5 yo suddenly wide awake at bedtime

[TheHouseofMirth]

DS has alays been an "owl" and has had a relatively late bedtime of 8pm. In the last week or so he's rarely been asleep before 9-9.30pm. I suspect we experience something similar every summer and think in the past we've just gone along with it but now he's at school I think he needs to be asleep earlier and from a selfish pov we're getting no evening!

We've always stayed with until he goes to sleep, largely because that's what mine and DH's parents did and it's nice. However, an hour of him tossing, turning or even lying still and us thinking he's asleep only for him to spring up like a bloody Jack in the Box is turning us into Very Grumpy Parents and is very definitely not nice!

Any words of wisdom?

I have a son like yours, he's 10 now but has always taken a long time to go to sleep, black out blinds might be worth a try but as one of his teacher's said "You can't make someone go to sleep" I think that he just doesn't need as much sleep as other people. He wakes up at the right time and isn't tired at school so the only problem is that I don't like to go to bed until he's asleep (very often after midnight). When were you and DH going to stop sitting with him, because now seems as good a time as ever, you do need time to unwind too!