Really hard time getting up in the morning
My 16-year old son has a really hard time getting up in the morning. He sets multiple alarms but ends up turning them off while still half asleep, then konking out again. It's become a real frustration for him. He's a hard working high-schooler so going to bed earlier is difficult and never seems to make any difference anyway. Has anybody out there successfully tackled this problem?
Apr 5, 2017
Parent Replies
This is just one of those things he'll have to learn to do, part of the boring buts of being an adult. He might consider putting his alarm (phone?) on the other side of the room from his bed so he actually has to get up out of bed to turn it off. Once he's up, he can talk himself into starting his day. Other suggestion: eating a high-protein snack before bed (nuts, peanut butter toast, hard boiled egg, etc). so that his blood sugar level is not so low in the morning. Hope this helps!
no advice but a ton of empathy for him, plus some data:
Schools start too early for our teens' health:
https://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2015/08/06/cdc-teens-losing…
Puberty changes sleep patterns radically:
http://sleepcenter.ucla.edu/sleep-and-teens
I have a feeling you're going to get a lot of advice being super judgmental of the kid, as if he's just being lazy or intractable, but he is dealing with very real biological changes! Again, I am sorry I don't have the solution -- but I've been there myself, and I know how frustrating it is.
There are alarm clock lights that brighten the room steadily for about an hour before wake time so it is easier to actually wake up. Also there are a bunch of apps that will wake you close to your alarm time based on the end of sleep cycle so it is again easier to wake up. Not sure of the names but maybe worth looking into.
Hi - sorry for the delay in posted but I do have a suggestion that was quite useful when I was a teenager ... and which my own son also benefitted from ...
My father maddeningly used to spritz a little nice smelling perfume around my sleepy head in the morning. The scent would wake me up. Turns out that the limbic system is aroused by smell. You could try "energizing" scents (mint, lemon, etc ... maybe google what these might be). I used a particular lime smelling cologne for my son, and we tried a bunch of other essences. Not too much. But good smells definitely helped wake him up. Good luck experimenting.