School starts tomorrow & bedtime’s still a mess? Do nothing.

Yes, nothing.

Last week, I told you how to start waking your child up earlier to get them back on a school schedule. If you did that, great.
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If not and your child has been going to bed at 9:30 all summer and school starts tomorrow, don't put them in bed at 7:30 tonight and hope for the best.

You can't force a child to sleep when their body isn't ready for sleep.

And you’re bound to have a battle about it at a moment when neither of you needs yet one more reason to be stressed out right now.

So tonight, don't try to fix it.

Do your normal bedtime routine and put your child to bed at a time when they can reasonably fall asleep.

Then tomorrow morning, wake them up when they need to get up for school.

Yes, they will be tired.

They’ll probably be cranky. And so will you.

Hopefully they’ll hold it together at school and save the meltdown until they’ve returned to you. But if not, their teacher can handle it.

Tomorrow’s earlier wake-up, combined with a full day of school, will make it a little bit easier for them to fall asleep earlier tomorrow night.

Then keep waking them up at the same time every morning.

Yes, even on weekends.

Yes, that means you need to get up early on weekends too. Sorry.

Letting them sleep in on weekends to “catch up on sleep” will actually make it harder for them to fall asleep at night which will leave them more tired again come Monday.

So keep the morning wake time consistent and gradually move bedtime earlier as you start seeing them yawn earlier in the evening.

After a rocky few days, if you stick to this plan, next week should feel a lot easier than this week does.

Need a little more support getting your family’s sleep back on track?

Schedule an Ask Me Anything Sleep Consultation for a quick tune-up and personalized advice you can start using immediately.

(And if you realize during our call that you need more than a 30-minute shot of advice, you can apply the cost toward a full coaching package.)

If you’re a returning client, email me here for 10% off any coaching package.

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