For plenty of people, the end of daylight saving time is a gift: an extra hour of sleep and a lazy Sunday morning. For one mom with a middle schooler, it is the start of a very long week.
Danielle Kelly, who hosts an ADHD parenting podcast called Chaos & Caffeine, wrote that the fall time change “wrecks” her entire household every single year. Her son is 11, he reads a clock just fine, and he understands exactly why the hour moved. His body does not seem to care.
Source: Scary Mommy.
By 5:30 In The Afternoon, It Is Pitch Dark And Everyone’s Body Thinks Bedtime Passed
Kelly says the trouble is not the clock. It is what the clock change takes away: the outside cues that tell a body what comes next. Dinner, bedtime and morning all land at the wrong moment, and the sun sets so early that it is fully dark by 5:30 p.m.
At 42, she says, she feels it herself. She gets tired around 6:00 p.m., then feels wide awake when she should be sleeping, and the dark afternoons drain her motivation.
She describes the change as if someone picked up the family’s whole routine and “shook it like an Etch A Sketch” before handing it back with a smile.
The Parenting Advice Stops Right When The Problem Gets Bigger
Kelly points out that the standard advice for babies and toddlers is to shift naps by about 15 minutes at a time. She says everyone understands a two year old waking up at 4:12 in the morning.
But once kids hit school age, the sympathy fades. People assume that an older child, especially one who can tell time, should simply adjust. Kelly says that is not how it works, and that the change keeps hitting kids long after the toddler years.
She writes as a neurodivergent parent of a neurodivergent child, and she brings up ADHD, anxiety and children’s circadian rhythms. Still, the pattern she describes will sound familiar to plenty of families.
Parents Blame Themselves For What The Clock Did
This is the part that may help the most. Kelly says that when kids turn moodier, harder to wake up or more impulsive after the change, parents often decide they have been inconsistent.
Her answer is that the real cause is a disruption to hunger, attention, sleep and transitions. After school gets rough too, because kids arrive home with very little emotional energy left.
She rejects the idea that this is a minor paperwork update. In her house, she says, it is a full reset. If your household turns a little feral when the clocks change, she adds, you are not imagining things.
Her Survival Plan For The Week After The Clocks Change
Kelly’s tips are practical, and none of them cost a dime:
- Lower the bar for a few days. Keep dinner very simple and pick meals with the least cleanup.
- Start bedtime earlier. Do it even if an older child pushes back.
- Add light in the morning. Use more alarms, open the curtains, and skip the unnecessary chatter before the day gets going.
- Hold on to the routines you can. Add extra light, rest and patience where you can.
- Expect a few days of adjusting. If homework, moods or evenings go sideways, the household is adjusting, not failing.
A Few Extra Ideas That Work For Plenty Of Families
You can add a few easy habits on top of her list. Here are some that sleep experts commonly suggest for the days after a clock change:
- Get outside in daylight as early in the day as possible. Morning light helps set the body’s internal clock.
- Move bedtime in small steps, about 15 minutes at a time, in the days before the change if you can plan ahead.
- Dim lights and put screens away an hour before bed so the body gets a signal that the day is winding down.
- Make a double batch of an easy dinner earlier in the week, such as soup or a casserole, and freeze the extra for the toughest night.
- Take the pressure off evenings by saving big projects, school fundraisers and extra errands for the weekend.
It also helps to say the quiet part out loud to your kids. A line like “our bodies are catching up to the clock, so we are all going to be a little off this week” can turn a grumpy evening into something the whole family is dealing with together.
Kelly’s essay is an opinion piece drawn from her own family’s experience, and every household is a little different. But her main message is a kind one for any worn-out parent in the dark of November: you are not failing. The house is adjusting, and a few simple dinners and early bedtimes can get everyone through to the other side.
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