15 year old bedtime

[Felic23]

I'm so tired! I've just increased my Son's bedtime from 9.30pm to 10pm on school nights..All his friends are in a habit of having a group call at this time and my Son was according to him only one who had to get off call to go to bed.

Even with this later bedtime I can hear he is still having to leave the call whilst they continue till I don't know what time. He is arguing the point that he gets up for school every day so hassle, is on time and doing well in school. So wants to extend again to 10.30pm to join in call longer.

The problem is 1. I don't think he will be getting enough sleep 2. I used to go to bed at 9.30pm. Now I'm staying awake in order to take phone off him at 10pm and say goodnight
I'm exhausted, what do other parents do when they want to go to sleep before teen on school nights?

Or maybe that’s genetic @jannier

Ive always needed sleep. And so have my two dcs, incl when they were babies/toddlers (eg both of them had a1.5 hour nap in the afternoon until they were 3+yo as well as sleeping 7.00pm till 7.00am). My mum is the same 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

There is such a thing as an average number of hours of sleep. But there isn’t such a thing such as a ‘right’ number of hours valid for everyone.
i mean you wouldn’t ask someone who needs 4~5 hours a sleep a night to sleep 8 hours. So why asking someone who needs 9 or even 10 hours of sleep at night to only sleep 8?

@BlueSkyBlueLife our activities wre timed a lot later, I assume to allow participants to come home from work.

Any clubs here require attending training a minimum of two, three times a week for competitions at weekends.

@Comedycook none of us could manage dinner before sports.

My youngest is ten and his athletes club is on 730-840 a couple of nights a week. It always strikes me the UK bedtimes appear to be out of sync with most of Europe, interesting.

Yeah to be fair, he's home from school by 3.30 and eats straight away.

Europe is very different I think on this issue

My 16yo is in bed by 9pm every weeknight, and generally asleep by 9:15. He wakes up at 6:20 every morning, so he gets nine hours’ solid sleep. He can be an absolute nightmare without it though. I fully accept that this is unusual!

Agree 100%

Perhaps the reason that some of these teenagers are unable to make good decisions for themselves is that they just haven't had enough practice?

My dd was perfectly capable of self regulating through her GCSE years, but it was a process of gradually getting her to take responsibility for herself over many years.

Yes, of course we still need to parent them at that age, but parenting at 15 looks a little different from parenting at 5. If you're still telling them what to do and when to go to bed at that age, how are they actually developing the skills that they will need as independent adults. It isn't like they suddenly hit 18 and know how to do everything without having had some practice.

Yes, gym after school 2 days a week and football training one day. Still home by 8 on football days. We don't go bowling or playing pool on school nights!

The thing is

1- fir this approach to work, you need to put the work in years before. That won’t be relevant to someone who hasn’t been doing that. They can’t just stop guiding and leaving their dcs to their own device.

2- it’s clearly not working fir the OP’s ds who has a ‘bedtime’ of 10.00pm, is starting to struggle to get up BUT still wants to go to bed later. He is clearly being pulled by the fact ‘all his friends’ go to bed much later and feels he is missing out. I think the expectation that a 15yo will be mature enough to step back and say ‘it’s not good fur my health/school results/attendance’ is too high.
Yes if you have a child like yours @DawnBreaks and @Glittering1 or like mine (who decided on his own accord to have the phone on silent/sleep mode from 9.00pm), it looks wonderful and easy.
In reality, many are still struggling with impulse control and the need to fit in to be able to let them do whatever they want.

It doesn’t mean you shouldn’t teach them why etc… of course. Just naive it will be enough fur all children