Is every morning a struggle to get your teen out of bed?
You’re already tired because your brain decided to rethink your life at 3:30am, again, then you burn through your remaining capacity by 8am because your teen’s a lazy sloth!
What if your teen took responsibility for getting up, you saved your mental capacity for important things, AND your relationship with your teen improved?
“… trying to get your child up for school when they don’t want to go is a very frustrating battle that’s hard to win. I tried up until 11th grade with my son and did not succeed. This year, … as per what Aly says … I said nothing. This is the very first year he’s getting up himself and going to school… the chronic morning frustration is solved…” – Erica S.
Is it lazy, or is it science?
During adolescence, your teen’s circadian rhythm shifts by up to two hours. This means their brain and body are wired to stay up later and wake up later, making early mornings extra challenging.
Well if they weren’t on their phone all night…”
It’s easy to blame technology and it does play a role in sleep habits, yet the science is true regardless.
And while we’re on the topic of blame, beating yourself up because you’ve missed some key step in raising a responsible teenager won’t help either.
This is not about blame. It’s brain biology.
Here’s the hard truth:
When you take responsibility for waking your teen up, going in their room 10, 20, 30 times a morning, you’re doing their work for them. They have no need, nor motivation to change because you’ve removed their opportunity to learn, fail, adjust, and take accountability.
Regardless of the words coming out of your mouth (insert nagging, begging, pleading, coercion, yelling, etc.), your consistent action clearly says, “I got you! I’ll wake you up every morning no matter how little you try.”
You are your own hostage
The lies you’re telling yourself are 1) it’s your job to make sure our teen gets up, and 2) they have to change their actions before you can change yours. NOPE!
By allowing natural consequences – being late to school, missing the bus/carpool, telling their teachers why they missed class, getting missed work/assignments, etc. – you teach your teen to take responsibility for their own mornings.
Your fears of what might happen – failing grades, truancy court (let them pay the fees!), you’ll be late for work – drive you to keep intervening. But by shifting your focus from compliance to empowering capability, you can break this exhausting cycle.
Plus, you model being responsible by showing up for your day on time, with or without them!
Breaking free by stepping back
Here’s 3 steps to support your teen to step up without micromanaging:
- Limit late-night screen time: Reduce the blue light that keeps their brain wired and turn off wifi/internet access around 11pm (age dependent). Negotiate a time with your teen, even if you’re starting later than you want and backing it up 30min/week to compassionately ease in, then stick to it.
- Set clear boundaries: Respectfully and calmly tell your teen you’re making a change, “Starting Monday, I won’t be waking you up for school anymore. I love you and I don’t want to fight every morning.”
- Support and encourage: Ask your teen what they need to take ownership of waking up – more alarm clocks (3 seems to be average), lighter curtains, lights on a dimmer, etc. Empathize with them wanting you to wake them up, and affirm you believe in them.
Learning REQUIRES failure!
Read that again…. Your teen will mess up! They’ll sleep through alarms, miss the bus, and get it wrong before they get it right. This is how they learn, just like failing a million times before they learned to walk. And just as you picked them up by their chubby wrists and lovingly said, “Try again”, your teen needs compassion when they fail, not criticism or rescuing.
Remember, their learning process isn’t a reflection of your worth as a parent. Support your teen to develop capability with compassion and the natural consequences of their actions and your boundaries will do the teaching.
After teaching caring parents like you how to break free and step back, one mama shared that after years of nagging, she let her son take control. “This year, he’s getting up on his own and going to school. I stopped waking him—and the frustration is gone.”
Another parent found that when she stopped criticizing her daughter for sleeping in, she opened up about why she was struggling with sleep which changed the conversation, and the solution.
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