Are You Trying to Deprive Your Child?

I never go to Wal-Mart.  I never go to Wal-Mart unless it’s 12:00 am and I just caught a frog in the back yard and I want to buy a terrarium for the lil guy so that the kids can enjoy the beauty of the wild within their own home.

I was SHOCKED, and internally angered by how many young kids I saw there.  Awake.  With both parents.  I mean it was fun to see a 5 year old boy shadow boxing, and stabbing imaginary bad guys with his pretend sword. But seriously.

COME ON! Dad, put the kids to bed and then go do your shopping while your wife kicks back and reads a book, or maybe just passes out along with the kids.

Kids need their sleep!  Their brains are trying to filter, connect, re-connect, etc ALL DAY.  The brain needs the rest!  Ironically I am writing this at 1:47am, but when you put your kids to bed, you can finally get things done that you need to…like feed a frog spiders, or flies.

If we want our kids to be the best they can be, then we need to be diligent about keeping them on a good sleep schedule.  By doing this we will allow their brains to make the connections that it needs to, in the time that it needs to throughout the night.  This is science, but it’s more common sense than anything.

There is an article (cites research) that I will link HERE, but will also summarize for you below.

• Lower test scores were scored by kids who had irregular bedtimes.
• If you’re going to keep your kid up that late, do it every single night.  Be consistent.  But seriously, why would you want to be consistently putting your kids to bed past 12am? Or past 9pm for that matter.
• Girls were more susceptible to the irregular bedtimes than boys were – potentially because girls are more sensitive to psychosocial environments.
• The study reports that adults also benefit from the same regular bedtime treatment.

Ya, I’m going to bed.  Bur for the rest of the week, I won’t be up past 10:30pm.