Dinner Parties & Late Nights: It’s All Fun and Games Until the Next Day!
My important message to you, Mama.
I can remember our first dinner party as new parents like it was yesterday. It was the first time we had let our toddler say up late.
It was an ‘early dinner’ with friends, intentionally scheduled this way because we had our two-year-old in tow and her bedtime was 7 pm.
We had a beautiful dinner and our daughter was playing wonderfully with the other kids. Once the clean-up was complete, we started to gather our things in preparation for the exodus (quietly bracing ourselves for the toddler tantrum that was about to ensue when we told our daughter that it was home time!).
That was when our friend asked, “Why don’t you stay a little longer?”
I looked at my husband, and he looked at me. The fear and hesitation were present in both of us, but we agreed to stay. After all, what was the harm?
Truth be told, it felt as though the other parents were glaring at us with judging daggers for wanting to get our daughter home to bed so early…by now it was 7:30 pm. So, I guess you could say we gave in to parenting-peer-pressure and we stayed!
At 10 pm we finally made our departure with a well-exhausted 2-year-old. Our daughter had a fabulous time and so did we.
On the way home, she fell soundly off to sleep and my husband and I giggled about our new-parent paranoia and how she had survived. We discussed how happy she had been, no whinging or whining, no clinging or crying, a little superstar really. I can vividly recall my husband saying “at least she will sleep in tomorrow”.
Oh, how wrong we were!
The next day…
The day started when she woke at 6.30 am. We knew something was immediately off. The wake-up cry gave it away and the day went downhill from there… tantrum after tantrum, angry outburst after angry outburst! It was as though our usually happy and vibrant toddler had been replaced by the daughter of the devil!
All I can say is one late night had unleashed a cyclone of emotion!
So, why do I tell you this story?
Well, two reasons:
- Parenting Peer-Pressure is REAL. Don’t be a victim. If you have routines, systems, and habits that work for your family, stand your ground! You put those systems in place for a reason and if you want to be consistent, don’t be pressured into deviating or letting that routine slide.
- Sleep matters (theirs and yours!). In fact, studies have shown that a child who regularly gets an adequate amount of sleep has improved attention, behaviour, learning, memory, and overall mental and physical health.
Researchers have found that sleep effectively impacts all areas of our life from growth to heart health and even brain function! So it’s pretty darn important.
Yet despite this, some will say it’s only one day, you will be right, but I can tell you it took 3 days before she returned to her usual happy programing — and they were a long three days for a tired Mama!
My message to you…
We had to learn the hard way that routines matter, and as a result, I can probably count on one hand how many times we have allowed our children to deviate from their bedtime routine in the five years since this event!
So I am here to tell you that next time you are feeling ALL the pressure to deviate from your bedtime routine — STAND YOUR GROUND!
You make the rules for your family, you know your needs and your child’s needs best. You know when it is the right time to let a routine slide or when that slide might just push someone over the edge.
You get to make the call and decide whether that one late night is going to be worth the early wake-up and the onslaught of emotion the next day (or three!).
For me, I like to live by this motto:
“A child who goes to bed early, wakes up early. A child who goes to bed late, wakes up early”.
I know which child I would prefer to wake up with the next day. How about you?
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