So I have a huge long list of blog ideas I want to post about. This one has been on the list forever, and I need to get it out so I can move past it! It has been haunting me. LOL
I need my sleep. I do not function well without it. I am mean and nasty. Really. Ask my kids.
So when I have a baby, I have a hard time. I really wish it were different so I could enjoy them while they are little. But getting up so much and being so sleep deprived is hard.
So I very much encouraged them to sleep through the night as soon as possible. And they never slept in the room with me. The Teenager did one night after he was born, and I didn't sleep at all because every sigh woke me up.
I had them sleeping through the night by 3 1/2 months. The Princess was one day shy of 2 months. It was heavenly. Oh, and sleeping through the night is 7 PM to 7 AM. A full 12 hours.
I hear moms say that at 1 year their child still doesn't sleep through the night and I just shudder. That's not good for the child or the parents.
Okay, so now on to bedtimes. My kids went to bed at 7:00. They need sleep. Most children do. The Artist doesn't need quite as much, so when he went to bed at 7:00, he would get up at 6:00. But I would rather have them in bed at night so I can have my alone time and time with my hubby.
Now that they are growing up, they don't need quite as much sleep. The Princess, age 4, still goes down at 7:00. The Chocoholic goes to his room for reading at 7:00 and reads for an hour, then bedtime is 8:00. The Artist has reading at 7:30 and bed at 8:30. The Teenager has reading at 8:00 and bed at 9:00.
We all get up at 5:45 to have family prayer before The Doctor leaves for work, and then we read scriptures from 6:00 to 6:30. So our house is rolling pretty early. Sometimes The Princess gets up and sometimes she doesn't. Next year when she starts school, she will be getting up with the rest of us.
Oh, and the 3 boys have to use their alarms to get up. I will not call them. If they sleep in and miss family prayer, they are grounded from all video games that day and have to go to bed an hour earlier that night. And they still have their chores and piano to do.
My mom did the same thing, and she said that people thought she was being harsh. But she was teaching us responsibility. She wasn't going to be there with us in college or on our missions, so we needed to learn. And we did. And so will my children.
And yes, it all sounds harsh. But I am teaching them a good thing. And they are learning.
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5 comments :
I don't think it sounds harsh. It sounds like a system that is working well for your family.
I tried the co sleeping thing for a little while and never really slept. I had the same idea as you that they should sleep through the night starting as young as possible. I would never come to them when they cried at night unless it was that somethings not right cry other wise I'd wait it out and they were soon to sleep.
Good sleep thoughts.
You're lucky your kids were so easily encouraged to sleep through the night.
Glad you figure out a great schedule for your kids. You didn't share your secret on how to get your 3 month old babies to sleep 12 hours at night. Did they cry it out or did you do something else?
Also, I don't think you are harsh with your kids if they miss family prayer.
I pretty much let them cry it out. When they started to cry, I would lay there thinking, "I am so tired!" And soon they would stop crying. So I would go back to sleep. A few minutes later they would start to cry again and I would sit up and sit there thinking, "I am so tired." And they would go back to sleep.
I also made sure to put them to bed before they were all the way asleep so they learned to put themselves to sleep, and not always have to be rocked.
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