Sleepy Teens

One of the problems I have every single day with my daughter is getting her out of bed. Every single day her alarm clock goes off and she ignores it for a bit and then she hits snooze. And it goes off and she ignores it and hits snooze. This can go on for hours. I try to get her up and moving before I leave the house at 7:30 am but it doesn't always happen.

And when I try to wake her up she is just nasty. She is cranky, she yells, she hides under the covers. It's pure torture - for everyone in the household.

So what can you do if you have a sleepy teen like I do? I did some peeking around and here are some suggestions I came up with (and I'm not saying that any of these will work! They are just suggestions from other desperate parents):

• Take them to the doctor for a full check up - there are sometimes physical reasons or mental health issues involved.
• Water - if they don't get up they do get wet
• Consistent revoking of privileges - cell phone, tv, computer, etc.
• Monitoring of diet and exercise - these things can affect how well you sleep
• Minimize over stimulation in the last hours of the day

These are just a few suggestions from the readers at Denise's Parenting Teens Blog. Stop by and read the responses from the February 27th entry, 17 Year Old Won't Wake Up - Any Advice?

Chris Brown and Rhianna - Is there a real lesson there for teens?

Three weeks ago Chris Brown and his girlfriend, the beautiful singer Rhianna hit the newstands. There had been a huge fight involving physical violence and charges were laid. Is this just another tidbit of celebrity news? Maybe. But there can be a lesson in there for teens.

Domestic violence is real and it doesn't just happen in trailer parks and in the ghettos. It happens in real life. While Chris and Rhianna may not be the best example of "real life" celebs are real to teens.

Here's some facts about domestic violence and teens:

• Of tweens between the ages of 11-14, 62% say they have friends who have been verbally abused by a girlfriend/boyfriend (Liz Clairborne Inc. study, 2008)
• 1 our of every 3 teens says that they know of a friend who has been physically abused (slapped, kicked, choked, etc) by a boyfriend or girlfriend (Liz Clairborne Inc. study, 2005)
• Almost 80% of teen girls who have been physically abused in an intimate relationship continue to date their abuser (City of New York, Teen Relationship Abuse Fact Sheet, March 1998)
• 30% of young women between the ages of 15-19 who are killed each year were killed by their boyfriend/husband (City of New York, Teen Relationship Abuse Fact Sheet, March 2008)

Shocking isn't it? I think the one that got to me the most is the statistic about how 80% of teen girls that are abused continue to date their abuser. The question is why?

Hopefully though, with this celeb news coming about about Rhianna and Chris, teens will start to talk about teen dating violence because if they don't talk about it there will never be enough help.