and are better off in different stables!

I start work at 7.30,get up at 6ish. I dont have an alarm on the weekend but i get up at similar time. I go upstairs when I feel like it, sometimes ill watch TV in bed other times I will go straight to sleep but I dont like to go to bed any later than 11

I don't think it's normal judging from when most of my friends send me WhatsApps. And yes, they do all work! I think most people get up a bit later like 7/7.30am and go to bed at 11/12 or so. I know one guy who is strict on his bedtime and is up at 6, including weekends!!

I'm definitely not normal, need a lot of sleep so I usually sleep after lunch as well just to keep up. I am early 50s but I've needed lots of sleep for my whole life.

I get up about the same time as you, when I am tired I go to bed earlier than you. Probably do that a couple of times a week - I need it. After recovering from living with an abusive partner who intentionally disturbed my sleep, I do not allow anyone to dictate my bedtime routine. It is nobody’s business but yours.

I’m usually in bed about midnight, up at 6.45 on work days. Ideally I’d go to bed about 1 and sleep until 9ish. I’d feel like I had no evening if I went to bed as early as 10pm, but I think it’s just personal preference.

Strange thing to be worrying about weeks later! He's got his opinion and you've got yours. Surely that's the end of it? Why are you still stressing weeks on?

I go to bed at around 10.30 - 11pm with our older dog, and my partner stays up til about midnight with our younger dog. Then we're both up around 6.55am for work. Earlier for him if he is driving to clients. I work from home but take it very seriously so am always up and working by 7.30am. Neither of us feel tired and I wouldn't sleep if I went to bed anything before 10.30pm.

Yep I'm an early bird at a similar age to you. I love it and am very protective of my early to bed curfew. Dh is bemused but we make it work.

I also think it's totally normal to be needing to offload post relationship and find it interesting to read too. I think the posters who don't should scroll by.

Please tell us more -
How did the breakup come about?
What other annoying opinions and habits did he have?
Rant away.

Your routine sounds normal.

Most women I know are managing work, domestic duties and kids so getting up at 6/6.30 on an aoverage school and work day is necessary.

It doesn’t surprise me in the least to read this:

Men are more likely than women to go to bed later at night: 43% of men go to bed from around 11:30pm onwards compared to 32% of women.

All the adults I know who sit up late watching films/gaming are male. I think it’s because they have fewer life responsibilities to get up for.

And yes while it’s not intrinsically teenage to have a late bedtime IMO it often goes hand in hand with having light life responsibilities.

No routine. What time I got up and went to bed depended entirely on what time I had to be at work in the morning. Which varied.

I do exactly this every day so for me it’s normal. I go to bed at about 10, wake up at 6:50 and I’m in work for 8 o clock.

Surely you both have the wisdom to understand everyone's life is different and comes with different waking up times?
I hate this idea of someone saying is this normal and people argueing if it's normal or not like their view of the world applys to everyone's life, we all live very different lives.
Some people don't sleep well, some people can't sleep past 5am, some people have medical issues, some people have young children, some people live on a busy street that's bouncing until 11pm.
You live your life how it works for you and he can do the same.

I've had that routine since I was about secondary school age I think.