[Indy]

My 12 year old son feels that a 9PM bedtime is too early. He has to get up in the morning at 6:25 to get on the bus. This conversation stems from my reading this article on cnn.com.

Enforcing bedtimes improves kids' health - CNN.com

Given the context of the article, he should go to bed between the hours of 7 and 8PM.

He feels he should get to stay up until 10PM.

What do you guys think?

[Barksum]

Hmm...first thought? I'm 12 years old, right? and my dad says to go to bed? Um...I get to go to bed!

My bedtime was 9 p.m. pretty much through high school because I had to get up early. My younger kids (ages 11 and under) go to bed at 8 p.m. My oldest (almost 17) goes to bed between 10 and 10:30 p.m., but she doesn't get up as early as your son and she determined that she needed to go to bed at that time in order to not be tired. (Could she be maturing?!) Have a friend whose son gets up by 5 a.m. for his job (farm work) so he goes to bed by 8 p.m. and he's almost 17, too, and also discovered that he needed more rest if he was going to be able to function. Not all kids recognize that they need more rest, though.

Came back to correct a spelling error and to say that teens actually need more rest than adults, so maybe when he turns 13 he should go to bed at 8 p.m.??? Seriously, if more kids went to bed 'on time' they would have a happier disposition and do better in all aspects of life. And, as the article did point out, bedtime is for the parents' mental health. LOL

[bandareed]

He wouldn't like my house! My 11 year old (turning 12 in two months) goes to bed at 8pm. She gets up at 6:45. On non-school nights she's sometimes allowed to stay up until 8:30-9.

[NoelleSin]

My daughter is 13 and she'd love to be up til 10 I like all to be in bed by 9pm and be quiet realising they are not falling asleep. My son 16 same routine and our 11 year old foster daughter, bed by 8:30 with TV privileges til 9pm then lights out. We are up at 5:45 with the 11 year old she takes the longes to be ready then my daughter is up at 6 and son at 6:15. These school hours are crazy. The girls are involved in sports and they go some nights til after 8pm with practices or games. A long day. So sleep in on the weekend works for me too. Although I know a consistent sleep pattern works best for their health.

[mommytoEli]

my almost 15 and 16 year olds go to bed at 8:30. they have gone to bed at 8:30 for YEARS regardless of their wake up times (which differ from year to year). this year, i am THINKING about letting my almost 16 year old son stay up until 9.....but i am just thinking and it might not happen until next year, when he is a junior in high school. lol. the only reason i might allow it is that with sports, he is just getting home too late to adequately get all his homework done.

Not all kids recognize that they need more rest, though.

welcome to my kids. they would stay up all night if i let them, but i swear that even the VERY few days i let them stay up until 9 because we are doing something special, i have to drag them out of bed the next day and they are PILLS! in my mind, if you can't get out of bed by yourself in the morning and be a half way decent human being the next day, you went to bed too late the night before. the thing that i find humorous is my kids, usually my older son, tell me they aren't "that" tired...but most nights when i walk by their rooms shortly after 8:30, both are SOUND asleep.

[DianeS]

Most people who have gotten enough sleep on a regular basis are able to wake up on their own, without an alarm clock.

So if 9:00 really is too early a bedtime for him, he should be waking up in the morning without an alarm clock, because he's gotten enough sleep for the night before his alarm sounds. Does he do that? If so, maybe a discussion is in order. But if he still needs an alarm clock to get up on time, and especially if he resists getting out of bed and drags around the house getting ready, then 9:00 is plenty late enough.

I don't think I had a 9:00 bedtime until high school sometime. I do remember that 9:30 was as late as it ever got on a school night.

[kretzklan]

I don't think it's unreasonable. All three kids go to bed at 9:45 right now...oldest gets up at 6:40 (so that's almost 9 hours) and other two get up at 8am (a bit over 10 hours). Shockingly, I'm within the realm of correctness according to the article. We have a no plug in rule for one hour before bed and the last 30 minutes is spent in cuddle time with mom and dad (although sadly that usually means watching baseball on tv with us...kills that other rule, huh?)

[Mkuhlmann06]

My kids are 12 and 13 - both in 7th grade. Bedtime when the next day is school is 9pm, on days where there is no school the next day bedtime is 10pm. Both my kids get up at 545am to catch the bus at 700am. My kids actually have to get up earlier in the summer (530am) because they go to daycare where I work, and have 930pm bedtime.

I don't think your bedtime is unreasonable. I would prefer my kids went to bed at 830pm (for hours of sleep purposes) but Raquel's tae kwon do class goes til 8pm and we don't get home til 815pm. Just for bedtime preparation and cool down time, as well as calm down time... 15 mins isn't enough.

I agree if kids are getting enough sleep, they shouldn't have too much difficulty getting up in the am.

[waited2long]

The kids in my life are 15 and 12. The 15 year old goes to bed at 9 and the 12 year old at 8. Both are allowed to stay up an hour later on non-school nights.

When allowed to be up later they are impossible to get along with!

[lucyjoy]

I never tell my children to go to bed. When they were little, I did. This is 12 years old's first school year without an imposed bedtime. I feel it's important for children to learn to regulate themselves. He must get himself up for school without my intervention in order to keep this privledge.

I read the article. My sons were rarely ill even minor illnesses like colds. We do live under the poverty level but that doesn't mean I can't make intelligent parenting decisions as this article suggests. I just feel at some point, my sons need to learn to make decisions and when my son suggested he was ready to handle this responsibility, I opted to let him try it. If he fails to do so(gets cranky, oversleeps, slacks off or is falling asleep in class etc) then I will intervene. I think it depends on the kid.

[Barksum]

Totally OT: Lucy, did your kids start to have colds or get sick as they began to attach? I know some families have noticed that their RAD kids NEVER got sick until they started to heal. I remember one mom (Karen, from the old board) was elated the first time her Ds actually got sick.

[lucyjoy]

Not all of them. d got a headache and sore throat at about 13 and was totally freaked by it cause it had never happened before.

[shy_bear]

My 11 year old goes to bed at 9:00. My 8 year old goes down at 8:00 and our 2 year old is suppose to go to bed a 7:30. I feel they need plenty of rest to function during the day.

[aspenhall]

DD is put to bed at 8-8:30 she rarely falls asleep, these days, before 10. She's cranky as all get out. But she does get ready in the mornings fine.

Because it's not dark earlier, she would never fall asleep earlier. She needs total blackness to sleep.

[athikers]

Can my kids go to sleep at 7:30 forever?

Actually, because of where we live, they go to bed at 8:00 in the summer and then about now it gets bumped back to 7:30 again (due to it being light out until 10pm in the summer here).

Interestingly, they don't get up any earlier when we put them to bed at 7:30

If it were my kid, 9pm would be reasonable. I went to bed at 9pm all through high school, I also started school at 7:30.

Tell him when he goes to college he can stay up as late as he wants