ANN ARBOR, Mich. – It's a battle being waged in bedrooms across the country and around the world: The struggle to get your children up and out the door on time -- without resorting to yelling or threats.
It's a struggle Michelle Blau and her son, Grant, of West Bloomfield, remember well.
"They don't like to get out of bed. I have two high schoolers," Michelle Blau said. "Years of battle, years of five more minutes, years of slamming doors, not eating in the morning because they didn't have time for breakfast."
It's a story you'll hear over and over again. So what are parents doing wrong? What's really the best way to wake up children? We decided to ask an expert.
Dr. Dawn Dore-Stites, a clinical psychologist and sleep expert at C.S. Mott Children's Hospital in Ann Arbor, said if your morning is a mess, your child's bedtime may be to blame.
"If you're waking your child up before their sleep needs are met, they're going to be bear to wake up in the morning," Dore-Stites said. "The best advice is to give the child or teenager the sleep they need the night before, and I know that can be really really difficult."
Dore-Stites said school-age kids need 9-12 hours of sleep a night. Teenagers need 8-10. But most of our children are not getting it, hence those miserable mornings.
"If you're waking up this really groggy kid who's still in the middle of their sleep cycles, it's going to be monstrous," Dore-Stites said.
Consistency is also key. That means on weekends, your child should get up within an hour of when they need to get up during the week.
As for the best way to wake up kids, Dore-Stites said turn on the lights.
"Bringing in some light, and in the Michigan winters, it's not going to be natural light, but even just turning on the overhead lights can help them gradually wake up," Dore-Stites said. "A kid who has met their sleep need, those lights and that consistent wake time is going to wake them up fairly easily and right around the time you're trying to wake them up."
Giving a 10-minute warning is also helpful.
"It can let a child kind of transition from the sleep state to a little more of an awake state," Dore-Stites said.
She encouraged families to make sleep a priority.
"The investment you make in good sleep can have such far-reaching effects on your health and it's kind of unlike any other health behavior," Dore-Stites said. "You can see change quickly. It's dramatic. It can affect every area of a child's life."
If you feel like your children are getting sufficient sleep, but they're still very difficult to wake up, talk to your pediatrician. That could be a sign of an underlying sleep problem.
For teenagers, Dore-Stites recommends keeping cellphones out of the bedroom at night and setting up a separate area for them to do homework.
"Having a separate homework space, even if it's just a floor pillow that the teenager uses for homework rather than their bed, can be an important consideration," Dore-Stites said.
For high schoolers, it may help to have teens set their own alarm. But proceed with caution.
"As a parent, if you're thinking about rolling out the alarm you should a) be a backup alarm for them because that is a new skill that they're learning to get up, get moving independently and b) be prepared that they might not succeed the first time you do that," Dore-Stites said.
That's what ultimately ended the morning battles at the Blau household.
"My strategy is actually very hands off. They do way better if they set their own alarms, wake up, don't have to interact with me. The minute I have to get involved, all hell breaks loose," Michelle Blau said. "There have been times where they're racing out the door, putting on their shoes as the car is pulling out."
"I've slept past my alarm, but I still find a way to get out the door," Grant Blau said.
Ultimately, that's what counts.
