Wake Up!

I have this fantasy where I bring my 15-year-old daughter, Meg, down to the U.S. Army Recruiting Station in Times Square and they let me sign her up for two weeks. While a guest of Uncle Sam, Meg would be awakened at the crack of dawn by a trumpet playing reveille and the scary, booming voice of a drill sergeant, thereby teaching her to get up on time in the morning.

Meg is a night owl. Hence, morning is not her friend, which means in the a.m., Meg is not my friend.

My day begins screaming, “Time to get up,” over and over and over again. I’m thinking making an iPhone recording to save my voice. I’m also thinking of investing in a jaws-of-life contraption to help pry her from the mattress, upon which she usually has a death grip when I am shaking her awake.

To change this, my husband, Neil, and I have tried everything, short of slipping her a ZzzQuil capsule at night or dousing her with a bucket of ice in the morning. When we removed electronics from her room at bedtime, she just stayed up and drew or read instead, or simply got up, laid on the sofa, and watched TV.

I can’t say I don’t understand the fascination with the wee hours, as I too have been known to love the nightlife.

When I used to work full-time, I did my best work after everybody else left at 5 or 6pm and the phone had stopped ringing. When my son, Luke, was a baby, I never minded the late night/early morning feedings, as I found it very peaceful. As our family grew and our New York City life got more hectic with drop-offs, pickups, chaperoning school trips, running to afterschool activities, then coming home to fix dinner and get homework done, I couldn’t wait until everybody, including my husband, went to bed so I could have “me” time to read, do some work, or watch a movie before I fell asleep. I also started getting up really early in the morning to have a nice cup of coffee and read the paper in absolute solitude.

But even though it’s easy for me to understand why Meg likes the calmness of the night, I don’t understand why she also doesn’t factor into her decision to stay up that she has to get up the next morning. She has been going to school for 11 years now—it shouldn’t be a shock when I rouse her.

I keep telling her that if she insists upon staying up all night, she’s got to find a way to wake herself up, as the whole situation is taking a toll on me.

Lately, extenuating circumstances have successfully moved her from her bed: an email from her teacher, a threat regarding her Sweet 16 party, and a Skype call from her brother, Luke, in Australia. I, however, can’t count on these things to continue. I’ve decided a little tough love is what may be needed to do the trick. When I have an on-site freelance job, I just have to get up and go, instead of waiting so we can take the train together, and if I’m working from home, I just need to leave and run errands in an effort to get her to take responsibility to get herself where she needs to be.

I’m nervous about this and still a little confused as to the best course of action. I have to sleep on it.

Lorraine Duffy Merkl is the author of the new opting-in novel, BACK TO WORK SHE GOES. For more of her writing, visit lorraineduffymerkl.com

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