Why? Because he wakes me up every morning shouting, “bye mom!” on his way out the door. Off he goes with his backpack, boots, jacket and everything he needs- homework and all. I never would have guessed he could do all that by 10. And so, with his AM routine in check, I say, go ahead, make your own decisions about bedtime- as long as I don’t have to get you up outta bed!
I used to say, go to bed. be in bed by 9. get to bed. you have to go to bed now. I’ve come to accept (happily) that he can decide whether or not that 2 hour American Idol episode is worth the extra scramble in the morning. My guess is it’s usually yes, definitely worth the fatigue, except when Seacrest and Cowell banter between bad commercials.Anyway, he will get up every eve and go to bed by 9ish- and he will even manage his own reading schedule.
Why am I saying this? Because it ties into the Parenting on Track strategy of “Privileges and Responsibilities” (I’ll go further into details– apologies for lagging!!!). Vicki says, “Isn’t the goal of parenting to eventually get t as many yeses as possible?” I say, amen sister.
Now, if you do it the off-track way, you say yes before they’ve proven a skill set that can handle privileges (like choosing a bedtime). That’s obviously not smart. I do that now with some things I KNOW I shouldn’t let slide—like letting them merrily play video games before they’ve cleaned up the pile of toys in the livingroom or picked the laundry off the bathroom floor or spit toothpaste allover the sink. Dumb stuff, where it SHOULD be like, “YES, you can play video games as soon as…” But, you have to baby-step it.
I’ll tell you, I did learn today that the little two CANNOT handle the responsibility of snack-sized oreos. No joke- they went to town and now, we have (natural consequence) no tasty treats for tomorrow…I can hear it now: another clementine!?
NOTE TO SELF: Explain that you do in fact help him if he needs something. He’s not on his own and he likes the quiet time before everyone stirs. He plays piano, watches TV and will even jump in the shower if he forgot! Hey , for all I know, the morning could go like this:
From Butt-Head to Well-Behaved: 
Posted on March 20, 2009
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