Daylight Savings Time

I don't know who came up with Daylight Savings Time, but since I have had kids, I decided that I do not like it.When you don't have kids, daylight savings can be fun, but perspectives change when children are involved.

By no means is Daylight Savings Time harmful to our children. I want to stress that I am saying it is frustrating and exhausting for both parents and their children, not harmful. Most parents understand that children are usually better when they have a routine.

Daylight Savings Time messes up that routine twice a year. Even as an adult, our bodies still take time to adjust. We know how hard it can be to readjust our own adult bodies when we change clocks, now imagine being a kid.  

Twice a year there are drastic changes in the kids' environmental layout at bedtime and in the morning. In the spring, we all lose an hour of sleep from the time change; while in the fall everyone gains an hour with the time change. As adults, we have very minimal effects of losing or gaining an hour of sleep. 

However, children don't understand and their biological clock doesn't change automatically. So instead of sleeping in that extra hour with fall daylight savings, children tend to wake up an hour earlier. The younger the child, the crankier they are that next evening trying to stay awake until bedtime.

When the time change takes away an hour of sleep in the spring time, the children tend to wake up at the normal time. The problem is that their normal time is actually an hour less sleep. Either way, the poor kids end up spending most of a week frustrated as their bodies attempt to adjust to the time change.

When I was a teenager and young adult before having kids, I used to love fall time Daylight Savings because it meant an extra hour at the bar. Now I have to make it a plan to go to bed earlier at Daylight Savings Time so that I can keep up with the kids. 

All of that in mind, don't forget to change your clocks back tonight. Saturday night, March 10, 2012, be sure to spring your clocks ahead an hour before you go to bed.