Sleep and older children

Ericka Kammerer wrote:
As I mentioned before, I looked up several studies,
with the general consensus being that the average teen needs
9-10 hours of sleep per night, and the "natural" bedtime is
around 11pm. Obviously, there's some individual variation,
but that doesn't add up to a necessary 4am-1pm schedule.

I don't know where the 4 am bedtime came from. 11 pm natural bedtime,
sleep 10 hours means a 9 am wake time. The vast majority of teens need
to get up several hours earlier than that to make it to school. This is
what is causing the sleep problems.

Therefore by weekend, the teen winds up with a sleep deficit, which is
why teens are apt to sleep in past lunchtime when they can. So it would
not be abnormal for a teen to go to bed at 11 pm on Friday, and sleep
until 1 pm. I think *that's* what we've all been talking about, no? Not
the late bedtime, so much as the sleeping-in-late and missing family
morning time.


But you know, even if it *did* suggest that 4am-1pm was
optimal, teens would have to learn to survive on a different
schedule until and unless the world sees fit to accommodate
things like schools starting at 3pm and workdays moving to
3-11 instead of 9-5 ;-)
Studies also suggest that sleeping in late on
weekends to catch up can lead to poorer quality sleep
and that schedules might have a significant impact on
the delayed sleep schedule that teens seem to experience.
It is not clear that this skew in their schedules is
innate.

Yes, the research I directed to you says that it is innate to have a
later bedtime as a teen. Something about melatonin.

The sleeping-in-late on weekends isn't because they go to bed even
later than 11 pm; it's because they need to catch up on the sleep they
missed all week long. Whether catch-up sleep leads to poorer quality
sleep I don't know, but I wouldn't be surprised.

What are you going to do though? If the teen can't naturally fall
asleep until near 11 pm? And school starts early?

All I know is that I wouldn't a) want to force my teen into an
unnaturally early bedtime (tossing and turning while wide awake can
definetly lead to insomnia); and b) have the heart to wake up a
late-sleeping teen on the weekend, knowing he/she's already dragging
around with a major deficit.


It may well be caused by other factors in
combination. For instance, they found that in those
in middle or late puberty, even very dim lighting
delayed melatonin secretion. So, that post-homework
tv watching or computer gaming might well be a partial
*cause* of the phase shift.

A few of the articles specifcally ruled out t.v., gaming, and other
modern-day diversions. There is something else going on with teens. Of
course, having those diversions - and caffiene in sodas - can very
defintely compound things.

There are also some
researchers looking into how teenaged alcohol exposure
might be affecting the brain's sleep system. So, it
might be a bit simplistic to say that we can't do
anything about this. We may not be able to eliminate
this phase shift, and it's very unlikely that we could
eliminate the need for more sleep during the teen years,
but it may be that with good sleep habits we can mitigate
some of the sleep deprivation.


Oh, I do agree to encourage the teen to have a regular bedtime. I guess
I'm just disagreeing that it has to or should be as early as 9 pm,
especially if it's natural for a teen to fall asleep closer to 11 pm.
And I'm definetly disagreeing that one shouldn't allow their teen to
catch up on sleep on the weekends. To me, it's cruelty to wake a kid up
if a kid desparately needs the sleep. Sure, if they really are staying
up until 4 am... but what I'm saying here is that it's quite natural
for a teen who doesn't stay up past midnight to still sleep until lunch
on the weekends.

jen

Joy wrote:
OTOH, a tattletale yappy little dog CAN make a difference ;-)

LOL, don't encourage DH. :-)

Come to think of it, that's the other safeguard we have: obnoxiously
yappy dog lives right next door. During summer, he sleeps outside in
the fenced in yard, in an area that is within yards of DD's bedroom
window. And also we have motion-sensitive lights all around the
property. The minute any kid slipped outside, the lights would all go
on.

Okay, now I don't have to feel so guilty about being such a heavy
sleeper! Cuz it is true that since I did this very same thing myself at
age 14, I am fully aware that at some point in time, one or both of my
DD's will try it too! I recall when we first moved in, I expressed this
concern to my neighbor, the one-who-hates-kids, and she told me to put
bars on their windows. I refuse to go that far.

Hate to say it, however, but that night I slipped out to meet my
friends was a total blast. :-)

jen

Joy wrote:
"Ericka Kammerer" wrote in message
...
Joy wrote:
"Banty" wrote in message
And - no parent wants to hear this, but how many times do we hear of
parents who
are sooo sure what their teen is doing and how well they know their teen
and
what a great relationship they have with their teen, to learn in
distressing or
even tragic circumstances that they did not know what was going on with
their
teen at all. So I think it's advisable to have the schedules sync
enough to
still maintain some supervision.
This brings up an [IMO] interesting question - at what age do (or did, as
the case may be) people start loosening the reins, so to speak?
What do you mean by "loosening the reins"? I think
to some extent, it's ideally a process that begins early
and continues gradually throughout their minority. It's
a continuous give-and-take between increasing maturity,
responsibilities, and privileges. I think you have to start
giving small privileges early so that they can demonstrate
responsibility, and then you just keep growing on that
foundation, being ever vigilant for changes.

Sure - and if the end result is supposed to be that they are capable of
functioning as autonomous adults by approximately the time they graduate
high school/turn 18 then from about the mid-teens on there needs to be an
increasing degree of autonomy granted - in order for that to be effective
there has to be meaningful opportunity for the teens to practice making
their own decisions and managing their own schedules. I guess I'm seeing
that as incompatible with "must make them go to bed on schedule, and must
make them keep a schedule that maximizes family time". Mind you, I'm coming
from the perspective of somebody who hasn't had a toddler in the house for
a long, long time - my youngest is about to graduate high school. I dimly
recall feeling differently when mine were little :-)

I don't really see it as incompatible at all. The
goal is to have kids who are healthy and alert and able to
manage their responsibilities, which include spending some
time with family. When they are mature enough and responsible
enough, they get to manage their bedtimes themselves. If
they do not manage to be healthy and alert or don't have
time to spend with family because they're sleeping until
noon, that is evidence to me that they are not yet mature
and responsible enough to handle the privilege of managing
their own bedtime. I don't really see how that's any
different from any other privilege. They all come with
commensurate responsibilities (or should), and those who
don't live up to the responsibility side don't get the
privilege. I mean, we can all bemoan the unfairness of
it all that teens live in a world that isn't geared toward
their natural schedule or their preferences, but that's
life and mature folks have to learn to deal with the
life they have, not the one they wish they had.

Best wishes,
Ericka

Ericka Kammerer wrote:

Rosalie B. wrote:

Research suggests that by and large, you can't
"catch up" on sleep. So, if the kid needs 10 hours a
night and only manages to get 8 hours a night during the
school week, he or she can't sleep 15 hours Friday and
Saturday nights to make up for it. Realistically, they
can sleep their 10 hours plus maybe a tad more. So,
if they're going to bed by 11pm (no need to go to bed
any later to accommodate their shifted schedule, and it
would probably be quite reasonable for them to go to
bed at 10pm), then they should still be out of bed by
10am at the latest, with 8 or 9am still being quite
reasonable even in the case of catching up a sleep
deficit.

I wasn't suggesting exactly this scenario. I was thinking that they
might sleep a LITTLE later on weekend.

I don't know about the research, but I know that if I had to work a
double shift, I couldn't make it up all at once, but I had to get that
sleep sometime. Otherwise I was apt to go to sleep while I was trying
to drive home.

a teen needs to sleep until noon every day of summer
break, regardless of how that might limit family time.
Yes, teen's biological clocks tend to skew later, and
I'm all for accommodating that to some degree, but
not to the extent of saying that it's okay to lose
family time for a summer because it's that important
for the teen to stay up until 3 or 4am on a regular
basis.


I don't know why you have to exaggerate everything so much. Sleeping
until noon EVERY DAY of summer and staying up until 4 am !!! That's
not what most of us are talking about.

I also tend to think that your premise that if you allow teens to
sleep late they will miss a significant part of family time to be a
false dichotomy because I suspect that the reason for the sleeping
late is because the teen doesn't want family time rather than that
they are inadvertently missing it.
I don't think it's acceptable for teens to opt out
of family life.

Well you may not think it acceptable, but everyone isn't you. I don't
think you can just make that flat statement and expect everyone to
agree. I don't agree.

I didn't say others had to agree. I said that I
believe it to be unacceptable. And, since my kids are so
unfortunate to have me as a parent, they're going to have
to live with my unreasonable expectations that they will
continue to be involved in a family life together even
when they're teens and have Much Better Things To Do.
Personally, I believe it's a choice.

So that is your choice. Just don't present it as if it was the ONLY
choice to make, or the only RIGHT choice or the only CORRECT choice.
It's not a good idea to be so dogmatic until you've BTDT a couple of
times.

There was never a time when I was living at home
and was not expected to take part in family activities.
I have the same expectation for my kids. Sure, they will
be more independent, but I also expect them to balance
their lives in a way that includes some family time.

I don't know exactly what you mean by family time. Doing chores
together? Shopping? Going to church together? Eating dinner? This
concept of "FAMILY TIME" is a foreign one to me and one that I would
not have occurred to me to quantify, or to complain about the lack
thereof.

My mom told me a couple of months ago that she visited her grandfather
EVERY Sunday after church, when she was home and she continued to do
that after she graduated from college (although she wasn't married
yet). She had that expectation for her children and grandchildren
too, but since we lived farther from her, she would at least expect a
weekly call. Her idea was that it was respectful to do that. My
sister did that, and she also visited our mom and called me more than
I visited and more than I called her (my sister). Is that the kind
of thing you mean?

When I was in college, I was expected to write home once a week at a
minimum. My dd#1 made arrangements to call her children once a week
and a preset time.

We just do those things earlier in the day, when
we don't have cranky, tired kids to deal with. It's not
very relaxing or fun when they're sleep deprived.

If kids are cranky at the end of the day it is more likely to be
because they were NOT allowed to sleep in the morning, or because they
missed their nap.
Um, if my kids are up late, they're cranky the
next day. Generally, they don't sleep in even when

Well then why are you saying that you want to do things earlier in the
day when they are not cranky and tired?

? We do things earlier in the day so that they
are not cranky and tired. It works quite well. They get
to bed at a reasonable hour, they wake refreshed and ready
to go, and it's a great time for all of us. If I were
to do things at 8pm, they'd be tired and cranky, and
they'd wake tired and cranky the next day because they
didn't get to bed on time.

That works for you. All children are not the same in that respect.
Some of my children could go to sleep late and not awake cranky and
tired. Some of them needed their sleep but even those children could
stay up and do something at 8 pm without severely impacting their
attitude the next day. We used to have a Tuesday schedule (during the
school year - the older girls were 3rd and 5th grade and we did this
until they were in 5th and 7th grade), where I picked them up from
school, and took them to their piano lesson. One would be playing the
piano and the other would be doing her homework and then they
switched. Then they had swim team from 4:30 to 6. We went to
McDonalds and got hamburgers and then we went to the ice rink and
skated from 7 to 9. The ice rink was about 45 minutes from home (we
lived in the country). This schedule did not make them late for
school the next day.

When my kids were teens, they had family time because I was supporting
them in their various activities. I was driving them to horse shows
or swim meets or whatever activity they were involved in (even after
they could drive, I still did most of the driving). I didn't say that
they had to spend time with the family because I didn't have to. And
the times that they went to bed were set by them because they knew
when they had to get up to be ready for whatever it was that they were
doing - they chose to do it, and they wanted to be prepared, so they
did what they needed to do in order to get to the event in a timely
manner and able to do well.

That's great, but my personal opinion is that
for my kids, it is not enough for them to live their lives
according only to their own activities and their own needs.
If the only thing they have on their plate for Saturday
is a 4pm rehearsal, that doesn't mean they get to be AWOL
until 4pm and disappear as soon as they're back.

I'm not suggesting that they should be AWOL until 4 pm, but I don't
think they are teenagers either. I was talking about my children when
they were teens and in high school.

I refuse
to live with family who don't make some time for each other.
Color me unreasonable if you like, but I believe it is
completely possible to place a priority on family time and
even have everyone enjoy it, even with teens.

How long a time are you talking about?

Whenever you say "Family Time" like that, it pushes my buttons because
I'm not sure what you are talking about or what family time includes.
It sounds to me like the things I had to do (let Aunt Ethel kiss and
hug me) because my mom expected that I would do them.

Why do you have to work so HARD to have family time? Isn't it a
natural result of having a family that loves and respects each other?
If not, I don't think it can be mandated, any more than love and
respect can be mandated.

grandma Rosalie

shinypenny wrote:
Ericka Kammerer wrote:
I'm not sure where the contradiction is? We take family
time where we can get it, especially since we do not control
what time many of the activities happen. (We don't schedule
anything but church on the weekends, but that's when the
"extras" tend to happen, like sleepovers, performances, dress
rehearsals, etc.)

Well, you do have control. You can always say no to all the extra
activities. (I say this, realizing just today I said yes to another
round of swim team and tennis for the spring... ) ;-)

Of course. What I meant is that while we do not sign
up for Saturday morning swimming lessons, or any other
Saturday activity, on a regular basis, the activities they
do have require occasional weekend commitments which we
do not control the scheduling for. So, yes, they could
stop the activity all together, but we do not have an
option to do the activity while still keeping all weekends
free of commitments.


If kids have activities in the evening,
we'll have family time in the morning. If they have activities
in the morning, we'll have family time in the evening. We work
around whatever. The kids are somewhat more likely to have
afternoon activities, which is convenient when they coincide
with the toddler's nap so that we can go out and do stuff
together in the morning. So, I don't see why morning can't
be family time? If, after all, we end up with activities
in the late afternoon/evening and toddler naps in the
early afternoon, when else are we going to do it? I rather
think that was my point.

That's what I suspected your point was, but you weren't quite saying
that. :-)

You want your older kids to be on the same schedule as the toddler. The
household currently revolves around his schedule. I get that. But, in a
few years your toddler won't be napping so who knows???

Well, based on what I can see coming down the pike, not
much will change. They will likely have activities to do and
friends they wish to socialize with, and those things will most
likely be primarily in the afternoon. Unless I greatly miss
my guess, they won't suddenly need a lot less sleep, yet their
school will start earlier. Thus, I rather suspect we won't be
able to push bedtimes a lot later. Therefore, we will likely
be in the same situation we are now: afternoons likely booked
with non-family time and not a whole lot of time left after
dinner. So, if we want to go out and do stuff as a family,
mornings will probably still be the more likely time to do it.

If your teens
start sleeping in late, maybe you'll get flexible on the weekends and
move family time later to accomodate *their* sleep needs. Right now,
you're accomodating the toddler's. (And probably your own, because you
likely have no luxury of sleeping in later since the young one gets up
early... believe me, I totally commiserate with that one.).

Regardless of anything else, DH will still have a life
that generally involves getting up at a reasonable hour in
the morning to go to work (and sleeping late on the weekends
throws his schedule out of kilter) and I will still have
demands on my time that require me to get moving in the morning,
so neither of us are likely to have the luxury of sleeping
until late for the forseeable future. And again, I don't have
any objection to the kids sleeping in a bit on the weekend,
but we'll continue to have to get going for church on Sunday
mornings, and I firmly believe that sleeping until noon on
Saturday when you have to get up much earlier the rest of
the week just makes things worse, not better. So, they're
welcome to sleep in a bit, but I seriously doubt we'll find
it workable to have weekend mornings as a time for sleeping.

Personally, I think there's value in some supervision
past the stage where you're just worried about their physical
safety.
I know my DD13 would not like me intruding into her bathroom or bedroom
when she's doing the kissy-face stuff in the mirror. :-)
Well, you did note yourself that supervision doesn't
always mean riding in someone's back pocket ;-)

Then why did you bother to say something about supervision? Like you
were implying I was not supervising her appropriately.

I have no idea about you and your daughter. For me
and my kids, having them awake for several hours after I
went to bed (as in the hypothetical 4am-1pm sleep schedule)
would not be adequate supervision, and I rather suspect that
will be true when they're 13 as well. Could be wrong, but
I just don't imagine that I'll feel comfortable with them
up that many hours with the rest of the house out cold.

The big one that leaps to mind is sneaking out,

Can't open a window in our house without someone hearing it.

but just because there's a rule against no phone or Internet
after 8pm doesn't mean it won't happen unless you've taken
other steps to preclude it from happening when you're not
awake.

Computer is in the dining room. The dining room is within feet of our
bedroom door. We would/do hear her if she was in the dining room. She
could take her cell to her room, but as I said, voices carry in our
house, and I would hear her talking on the phone. Or if I was sound
asleep, DH would because he's a light sleeper.

She does have one friend who's a total insomniac who attempted once
calling her after midnight. DD brought her ringing cell phone to me,
rolling her eyes, and asked me to answer it for her and play "bad cop."
I did, and reminded the young lady that we do not receive calls from
friends after 9 pm. Of course, when DD gets a few years older, and gets
a boyfriend, I can see myself easing up on this rule too. Maybe in high
school the new rule will be no calls after 10 or 11 pm.

At any rate, this is just getting silly. At some point, you do have to
loosen up and relax and extend some trust to your kids. That's the
whole point - you extend more and more trust, the older they get. The
amount of trust I give DD13 is appropriate to her current maturity
level and she has proven worthy of it to date.

Which is fine for you and your daughter. I have no
argument with extending privileges as maturity and responsibility
dictate. You just asked what else could be going on "after
hours" and I gave some examples. They may not be relevant
for you and your family, but they surely are for a number
of families out there going by the number of acquaintances
who have been dealing with late night surfing and calling
and roving.

And you do realize that just because your 8 and 10 y.o. are getting
tucked into bed at 9 pm, doesn't preclude them from waking up at 4 am
and going out their bedroom windows either, right?

Yep. That's why the 11yo is still sharing a room
with the 8yo. He can have the downstairs bedroom in a
year or two, but not before we get the window alarmed,
because that's two floors away and I wouldn't be able
to hear someone sneaking out (or in). That's also why the
toddler's door has a toddler lock on it so she can't get out
and the doors out of the house are toddler-proofed. I don't
particularly want to find her on the street at 2am, which,
given her personality, is a real possibility.

I mean, seriously,
you have no guarantee that they're going to sleep through the night, or
not sleep walk or whatever. Unless you plan to be awake 24/7, just in
case!

Never said one should, only that one needs to
be aware of the possibilities and plan for them based
on the personality/responsibility/maturity of the
individual child and the rest of the situation. Given
your daughter's personality and your environment, it
may be completely reasonable for her to be up until
dawn while you snooze. For others, it may be unreasonable
to have teens up so late after they're in bed.

Best wishes,
Ericka

shinypenny wrote:
Ericka Kammerer wrote:
As I mentioned before, I looked up several studies,
with the general consensus being that the average teen needs
9-10 hours of sleep per night, and the "natural" bedtime is
around 11pm. Obviously, there's some individual variation,
but that doesn't add up to a necessary 4am-1pm schedule.

I don't know where the 4 am bedtime came from. 11 pm natural bedtime,
sleep 10 hours means a 9 am wake time. The vast majority of teens need
to get up several hours earlier than that to make it to school. This is
what is causing the sleep problems.

Therefore by weekend, the teen winds up with a sleep deficit, which is
why teens are apt to sleep in past lunchtime when they can. So it would
not be abnormal for a teen to go to bed at 11 pm on Friday, and sleep
until 1 pm. I think *that's* what we've all been talking about, no? Not
the late bedtime, so much as the sleeping-in-late and missing family
morning time.

I think there have been several things being discussed.
One has been whether it's okay in the summer to let kids drift
to whatever schedule because, hey, they don't have to be in
school and it only takes a couple days to readjust once school
starts. My opinion on that is that it's not okay because
the rest of the family doesn't typically get to change their
whole schedule in the summer to accommodate that, and for
some it takes a lot more than a couple days to readjust.
In terms of the sleep in late on the weekend to
catch up, as I've said elsewhere, I don't have a problem
with a little lie in. I don't think you have to get up
at 6am on Saturday just because that's what you do M-F.
However, if you're sleeping until noon on Saturday, I
would suggest that that is doing more harm than good in
the overall picture. Research does not suggest that
you can catch up that way. You can get that full 10 hours
(or whatever you need) on the weekends, and you can
sometimes catch a little more than that, but you can't
really make up the sleep deficit by sleeping away the
"missing" hours from earlier in the week. Plus, getting
up late on Saturday means that you're actively resetting
your clock much later, making it that much more difficult
to fall asleep at a reasonable hour that night and that
much more difficult to get up when Monday rolls around
again. Part of managing your sleep schedule so that
it doesn't get out of hand and create more of a sleep
deficit means avoiding those wild swings in schedule
where possible.

But you know, even if it *did* suggest that 4am-1pm was
optimal, teens would have to learn to survive on a different
schedule until and unless the world sees fit to accommodate
things like schools starting at 3pm and workdays moving to
3-11 instead of 9-5 ;-)
Studies also suggest that sleeping in late on
weekends to catch up can lead to poorer quality sleep
and that schedules might have a significant impact on
the delayed sleep schedule that teens seem to experience.
It is not clear that this skew in their schedules is
innate.

Yes, the research I directed to you says that it is innate to have a
later bedtime as a teen. Something about melatonin.

Yes, some of it is innate, but the question is
whether we are adding additional factors that exacerbate
the problem.

The sleeping-in-late on weekends isn't because they go to bed even
later than 11 pm;

Well, for many that *is* a factor. They want to stay
up late, and they're allowed to stay up late because it's the
weekend and they don't have to get up early for school the
next day. Plus, Friday and Saturday nights are prime time
for going out with friends. So, often it *is* the case that
these teens are up significantly later on a Friday or
Saturday night, which exacerbates the problem because they
will sleep in very late the next day and not be exposed
to sunlight to reset their clock until after noon. That
makes they want to stay up even later on Sunday night, and
makes it harder to get up Monday morning. So, instead of
starting out the week having caught up a bit, they start
out with an even worse sleep deficit.

it's because they need to catch up on the sleep they
missed all week long. Whether catch-up sleep leads to poorer quality
sleep I don't know, but I wouldn't be surprised.

But again, you can't really catch up for the
most part. You can recoup a little of it, but you
don't ever really make up for missed sleep.

What are you going to do though? If the teen can't naturally fall
asleep until near 11 pm? And school starts early?

Well, there's that question I raised above: is
the 11pm the biological imperative, or are there other
things we do that exacerbate that? If we reduced the
exposure to tv and computer in the evening, would that
help keep the biological clock from slipping so late
into the night? Can physical exercise timed appropriately
help establish a better sleep schedule? We know that
more routine sleep and wake times help to reinforce a
schedule, teen or not. I rather suspect that this is
not a completely lost cause. I doubt you can get your
teen asleep at 8:30, but I'll bet with good habits you
can get a lot closer to 10pm. At that rate, you're
at least cutting into the sleep deficit significantly.
Even better if you could successfully move bedtime back
to 9:30.

All I know is that I wouldn't a) want to force my teen into an
unnaturally early bedtime (tossing and turning while wide awake can
definetly lead to insomnia);

Sure, but that doesn't mean that you can't work
the issue and attempt to establish a *successful* earlier
bedtime.

and b) have the heart to wake up a
late-sleeping teen on the weekend, knowing he/she's already dragging
around with a major deficit.

Even if, on balance, waking him or her at 10am
is better and leads to less of a sleep deficit than
allowing him or her to sleep until noon?

It may well be caused by other factors in
combination. For instance, they found that in those
in middle or late puberty, even very dim lighting
delayed melatonin secretion. So, that post-homework
tv watching or computer gaming might well be a partial
*cause* of the phase shift.

A few of the articles specifcally ruled out t.v., gaming, and other
modern-day diversions. There is something else going on with teens. Of
course, having those diversions - and caffiene in sodas - can very
defintely compound things.

Right. I'm not denying that there is an issue.
I'm saying that the overwhelming majority of teens
engage in several habits that are likely to exacerbate
the problem. I'm not throwing in the towel without
trying to make some headway on those issues. I have
little control over when my teens will have to wake
up to get to school. The only thing I can do to help
them overcome the potential sleep deficit is try to
make it possible for them to get to bed early enough
in the evening. Even allowing them to sleep in on
the weekends doesn't *fix* the sleep deficit. It
just allows a momentary respite from it. They're
still going to school sleep deprived, and that's far
from ideal. We *have* to try to fix the actual problem.

There are also some
researchers looking into how teenaged alcohol exposure
might be affecting the brain's sleep system. So, it
might be a bit simplistic to say that we can't do
anything about this. We may not be able to eliminate
this phase shift, and it's very unlikely that we could
eliminate the need for more sleep during the teen years,
but it may be that with good sleep habits we can mitigate
some of the sleep deprivation.

Oh, I do agree to encourage the teen to have a regular bedtime. I guess
I'm just disagreeing that it has to or should be as early as 9 pm,
especially if it's natural for a teen to fall asleep closer to 11 pm.
And I'm definetly disagreeing that one shouldn't allow their teen to
catch up on sleep on the weekends. To me, it's cruelty to wake a kid up
if a kid desparately needs the sleep. Sure, if they really are staying
up until 4 am... but what I'm saying here is that it's quite natural
for a teen who doesn't stay up past midnight to still sleep until lunch
on the weekends.

Personally, I would work the other end a lot harder
before giving up on it entirely, and I am not so convinced
that getting, say, 15 hours of sleep on the weekends is, on
balance, the best cure.

Best wishes,
Ericka

In article ,
"Joy" wrote:


And - no parent wants to hear this, but how many times do we hear of
parents who
are sooo sure what their teen is doing and how well they know their teen
and
what a great relationship they have with their teen, to learn in
distressing or
even tragic circumstances that they did not know what was going on with
their
teen at all. So I think it's advisable to have the schedules sync enough
to
still maintain some supervision.

This brings up an [IMO] interesting question - at what age do (or did, as
the case may be) people start loosening the reins, so to speak?

There IS no set age: it depends on the family and the kid. Even with
my twins, the amount of freedom they were given varied based on their
maturity and trust levels.

Actually, you start loosening the reins in a VERY real way the moment
the umbillical cord is cut. All the rest of parenting is more and more
loosening, until they day you cut the final string and they fly off on
their own.

When my kids were newborns, I couldn't stand to have them in a different
room from me. By the time they were two months old, they took naps in
one room while I was in a different room -- that's a loosening of reins.
When they were two, I insisted on holding hands whenever we were near a
street. By the time they were 16, I didn't do that anymore. (Much
earlier, but you get my point.) Its constantly about how much to let
go, how much to hold on, where the appropriate limits are, and the
appropriate limits are a constantly moving target.

Parenting: the only job where your goal is to work yourself OUT of work.

(Yes, I know you never stop being a parent, but eventually you stop
being a manager and move on to consultant -- and, someday, just
colleague.)
--
Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care

Ericka Kammerer wrote:
Of course. What I meant is that while we do not sign
up for Saturday morning swimming lessons, or any other
Saturday activity, on a regular basis, the activities they
do have require occasional weekend commitments which we
do not control the scheduling for. So, yes, they could
stop the activity all together, but we do not have an
option to do the activity while still keeping all weekends
free of commitments.

Yes, that's what I mean, you could stop the activity all together. It
is a choice. 'Course, as I said, I just signed us up for swim team
again which will require Saturday swim meet commitments. But I'm now
rethinking the tennis because it'll likely conflict with swim meets.
Hmmm...


Well, based on what I can see coming down the pike, not
much will change. They will likely have activities to do and
friends they wish to socialize with, and those things will most
likely be primarily in the afternoon. Unless I greatly miss
my guess, they won't suddenly need a lot less sleep, yet their
school will start earlier. Thus, I rather suspect we won't be
able to push bedtimes a lot later.

I think the point you are still missing is that even if you keep the
bedtime as it is now, once they hit the teen years, they will very
likely not be able to fall asleep before 11 pm. Even *if* they are
getting up earlier, and even if they need more sleep. So you'll have
two teens tossing and turning in bed, trying to get to sleep,
unsuccessfully, for a couple of hours. And I can tell you that really
is a set-up for insomnia.


Therefore, we will likely
be in the same situation we are now: afternoons likely booked
with non-family time and not a whole lot of time left after
dinner. So, if we want to go out and do stuff as a family,
mornings will probably still be the more likely time to do it.

Regardless of anything else, DH will still have a life
that generally involves getting up at a reasonable hour in
the morning to go to work (and sleeping late on the weekends
throws his schedule out of kilter) and I will still have
demands on my time that require me to get moving in the morning,
so neither of us are likely to have the luxury of sleeping
until late for the forseeable future. And again, I don't have
any objection to the kids sleeping in a bit on the weekend,
but we'll continue to have to get going for church on Sunday
mornings, and I firmly believe that sleeping until noon on
Saturday when you have to get up much earlier the rest of
the week just makes things worse, not better. So, they're
welcome to sleep in a bit, but I seriously doubt we'll find
it workable to have weekend mornings as a time for sleeping.

Talk to me in 3 or 4 years. :-)


I have no idea about you and your daughter. For me
and my kids, having them awake for several hours after I
went to bed (as in the hypothetical 4am-1pm sleep schedule)
would not be adequate supervision, and I rather suspect that
will be true when they're 13 as well. Could be wrong, but
I just don't imagine that I'll feel comfortable with them
up that many hours with the rest of the house out cold.

Yep, as I said, I have had to learn to get comfortable with it this
year as our reality is shifting with a teen in the house. I would not
be comfortable with DD11 being awake late at night - by herself or with
her sister. She's a different age, and has different supervision
requirements.

Which is fine for you and your daughter. I have no
argument with extending privileges as maturity and responsibility
dictate. You just asked what else could be going on "after
hours" and I gave some examples. They may not be relevant
for you and your family, but they surely are for a number
of families out there going by the number of acquaintances
who have been dealing with late night surfing and calling
and roving.

In which case, yes, a parent needs to restrict such privileges. Not an
issue here because so far she has proven trustworthy following the
house rules.



Yep. That's why the 11yo is still sharing a room
with the 8yo. He can have the downstairs bedroom in a
year or two, but not before we get the window alarmed,
because that's two floors away and I wouldn't be able
to hear someone sneaking out (or in).
That's also why the
toddler's door has a toddler lock on it so she can't get out
and the doors out of the house are toddler-proofed. I don't
particularly want to find her on the street at 2am, which,
given her personality, is a real possibility.

EEK!

A few weeks ago, the girls' 18 month old sister woke up in the middle
of the night, climbed out of her crib, went downstairs, grabbed DD's
cell phone, punched a bunch of numbers, and called me on my cell which
is preprogrammed in. Worrisome, but also very cute. :-)


Never said one should, only that one needs to
be aware of the possibilities and plan for them based
on the personality/responsibility/maturity of the
individual child and the rest of the situation. Given
your daughter's personality and your environment, it
may be completely reasonable for her to be up until
dawn while you snooze. For others, it may be unreasonable
to have teens up so late after they're in bed.

Nah, up until dawn is pushing it. Except on occasion for slumber
parties or to see the meteor showers. But we don't allow slumber
parties on nights when we need to get up early the next day.

jen

Ericka Kammerer wrote:
In terms of the sleep in late on the weekend to
catch up, as I've said elsewhere, I don't have a problem
with a little lie in.

I've never heard it called a "lie in" but it's cute so maybe I'll adopt
that expression!

I don't think you have to get up
at 6am on Saturday just because that's what you do M-F.
However, if you're sleeping until noon on Saturday, I
would suggest that that is doing more harm than good in
the overall picture. Research does not suggest that
you can catch up that way. You can get that full 10 hours
(or whatever you need) on the weekends, and you can
sometimes catch a little more than that, but you can't
really make up the sleep deficit by sleeping away the
"missing" hours from earlier in the week. Plus, getting
up late on Saturday means that you're actively resetting
your clock much later, making it that much more difficult
to fall asleep at a reasonable hour that night and that
much more difficult to get up when Monday rolls around
again. Part of managing your sleep schedule so that
it doesn't get out of hand and create more of a sleep
deficit means avoiding those wild swings in schedule
where possible.

Heh, talk to my DH. He's been passed out sleeping the ENTIRE DAY.
Sigh... okay, he has an excuse, he woke up with 103 temperature that's
been raging on and off all day long. I made him some homemade chicken
soup but he hasn't stayed awake long enough to eat any of it. :-(

Since around the time of my first pregnancy, I've suffered on and off
with really bad insomnia issues. I've been nearly insomnia free now for
the past 4 years. A big part of the solution for me was becoming a
telecommuter, which enables me to work with my natural rythyms instead
of against them. I no longer set my alarm but instead I wake up when
and only when I'm done sleeping and naturally wake up, which happens to
be 7 am, and luckily when my kids need to get up for school too.

Over the past four years, my natural rhythm seems to be to fall asleep
somewhere around 11 pm, and wake up around 7 AM. I find I simply cannot
fall asleep any earlier than 11 pm. In the past in all those years when
I've had to leave for the office, I would try to go to sleep earlier -
knowing I was suffering from a major sleep deficit - and sure enough,
this lead to insomnia. Too much time in bed not sleeping is a *major*
cause of insomnia. That's why they tell you to get up and do something
outside of bed until you're drowsy. Otherwise, you start to associate
your bed with being awake, not asleep.

And even now, I have a *really* terrible, awful time waking up earlier
than 7 am. For example if I have an early flight and must set my alarm
an hour or even a half hour early.. it just destroys me for a couple of
days. I also have a really hard time handling bicoastal business trips
- the time zone change is a killer. On weekends I might stay up until
midnight but I'm always naturally awake - no alarm needed - no later
than 8 am. Sometimes I *wish* I could sleep in late... but I can't
anymore!

So I do agree with you that everyone has a natural schedule and
sticking more or less to it during weekends and summers is a good idea.
However, I just disagree that every member of the family can be trained
to have the same exact schedule! Especially teens, who are natural
night owls. I think we all have a natural schedule (which yes varies
during teen years). The real trouble is when work and school and
whatever forces us to sleep during hours that are contrary to our
natural schedule.


Yes, some of it is innate, but the question is
whether we are adding additional factors that exacerbate
the problem.

Sure, control for the additional factors, but also recognize that there
is a big innate factor that you can't control, and it's naive to
minimize it.



Well, for many that *is* a factor. They want to stay
up late, and they're allowed to stay up late because it's the
weekend and they don't have to get up early for school the
next day. Plus, Friday and Saturday nights are prime time
for going out with friends. So, often it *is* the case that
these teens are up significantly later on a Friday or
Saturday night, which exacerbates the problem because they
will sleep in very late the next day and not be exposed
to sunlight to reset their clock until after noon.

Heh - my kids' windows have sheer coverings so they get full-on
sunlight early in the AM; all our bedrooms face east. On the flip side
however they cannot go to bed before the sun goes down - it's too
light.


That
makes they want to stay up even later on Sunday night, and
makes it harder to get up Monday morning. So, instead of
starting out the week having caught up a bit, they start
out with an even worse sleep deficit.

it's because they need to catch up on the sleep they
missed all week long. Whether catch-up sleep leads to poorer quality
sleep I don't know, but I wouldn't be surprised.

But again, you can't really catch up for the
most part. You can recoup a little of it, but you
don't ever really make up for missed sleep.

Better to recoup if you can, then interrupt the weekend lie-in and
create an even worse sleep deficit, no?


Well, there's that question I raised above: is
the 11pm the biological imperative, or are there other
things we do that exacerbate that?

Research says it IS a biological imperative.

*And* as a society we also probably do some things that exacerbate it.
Those things you can and should control as a parent. But you simply
can't force a teen to fall asleep at 9 pm if the teen's natural,
biological imperative is to not get sleepy until 11 pm. And by
enforcing an in-bed-by-9pm rule with a teen, you are very, very likely
going to bring on insomnia... exactly what you were trying to avoid!


If we reduced the
exposure to tv and computer in the evening, would that
help keep the biological clock from slipping so late
into the night?

DD13 doesn't watch t.v. or use the computer after 8 pm. Heck, she
doesn't watch t.v. at all during the week. Unlike her sister, the t.v.
addict, she hates t.v. Yet, she still naturally can't fall asleep
before 11 pm. Even with low lighting, a quiet house, soothing bath,
etc, etc....

Can physical exercise timed appropriately
help establish a better sleep schedule? We know that
more routine sleep and wake times help to reinforce a
schedule, teen or not. I rather suspect that this is
not a completely lost cause. I doubt you can get your
teen asleep at 8:30, but I'll bet with good habits you
can get a lot closer to 10pm.

DD13 has excellent habits (including getting a lot of strenuous
physical activity early in the day, not drinking caffienated beverages,
and having a healthy diet with little sugar, etc), and yet she cannot
fall asleep much before 11 pm. She's just not sleepy enough before
then.

At that rate, you're
at least cutting into the sleep deficit significantly.
Even better if you could successfully move bedtime back
to 9:30.

All I know is that I wouldn't a) want to force my teen into an
unnaturally early bedtime (tossing and turning while wide awake can
definetly lead to insomnia);

Sure, but that doesn't mean that you can't work
the issue and attempt to establish a *successful* earlier
bedtime.


Not if it's completely contrary to their biologically imperative
rythym.


and b) have the heart to wake up a
late-sleeping teen on the weekend, knowing he/she's already dragging
around with a major deficit.

Even if, on balance, waking him or her at 10am
is better and leads to less of a sleep deficit than
allowing him or her to sleep until noon?

Waking him or her at 10 instead of 12 ends up in a deficit increase of
2 hours, not a decrease. And, it does not guarantee the teen will be
sleepier earlier that night, if that is what you were thinking.




Right. I'm not denying that there is an issue.
I'm saying that the overwhelming majority of teens
engage in several habits that are likely to exacerbate
the problem. I'm not throwing in the towel without
trying to make some headway on those issues. I have
little control over when my teens will have to wake
up to get to school. The only thing I can do to help
them overcome the potential sleep deficit is try to
make it possible for them to get to bed early enough
in the evening. Even allowing them to sleep in on
the weekends doesn't *fix* the sleep deficit. It
just allows a momentary respite from it. They're
still going to school sleep deprived, and that's far
from ideal. We *have* to try to fix the actual problem.

I think mandatory naps for teens is a good idea. :-)

Personally, I would work the other end a lot harder
before giving up on it entirely, and I am not so convinced
that getting, say, 15 hours of sleep on the weekends is, on
balance, the best cure.

Seriously, would you be opposed to your teen taking a long nap each
afternoon? Or would that cut into family time?

Naps are highly recommended. DH is a big napper - he takes cat naps
every day, and it really helps him. Me, I've learned through trial and
error I can't take even a cat nap or it wrecks my schedule.

The thing is, it's all highly personal and individuals need to learn
what works for them. Your kids need to figure this out on their own
when they're older - you can't guess what is right for them. You can
certainly advise and recommend and make suggestions they might try, but
ultimately, it's up to them to figure out what works for them.

It may turn out their natural schedules are identical to your own - and
then this won't even be an issue for you down the road!

jen

In article .com,
"shinypenny" wrote:


And even now, I have a *really* terrible, awful time waking up earlier
than 7 am. For example if I have an early flight and must set my alarm
an hour or even a half hour early.. it just destroys me for a couple of
days. I also have a really hard time handling bicoastal business trips
- the time zone change is a killer. On weekends I might stay up until
midnight but I'm always naturally awake - no alarm needed - no later
than 8 am. Sometimes I *wish* I could sleep in late... but I can't
anymore!

Interestingly, when I need extra sleep, I still wake up at my "normal"
time -- but can go back to sleep for a couple of hours.

However, I'm more likely to catch up with naps -- my own natural rythym
would have me sleeping every afternoon from about 1 to 2.

And if I have to get up really early, I can get up, easily, at 4 am --
but if I try to get up at 5 or 6, I'm a basket case.

It really DOES end up being a question of knowing your own rythyms, and
cooperting with them to the extent possible.
--
Children won't care how much you know until they know how much you care