When my oldest son was a baby, she was famous for waking up around 5am every morning. single. day. I’ve tried restarting naps, keeping her up late, and giving her dreams before bed to try to get her to sleep until at least 6 if possible, but nothing has worked. Even at 11 years old, she is still an early riser and never sleeps past 8 a.m., even on weekends. Some kids are wired that way.
But one mom on Reddit has really reached her breaking point, sharing on the /parenting subreddit, “I get angry when my kids wake up too early.” The original poster (OP) wrote that her children refuse to wake up even though 6:40 a.m. is the time they have to wake up for school on weekdays. But on the weekends, that seems to be their natural wake-up time. “When I hear their voices before 7:30, I get angry. Really, I just want to get some rest. Then I can’t wait for the rest of the day and feel guilty about it. I want to sleep so badly. I want them to be so quiet,” she wrote.
Weft.
I was an early riser when I was a kid, and now that I’m a full-fledged morning person, I wake up early on the weekends. It’s exciting to start the day when there’s actually no school or work to do, and I think it’s quite normal for kids to wake up early on days when they don’t have to. But I also need rest. And I want it even just in the mornings when I can actually enjoy a little bit of sleep.
Luckily, Reddit has plenty of ideas for her, including beautiful art to distract her.
“‘This is why I buy Pop-Tarts.’ My sons were up from 4-6 a.m. most of their lives. I wasn’t,” one commenter wrote.
Another agreed, adding, “I don’t think OP has discovered the secret to being a very effective parent in this situation: feed them an unhealthy breakfast, watch a movie, then go back to sleep.”
“The trick is to limit screens in their daily lives so they can play the ‘unlimited screens until mom and dad wakes up’ card. Their little minds get excited and work hard to stay quiet. Just have some cereal and milk within arm’s reach and you’re ready to go,” another parent told me.
To be honest, when I was a kid, most weekend mornings were spent on the living room floor watching cartoons and eating whatever my sister gave me.
There were also lots of great ideas and hacks for OP to buy himself some extra ZZZs.
- “I always said I would clean my room when I woke up, so I was always quiet (lol).”
- “I think the answer is to either go to bed earlier or switch off from the kids and your partner in the morning when you wake up.”
- “What time did you go to bed last night? My mornings have been so much easier since I went to bed earlier.”
- “I also bought milk in small containers so I could make cereal. It had its own cabinet with plastic cups, bowls, spoons, etc. It would give me better time to rest.”
Other commenters wanted to remind OP that this life won’t last forever. “My son, who is almost 15, has to be pried out of bed on weekends. He was the kid who would wake up at 6 a.m. no matter what time he went to bed,” one person wrote.
“I promise it’s going to get better! My 12-year-old and I slept until 9am today and we were almost crying tears of joy,” said another woman.
Most of all, many commenters said it’s all a matter of the child’s age and whether you can trust them to just watch TV or play on the iPad until you catch up on your sleep. I remember many early mornings when I would snooze on the couch while my toddler sat on me gulping down a bag of applesauce. sesame street On TV. It didn’t last forever, but now the memory retains a pleasant nostalgia.
But what multiple commenters wanted OP to know is that if you’re not a morning person and you’re feeling angry, it’s time to move up your own bedtime. It can make a big difference in how you feel in the morning, and I can’t say enough about how comforting it is to have the same bedtime as your 5-year-old.
Get more sleep, charge your electronics, and make sure you have a charm or a box of powdered donuts in your kitchen. In the end, when you’re vacuuming outside their bedroom door at 10 a.m. on a Saturday morning, you’ll be really impressed by how soundly they’re sleeping.
