Showing posts with label teenagers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label teenagers. Show all posts

Tuesday, May 26, 2020

Coronavirus My Teenage Vampires


Ha ha. "Coronavirus Vampires" was the title of the article forwarded to me today.

In the author's scenario, his kids were glued to their cell phones all night and slept during the day. For us, it is a combination of Xbox and phones that turned our sons into creatures of the night.

We could have canceled their phone service. We could have locked down the wi-fi after 10 pm. My wife and I could have stayed awake and listened all night for whispering in their bedroom.

Ha!

I mean what adult can stay up as long as a teenager night after night to make sure they are "in" bed. At some point, something just has to give.

And just try to wake up a teenager for any reason, like school, and it is usually a battle. And when there is no reason? I laugh. Good luck.

The boys won that battle as they did for the author's family.

Now when I go to bed, I tell the boys good night, be quiet, and wash any dirty dishes you make during the night.

With this nocturnal schedule and no required schoolwork for the rest of the school year, our house has been a beacon of peace and tranquility. (Not quite, but almost.)

We always see our boys at breakfast and then at lunch or dinner depending on when they go to sleep and wake up.

Dinner for breakfast, breakfast for dinner.

Perhaps McDonald's saw this phenomena happening months ago when they made their breakfast menu available all day.

Conspiracy theories abound.

My neighbors have a toddler with a "regular" sleep schedule and have not had a sitter in over in 2 months. Ouch.

When I tell them that we have our days free to work, take walks, and enjoy the peace and quiet, I see the envy in their eyes.

Occasionally, my boys will try to get their sleep schedule back on track on their own for a day or two, but inevitably, the 12-hour teenage sleep curse happens and their schedule goes out the window.

When school starts again in August, three months from now, we can battle. But for now we will enjoy the peace.

Have your kids become vampires too?

As a side note: I am very curious to see how the health of teenagers of the coronavirus age who have 6 months of good sleep, low school stress, and more family time is affected in the long run.