Do your kids have a set bedtime or have they ever?

[UberMama]

This could belong in any number of forums.

Do your children have a set bedtime or have they ever? If you have a reason for why they do or do not, what is your reasoning? (if you don't mind sharing)

My MIL is on my behind about not having a set bedtime for my kids. But I prefer to go based on their cues (and their cues usually coincide with when I think they should be hitting the hay anyway). It's working for us so far, so why not?

[Peony]

Nope, we go with the flow here. Also DD1 will not sleep until she is utterly exhausted so it's not worth even thinking about a bedtime before 9:30-10pm. :

[hipumpkins]

this is from my blog:
A good nights sleep

Who decided that kids HAVE to go to sleep? and who says they have to be in bed before 8 o'clock? why is it so horrible for a little kid to be up late? Honestly I have no idea and I don't know why I bought into such myths. IF adults can be night owls why can't children?

Around the time Johanna was 2 she would ask for her Nuk when she was tired and ready for bed. Oh how mike and I gloated how wonderful our little girl was. No need to force her to
sleep. Off she goes on her own, well not exactly on her own she would ask to go to bed on her own although that meant, "Please come with me I am ready for sleep" So once she started falling asleep around 7:30 or 8 I got it in my head that this was BEDTIME. I loved it too by the way b/c she slept for more than 12 hours so not only was she asleep early she was up late (well, late for a toddler anyway) This made up for the more than a year when she was up every 90 minutes at best and 45 at the worst. So here comes a birthday and Johanna turns 3 and frankly we are all turned on our ears.

The bedtime battle started with, "Ok let's go brush your teeth" We tried being creative, "Let's look for Bambi and flower in your mouth or whatever story was big that day or week. (It was funny during Christmas brushing Jesus out of her mouth) Anyway...even with the games Johanna did not want to brush. She did not want get on PJs (Or hermit crab shells or cat fur...or whatever else we might be calling PJs to manipulate her into wearing them) I did finally give up on the PJ battle by letting her choose to wear her clothes or PJs.

Once the technical stuff was taken care she would go to bed happily to hear a book or 2 but when the stories were over so was the happy kid. She would cry and sometimes scream that she didn't want to go to bed. She wanted to stay up and play. She wanted to eat. She wanted a new pillow. I was the queen of patience calmly reminding her that it was bedtime and time to sleep. It was time to be quiet it was time to lay still. And no we can not read another story. On and on the complaining went. Until finally she would fall asleep sometime after 9.

I felt horrible about this new shift but I couldn't help thinking, "Kids need structure. Kids like routine" Hmmm my kid sure didn't seem to like this routine and frankly neither did I. It was just 2 nights ago that was my breaking point. Johanna had a full on tantrum and cried her self to sleep....sometime after 9pm. How awful...here I am spouting off about not letting babies cry themselves to sleep and I was letting my daughter do just that as I lay next to her like some evil robot reciting, "It's bedtime..calm down"

That was it for me. I asked Johanna the next day if she thought she could let me know when she was tired and ready for bed. I apologized for our bad night and told her I was looking for a better way. She said she would let me know when she was sleepy. I explained that we still have to do all the getting ready for bed stuff but she could just tell me when she wanted to sleep. That night she still argued a bit about brushing but we got them brushed. She put on her PJs without complaint. She also stayed up until 10:30! She woke up at around 9 am the next day.

I asked her if she liked her new routine. She said she did. So now tonight she chose to sleep in her clothes from the day and she brushed her teeth without any problem. I was cleaning the kitchen tonight when she came in and said she was tired and she had already peed and was ready for bed. WE read 2 books and she was asleep...sometime after 9.

So perhaps kids need structure but the structure they need is their parents listening to them even when it goes against "all the rules" The structure of just being there and being able to be counted on. That's the kind of mom I want to be.

[ChattyCat]

I think that kids need a routine, but not a schedule.

DD usually goes to bed around 7pm, but today she's sick and hadn't napped well, so she went to bed at 5pm, when she was obviously ready.

DS usually goes to bed around 8pm, but a few nights ago was up until almost 11pm.

Everyday is different. And, so is every child. I don't go to sleep at exactly the same time every night (like, why the heck am i still up now???). I certainly don't expect my kiddos to.

[blsilva]

We have a loosely set bedtime of 7:30, but its more of a goal than an actual law. It works for us to have this in mind when we do our bedtime routine. If the kids aren't tired at that time, then we let them stay up a little longer, and if they are tired early, they go to sleep early. But usually they are tired around that time, which is why we set it for then.
That said, I really see no reason you have to have a set bedtime. If what you're doing works for you & your family, then go with it.

[Daisie125]

Nope, no 'bedtime' here. DS usually goes to bed sometime between 10pm-1am depending on what time he got up that day, how well he slept the night before, and how many/how long of naps he took that day. He gets up anywhere between 8am-12pm.

I like it that way. I can't see banishing my child off to bed at some silly hour just because "they" say I should. If he went to bed at 8pm, he would be up before the sun! No thank you!

[Redifer]

Nope, no "bedtime" here. DD lets us know when she's tired. Somedays, if she's been inactive (especially in the winter months), it can be around midnight or 1 am. Other days, if she's particularly active, and especially in the first warm weeks of the season, she can be passed out by 5 or 6. It depends on her activity, what she ate, if she's hitting a growth spurt, etc.

My IL's are all on our butts about her "bedtime". I don't see why. She rests when she needs to rest. We have a bed routine, not a schedule. We're nightowls as it is; both DH and I have been since early childhood. I remember being forced into bed long before I was tired, and wars over bedtime. As an adult, there are some nights I'm tired long before the clock says I should be, or long after. I figure the same works for DD. Her body tells her when she needs to rest, and she doesn't fight it.

[alegna]

Nope. We all go to sleep when we're tired.

I refuse to make rules or create fights about sleep or food.

-Angela

[smudge]

Well, : we try and have DD (19mos) in bed by 7pm. She will then sleep till 7am. We are all happier this way.

[onelilguysmommy]

nope, and nope

and because i think its stupid to put my kid to bed so i can go to bed later, only to get less sleep and be tired the next day. why people do that, then complain about being so tired cause their kid wakes up at the same time everyday irks me, but maybe im plain weird.

especially pregnant, i do NOT want to have to wake up just cause he is because i went and made him go to sleep and chose not to until way later every day. its differrent on occasion, but every night, id be falling over LOL!! and hes quite happy to oblige going to sleep and waking up about when i do every day, so thats always nice.

[antannie]

We have a set bedtime but are flexible. DP is up at 5am and dd at 6.10 so an early bedtime is a necessity. It is 9:45 at the moment and I can hear my daughter reading out lound still.

If I can't cope anymore I have the 8pm bedtime to insist upon. I ususally read to her at bedtime anyway so sleep time varies.

[eloquence]

Yes, its midnight.

[Tanibani]

Yes and yes. Absolutely. If they had their way, they'd be up past 10pm. &

I'm sorry, but I need some quiet time to myself. And if DS gets less than 11 hours a sleep, he's not the same kid. None of us (in our family) are at our best if we are missing sleep.

Bedtime for years used to be between 8pm-9pm or later, which drove me nuts. (Lights out at 9pm, no more stories... I stay in the room nursing one while the other conks out.)

I envied friends who said their children were in bed/going to sleep by 7:30 pm.

Now It's between 7pm-8pm (lights out at 8pm). Basically, they are out by 8:30pm, which I can live with.

It's really helped with the misbehavior. Now my 7 year old wakes up on his own at 7am. If he goes to bed late, it's like waking the dead in the morning.

When he was younger, he'd be wired at night and cranky during the day (wasn't getting enough sleep) and Mary Kurcinka's book - Sleepless In America - Is Your Child Misbehaving or Missing Sleep? really helped me get a handle on it.

I thought it was IMPOSSIBLE to get him down earlier. It's not.

Does your child refuse to cooperate in the morning? Do you dread the constant bickering and fights between siblings, especially late in the afternoon? Does your child get into trouble for not listening or lacking focus? Is it a battle every time your child has to complete a task — any task? Is your child “losing it” over seemingly insignificant issues, like a bad hair day? Does your child seem to “resist” sleep? Are you tired? Really tired?

If the "they go to sleep whenever they want" or "we all go to sleep when we are tired" works for your family No way would it work for me.

We need to be out of the house early for school or other things.

[anniegirl]

Oh wow, I'm soooo glad there are a lot of you out there like me. I've thought about asking this question myself.

Ds1 has no set bedtime. Dh took over the whole night time routine with him a few months ago and they just play and read and watch TV together until he falls asleep. At first I really let it stress me out, I just had it so set in my head that he needed to be in bed. But then I realized it really it works well for us and let go of the expectation/pressure that ds needed to be in bed at a particular time. And ds thrives on that time with his dad, he looks forward to it all day and can't wait for da-da to come home. I feel silly for having stressed about it.

Ds2 goes to bed between 7 and 8 because he's tired and ready to by then.

ETA: While I was typing this ds1 fell asleep on dh while they were watching the PBS documentary on the automobile. So tonight his bedtime was 10:15, that's pretty good!

[pookel]

We try to get him to sleep by midnight or 1-ish. I'm not going to force him to go to bed, but he will get cranky and hyperactive and not sleep when he's overtired if we don't give him some gentle encouragement.

Also, I have a limit on how long I'm willing to stay up and play or read to him, and that limit is when *I* need to go to bed.

[ericswifey27]

My son used to stay up late, and sleep in late, so it wasn't an issue. Now that he is attending preschool at 10am, he can't stay up late like he used to. So he's almost always in bed between 8 and 9pm, so he's not tired and cranky the next day. But no, there's no time nazi making sure he has to hop in to bed because it's 9:01 or anything like that

[UberMama]

See, I think if your (general your) kids are the type to stay up as late as they can - then I can completely see why one would have a time for bed. My kids though, for some odd reason, lol - have always wanted to hit the sack by 10-11pm at the absolute latest, but normally around 9pm.

Woo, just got my first TAO OT "alert" (warning) from this thread.

[Earthy Mama]

We have a range of time to go to bed. School nights it's usually between 8-9. The girls are way cranky in the am if they stay up too much later. Maddie has softball games right now, too-so some nights we don't get finished until 9:30 then go home and hose everyone off because they are gross-it's after 10 before we get into bed. Those following mornings are tough.

[jadegirl553]

Yes, we have a bedtime.

I noticed that if my son was in bed at or around 7, he'd fall asleep almost immediately, and sleep really well. But if he stayed up later (like an hour or two), he'd lay awake, toss and turn and wouldn't sleep as well. He also gets really cranky if he doesn't get enough sleep- he's just one of those people who needs a lot of sleep! And I figure that it's my job to help him get it if he needs it, and that means having a bedtime.

[angie7]

My kids are in bed everynite by 8pm. That is when they are ready to go to sleep. They have had this bedtime since they were 4 months old.

They started this and we have just stuck to it. I feel it is important for kids to have routine and structure.