Help waking up DS

[joyluc]

My 12-almost-13 year old DS is.really.hard.to.wake.up. I am looking for suggestions for things I can put in place so he wakes himself up (because really this isn't my job) and consequences if he doesn't wake up or he doesn't get out of bed and misses school or another commitment. I am tired of starting the morning yelling at him. He has teenage sleep patterns so isn't tired at night and ends up falling asleep pretty late.

He gets on the school bus about 30 minutes after we leave for work. I would like him to be up and moving before I leave because then he will make the bus 95% of the time (sometimes he gets in that dreamy state and misses things right in front of him). Towards the end of last year we told him that if he missed the bus he would have to walk - it is a long way but there are sidewalks all the way so it is safe. He did that a few times and seemed to think it was an okay trade-off for getting to sleep later. Unfortunately his school doesn't have detention or anthing for being late - I am going to talk to them about this.

How do your teenagers wake up? How involved are you? TIA

[~PurityLake~]

It sounds to me like he needs an earlier bedtime. I was still in bed by 9 pm when I was that age. If I remember correctly, 13 year olds still need 9-10 hours of sleep a night.

[purslaine]

I would let him sleep in and walk or bike to school.

Make sure he has an alarm clock, and put it across the room.

[nd_deadhead]

I agree with earlier bedtime. My twin boys are almost 15, and during the school year (when they have to get up at 7) they are in bed by 10:30. One thing that makes that easier for us is that bedtime is the same even on weekends, so Monday morning isn't a huge battle. After a few days of getting up earlier, I think he'll find it easier to go to sleep on time. Making sure he gets enough exercise during the day can help too.

I also agree with the alarm clock across the room - that works for one of my sons. He sleeps in a loft bed, and has to really get up to turn it off.

Some nights one of my sons has trouble falling asleep, so he takes melatonin (on the advice of his doctor), and that helps a lot.

[Ornery]

For us, the natural consequence for not getting up on time for my now almost 14 yo ds is an earlier bedtime. He has been waking himself up and getting himself ready since he was around 8 or 9. I refuse to get into a power struggle about him getting up. During the school year, he goes to bed between 9 and 10. On the weekends and during the summer, it is usually closer to midnight.

If he isn't up and in the shower by an hour before he needs to leave, then his bedtime is pushed back a half an hour. If he isn't up and in the shower by a half an hour before he needs to leave, his bedtime is pushed up an hour. And so on. He then makes the choice that if he wants to sleep in, he has to go to bed (lights out and everything off) early that night. That is what works for us.

[ollyoxenfree]

I've been letting ds, age 16 y.o., sleep until 12 noon this summer. I think he would sleep until 2 or 3 p.m if I didn't wake him up, and then he would be awake until 3 or 4 a.m. I know it's a pretty typical teen sleep pattern (heck, it's the sleep pattern I had when I was his age). I just can't get over the idea that he should be out of bed before noon though, lol! This is our compromise.

I always preferred to wake the children gently - opening the curtains and giving them a bit of a back rub. DS thinks it's childish and he doesn't want that any more. Alarm clocks are great, but most days, he's actually woken up by the telephone - one of his friends will call.

Earlier bedtimes, alarm clocks, natural light (opening the bedroom curtains in the morning)...

[Satori]

Originally Posted by kathymuggle

I would let him sleep in and walk or bike to school.

Make sure he has an alarm clock, and put it across the room.

This, I'm an adult and *I* still need to do this and I set 2 alarms. The first one goes off 30 minutes before I need to get up. So it goes off, I get up, turn it off and go back to bed. That gives me 30 minutes to come to a more wakeful state and by the time the 2nd alarm goes off I'm more open to the idea of I need to get up. At one point I was setting 3 alarms with the 3rd going off 15 minutes after the 2nd alarm. I only need to do that when I'm seriously sleep deprived though.

[montlake]

My 15 year old doesn't wake well at all. Regardless of time of day or how much he has slept or not slept. He can sleep through his alarm clock blaring for hours. I wake him up on school mornings but I'm mostly ok with doing it. It's not always a pleasant process though. He is a TERRIBLE sleep talker. Some days it's 5-10 minutes of him sitting up, looking at me eyes wide open but babbling total jibberish that makes it clear he's still sleeping. Those days I have to make sure I see him "switch on" because he LOOKS awake but really isn't. If I left the room before I really saw him snap to, he would eventually slump back over on his bed and stay asleep. It can get very annoying to be telling him to wake up and all I get in response is something like "where are the popcorn outside bottles" :

I do wish the wake up process was easier but we've tried everything. I hope you find a solution that works for you. I'll keep my fingers crossed, I feel your pain.

[robin4kids]

Well i don't know? I have an 11 y/o and a 13 y/o. The 13 y/o will forget to set his alarm, so many times I will walk in , switch on the light and say time to get up. He will move forward from there. The 11 y/o though is very hard to wake. He will fuss if he is tired. It has gotten tot eh point that I just yell in that it is time to get up and if he is not moving then I yell again. I refuse to spend more than a couple minutes waking everyone. If they miss school then they miss their weekend. No friends, nothing extra, unless it is a family event. I am not going to argue or beg.\

My kids do a lot during the school day. They have swimming 3-5 days a week. The swimming does not start till late, so they HAVE to stay up late. It is not ideal, but it is what it is.

Maybe you could start a positive reward at the end of each week or two that he does not miss the bus, or gets to school on time. We have talked about making a chart. If they do XYZ every day during the week then they can either get a very small reward or save it up and earn a bigger reward at the end of the month. Say go to the movies or a skate park or whatever suits their interest.
Good Luck!

[mommy68]

My 14 yr old is homeschooled and gets up pretty early most mornings so he can have his coffee and get started with school early. He likes to get done early in the day so he has time to do other things. He uses his alarm clock. We no longer wake him up and haven't done that in a couple of years, but in the past we did turn on the hallway light and wake him that way.

I'm the one that has a hard time waking up in my house. I get up for a few minutes when DH leaves for work at 6am and then I go back to sleep and my children are always up doing stuff long before I get up around 7:30ish.

[Mamax3]

I agree that he needs to go to bed earlier. 12/13 year olds still need quite a lot of sleep, brains are still growing, etc.

I would definately implement an exercise program or have him join a sport which will make him tired and also his sleep will be better quality sleep.

My kids swim right after school 3-5 days per week and all of the kids in my house have to be upstairs and in bed by 7:30pm (even the 12 year old). They may read but lights out at 8:30pm. They have dinner, homework done, and instruments practiced all by 7:30pm. We manage to do this every night during the school year and I never have a problem getting my kids out of bed in the morning. They don't balk at the bedtime either because they are tired by then.

My 12 year old has to catch the bus at 6:50am every morning for school, so while a 7:30pm bedtime may seem early, it works for us and he stays physically healthy all winter because he gets enough rest.

[joyluc]

Thanks everyone for your suggestions. I have bought him another loud alarm clock and he has put it across the room. He is also trying to figure out how to make his iPod turn on the music through the speakers so that would go off too.

He has always been a stay up late child - I think because I have WOH his whole life and he stayed up to see me. Now the teenage changes are just making it worse. He also has a hard time falling asleep so he stays up and does projects or reads. I try to prevent him from going on screens late.

He is on the football team and practices 4-5 days a week. Since that started I think he is going to bed earlier because he is tired.

I told him that if he misses the bus he will have a week of going to bed - lights out, no music - at 9:30 which is really early for him. If it happens again he will have to be in bed at 9:00. Right now with football I am not sure I can go earlier than this. He said but you know I will miss the bus, I said it is totally in your control I don't know you will miss the bus. It is good to have a strategy to make him responsible for waking up instead of me yelling.