Parents Late Night Meet, Young Child

[Pirouette]

M & Ms.

Seriously, though, is she on a meal schedule, too? Adding in a snack between lunch and dinner, then pushing back dinner by an hour might help, if the meet schedule permits. If her body is used to going to sleep 3 hours after dinner, try to match that timetable if possible.

My kids were ruled by their internal clocks for a long time. 8 years old is a tough age to adapt. Too old to nap easily, too young to deal with the change in schedule easily. Good luck!

 

[sce]

After all, most people in the US aside from you Arizonans adjust our kids' clocks by an hour in each direction twice a year and no one seems to suffer tremendously from it.

I beg to differ on this. Many people, babies and young kids especially but older kids and adults too, so suffer from the time change. it can take weeks to feel normal again, over that little hour.

I also feel a well rested child can usually handle staying up late once in awhile. So the child with the late meet should be getting good sleep all week, rest that afternoon and eat well before the meet.

I actually have similar concerns with early meets, as my kids do not wake early and ten to stay up later. So I have to work a bit harder to ensure that they get good sleep the few nights before the extra early day. Sure they still struggle with waking and feel more tired but they handle the meet okay and then are exhausted afterwards.

 

[kandkfunk]

Just to put sleep into perspective, current Pediatric recommendations for kids ages 7-12 is 10 to 11 hours of sleep per night. Lack of sleep is one of the main contributors for behavioral issues in children. It was always tough for my DD to get adequate sleep trying to juggle gym, homework and school, but she could sometimes adapt to a little less sleep. However, it was imperative to my son's disposition and mental health, and ultimately my sanity, for him to get as much sleep as possible. I think the ability to adjust sleep schedules is a very individual thing for kids and families.

To the OP, you have gotten a wide variety of advice on this thread. Hopefully, something said here will help the next time you face this situation. The good news is there really aren't a lot of meets during a typical gymnastics season, and you won't have a late session every time. This should be a fairly rare occurrence. Good luck!

 

[LucysMom]

Thanks for all the great advice!! I think a nap in the early afternoon would be good. We may add a small amount of caffeine next time. Also (drumroll....), I will take some of CoachP's advice and this is what I am thinking: For an evening meet week I will move her shower to nighttime and have her stay up 30 minutes to an hour longer each night. Also I will try to get her to sleep in the next morning. She normally wakes up at 6am. She leaves for school at 7:20, so there is a little wiggle room especially with moving the shower to nighttime. Honestly, I hope we don't have another night meet!

 

[Deleted member 14190]

Thanks for all the great advice!! I think a nap in the early afternoon would be good. We may add a small amount of caffeine next time. Also (drumroll....), I will take some of CoachP's advice and this is what I am thinking: For an evening meet week I will move her shower to nighttime and have her stay up 30 minutes to an hour longer each night. Also I will try to get her to sleep in the next morning. She normally wakes up at 6am. She leaves for school at 7:20, so there is a little wiggle room especially with moving the shower to nighttime. Honestly, I hope we don't have another night meet!

=
just be carful with the caffeine, you don't want her wiggling all over the beam.

 

[balancedmom]

Last year, we had numerous meets on Sunday nights over an hour away. While competition ended before 10, the awards did not necessarily....at one meet, my DD, almost 9 at the time in 3rd grade, started competing after 7. The meets were too late for these young kids and Monday mornings were hard. And, next week, we have another with stretching at 530 on a SUNDAY! ugh. I do not like these late Sunday meets. Not that I can do anything about it. But I feel you.