Does adult time in the evening disappear as your DC get older

[Orissiah]

What do you do in the evenings as your DCs get older and go to bed later? Do you spend time watching TV with or doing activities with or going out with your DC or do they simply get on with things themselves by themselves? Do you need to retreat to your bedroom or go out in order to have some adult/"me" time?

It certainly has for us - DS has never needed much sleep but now he's approaching teenage years he's still up nearly as late as us.

We say during the week that 9pm is his cut off and that is the time for him to go to his room, shower, pack bag for the next day, read etc.

During the holidays / weekends then we move it back to 9.30 / 10.00pm.

We have a big gap between him and DD so its not proved an option for us to go out more with the DC as DD needs her sleep.

Yes. DS is now 12, and is up till 10.30 most weeknights, sometimes later at weekends. In the evenings he is often on the computer chatting to friends getting on with homework, or practising the guitar etc, while I read or get on with other stuff once I have got DD into bed, but sometimes we watch a DVD together (something too old for DD (8), eg we are currently working our way through Modern Families) or something like that.

We have two living rooms (only one TV though) so it is easy enough to do things separately, and mostly it works fine, though I do have to admit that sometimes I wish he went to bed earlier so I could just have an evening without interruptions.

yes, completely disappears...

mine are 11 and 13, and we live in a small flat so we are altogether all the time....

is is 11pm over here and DD (13) is now getting ready for bed (to be fair, we were out for a meal for her birthday, so things are a bit later than usual)

DH and I just about manage a quick cup of tea and a chat for half an hour or so, and then its off to bed for us too.

Yes!

Ds' are 8 and 6 and now not going to bed until 8.30pm. I miss the time just me and dh but I'm slowly getting used to it. I tend to go to bed about 9.30pm when I'm not working nights so it makes a difference, them staying up until later.

They are happy enough to entertain themselves, playing together or watching re-runs of Deadly 60 so I tend to go off and watch different tv or read a book.