Not quite a full stop . . .
. . . but something has made me slow down. It may be to do with having a thirteen-year-old in the house who keeps strange hours. I’m a light sleeper and easily woken by noises in the night. I know which doors are opening and closing, which stairs creak, and while everyone else sleeps through them, I cannot.
The next couple of days will be devoted to retraining the lad’s adolescent brain to the more normal rhythm required for (whisper it) school, before he returns to London.
Teenagers experience many changes in their lives – the body developing in startling ways, the mind posing problems and not solving them, social hurdles, academic expectations, misconceptions, skewed perceptions, peer pressure, and the awful awareness of self as neither child nor adult, not fitting any group, perpetually on the outside looking in. The grass is not greener on the other side, but it seems like it.
Add to this the change in their circadian rhythm which means that melatonin is released around two hours later than for adults or young children. This results in them wanting to stay up later and sleep longer in the morning, often in direct opposition to a requirement to rise early and prepare for school.
It is recommended that teenagers have eight to ten hours sleep a night, while they are still growing and their brains are developing rapidly. Fewer than seven hours a night leads to exhaustion, irritability, and difficulty in coping with the demands of family and school.
I remember my early teenage years, but not with great pleasure, so I have sympathy for my adolescent and pre-adolescent grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
They will survive.
Your temporary visitor is quite a nice looking lad.
ReplyDeleteThank you. Middle daughter's son.
DeleteTeenagers' bodies are indeed developing all the time, in height, weight, hairiness, breast size etc. Everyone can see the changes.
ReplyDeleteBut I am not sure about how their mind develops, partially because it can't be seen. Sometimes what comes out of an 18 year old's mouth sounds so immature that I really do worry about their brains. And their social skills.
They are certainly unpredictable, sometimes so reasonable and mature, at other times like toddlers having tantrums.
DeleteI remember needing a short nap after I got off the school bus once I reached teen years. Mother always let me nod off, eat dinner then do homework. Lots of homework as I recall with pencil and paper and heavy books, lol.
ReplyDeleteI worked with a teacher who always had a nap when she got home, after a cup of tea and a piece of cake.
DeleteThat is a great photograph ...
ReplyDeleteYes, back to school for many this coming week, and usually time for all the family to get back into the rhythm of things.
My rain dance has finally paid off LOL as I sit typing we have some much needed rain.
Have a good weekend.
All the best Jan
Well done, Jan. I hope your feet aren't too sore. 😉☔
DeleteLOL Great Reply :)
DeleteAll the best Jan
We all went through it and most of us came out the other end okay, so I suspect he will, too.
ReplyDeleteYes, we all survived, one way or another.
DeleteSounds like our Will, he's only 9 years old.
ReplyDeleteThey seem to start earlier and earlier these years!
DeletePuberty wasn‘t kind to me, and I can fully understand why teenagers often behave the way they do, as long as it‘s not really nasty or downright criminal or dangerous.
ReplyDeleteYou have a very sensible approach to it all, Janice.
It's horrible, Meike. I remember it so well and how nasty I was to my ever-loving mother.
DeleteMost teenagers need more sleep than they get, I think. I think making sure they don't have devices in their rooms at night can really help a lot. Your grandson is a handsome young man! He's lucky to have such sensible guidance and understanding from his adults. I'm sure he'll be fine. :)
ReplyDeleteWe keep telling ourselves he'll be fine . . . why should he be the exception? 😷
DeleteIn the US school starts very early, around here teens are out for the school bus well before seven. I have never understood why we don't move the hours back to allow for their sleep needs. But every time it comes up, we get the "we lived through it, so can they" mentality which defeats a pretty sensible idea. I've literally seen kids sleeping on the sidewalk when the bus arrives!
ReplyDeleteIt's an ongoing discussion which is never resolved. School starts at too young an age in UK - the September following a child's fourth birthday! - and too early in the day.
DeleteVery understanding of you-Most folks beyond the age of twenty do not remember being thirteen and how difficult the changes are.
ReplyDeleteAs "Librarian" states , adolescence was not kind.
I was a hateful teenager, a real misery. I was a little better by the time I was seventeen. 😉
DeleteYou sound insightful, compassionate, and prepared...what a lucky guy.
ReplyDeleteWe all know what's best for other people . . . 😕
ReplyDeleteAnd . . . I don't know how it works there, but here high school begins fairly early in the day. This is largely, if not entirely, due to double bussing. The same bus is used twice, once for the high school kids and once for the elementary school kids. So the older kids get the first bus when ideally, I guess it should be reversed. But then the times are somewhat more suitable for the families of younger kids. It is a very imperfect situation, however.
ReplyDeleteThere is never a perfect solution. We don't have the school bus system generally. Children are either taken to school by their parents, walk, cycle or use public transport, including trains and buses. It's not perfect, and it's too early for teenagers, but it's an 'introduction' to adult life and we can't mollycoddle them all their lives and expect them suddenly to be able to cope with university and/or living away from home. Sorry, gone off on a tangent there. (Some things never change. 😉)
DeleteA handsome young man. Hope he can adapt to a better schedule
ReplyDeleteThank you, Ann. I'm sure he will.
DeleteAnd what a fine looking teenager he is too Janice. Looks to be such a lovely young man. I have just had 2 eleven/nearly twelve year old boys for the day & I am shattered 😉so I hope you can get him to adapt to his new schedule okay.
ReplyDeleteI do wonder how we managed to do all we did when our own children were growing up. As you say, Julie, it's exhausting now. I suppose we're just out of practice! 😉
DeleteHandsome grand. All you say is true - preteen and teen years are so tough.
ReplyDeleteThey seem to have so much more to contend with these days, but I suppose all generations adapt to the requirements of the day!
DeleteSome schools open much earlier than others. They are apparently not in the loop as to how teens operate.
ReplyDeleteRegistration is usually around 8:45 but children have to travel, sometimes for an hour or more, so need to get up around 6:00 to dress and eat before they leave the house.
DeleteYour grandson has good genes, me thinks.
ReplyDeleteMy parents were very insistent about us being in bed by 8pm until I was about fourteen, and I think I used to get up about 6.30 to get ready for school. It wasn't a hardship to get up as I had a decent sleep. But goodness knows what I would have been like with electronic devices. I am bad enough now. I would hope they would have been banned in our bedrooms.
Children start hankering to stay up later from the age of about 9 these days. Electronic devices are a sore temptation always.
DeleteI don't remember my own "developing" years at all so I guess it was smooth sailing like the rest of my life. Possibly I was too busy reading books or playing on the beach, being the loner I always was, which might have helped as I didn't get drawn into whatever angst groups of girls got into.
ReplyDeleteHere in Australia school starts at 9am, so teenagers get to sleep in to a reasonable hour and get to school by walking or riding bikes or pubic transport. We don't have dedicated school buses unless one is hired to arrive at a school to pick up kids going on an excursion to the zoo or museum.
Some schools have their own buses, but most children make their own way to school, by bus, train or other means. I used to catch two buses to school.
DeleteOh Dear!! "pubLic" transport, PUBLIC, PUBLIC, not pubic... so sorry.
ReplyDeleteHa ha ha - I wouldn't have noticed if you hadn't pointed it out.
DeleteAha! So that's what went awry. I never did outgrow the circadian rhythm of my youth. Your grand is one handsome fellow. ;-)
ReplyDeleteI was always a night owl so getting up in the morning was a struggle. Not so much, now. 😷
DeleteHe is such a handsome lad. I wish him only the very best in his life. Your description of youth was perfection.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Denise.
DeleteI used to sleep till midday when I was a teenager. Now I'm lucky if I get 5 hours' sleep.
ReplyDeleteSleep is sometimes like a will-o'-the-wisp, difficult to capture.
DeleteSuch a cutie. The youth brings out the youthfulness in us...or does it. They do have a way of reminding us when we were younger and had the energy they have. My bed time now days...9:00 pm...wake up at 7:00 am. I think I get plenty of sleep.
ReplyDeleteYouth sometimes brings out pangs of memory, but we live in the present, not the past. 9:00 till 7:00 sounds perfect.
DeleteMy grandson is at the same stage. He managed the time transition, but I imagine it wasn't easy. He could sleep until 10 during the summer.
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting seeing them develop. Teenage years seem like a foreign domain.
DeleteFrankie is a beautiful boy. It's always a difficult world to navigate, especially so at this tender age. I wouldn't return to my early teen years for all the tea in China. I hope Frankie has a good school year ahead of him.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Stephanie. Our perception of difficulty changes with our age and experience, I think.
DeleteThat is a tough age -- lots of demands from within and without! I was never a late sleeper, even as a teenager. That melatonin change never kicked in with me!
ReplyDeleteYou were one of the fortunate ones. My husband never had that problem, either.
DeleteCarlos slept through Hurricane Katrina when we lived in Miami but if a cat jumps on a chair I hear it and am wide awake!
ReplyDeleteThat's funny. My husband can sleep through anything, too.
DeleteMy grandson is 13, he goes to sleep when we do around 10pm and he sleeps through the night most nights, thankfully.
ReplyDeleteThat is impressive. Well done your grandson.
DeleteLovely photo of your grandson. I wish you, your grandson and his parents all the best in navigating this minefield that we have all been through.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Beverley. 😊
DeleteOne of my grandsons is the same age. He has spent a lot of the summer with me as most US school systems are out for two and a half months during the summer but parents must work. Sometimes he was just here during the weekdays; other times he spent several nights a week. He headed back to school this past Tuesday. He spent the night here last Sunday and clearly had worn himself out over the weekend. Had a restless night so that once I fed him breakfast on Monday, he fell back asleep until 2:30 pm. Was told I could not mention the start of the school year (I didn't) as he was dreading it. Middle school years ages 12-14 are tough for all the reasons you mentioned.
ReplyDeleteYes, we tend not to discuss school for many of the same reasons. We have a grandson and a great-grandson, both 11, both starting new schools in September, both dreading it.
DeleteThat's one very nice looking youngster. I worry about the hours high school students are expected to keep. In out county they're the first to start school in the morning so they have to get on the bus at 6 - 6:30 a.m. Many of them have after school jobs that run into the evening so they might not be home from work until 10 p.m. If they try to do homework, then they're up until midnight or 1 a.m. And they get back on the hamster wheel again in the morning. I never got enough sleep when I was in high school.
ReplyDeleteLove,
Janie
That is a tough regime, and exhausting.
DeleteYou're so fortunate to be able to spend that time with your grandson, and he's a lucky kid, too. Some of my fondest memories are of being with grandparents. Kids never get enough rest. I think I was sleep deprived from 14 to 40.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate time spent with my younger family members - they're refreshing company.
DeleteI wouldn’t want to be a teenager in these challenging times……
ReplyDeleteWhat a nice photo x
Alison in Devon x
Once was bad enough!
DeleteBank Holidays confuse me and you're right being retired weekends could be every day!
ReplyDelete