Ours is 3. He's winding down at 7:30 PM. That leaves 8-11 PM most evenings for my time.

I'm not going to pretend like I don't miss having 5-11 PM for myself, or the fact that weekends tend to be quite busy. But I've done the "all non-work time is _my_ time" for my previous 38 years. And I've also come to understand that the luxury of time I had previously I was also quite adept at BS'ing myself about: "I'll start that tomorrow! never starts it"

If I don't work on a side project, I understand very clearly now it is because I didn't sit down and actually do it.

It's not my son's fault, it's my own.

My experience has been close to yours. The wife and I have a 3 and 5 year old. We did tons of research into different methods of sleep training methods and arrived at practical ways to make sure they understood that bedtime meant staying in their room and in their own beds, even if they weren't necessarily sleepy yet.

The 5 year old is in his "big boy bed" and we use a color-changing nightlight on a timer that is a soft red when he needs to stay in his room and turns blue when he can come out. The 3 year old is still in his crib for another few weeks, then we will transition him to the same setup.

Apart from the predictable times here and there where the older one sneaks out of bed to see what we're up to, it's worked out really well and gives us our sanity back from around 745pm to whenever we go to bed.

I have kids that same age, and our bedtime is 8:00. Usually they're asleep by 9 but there have definitely been days where they are up and fighting until well past 10. Certainly the gp was exaggerating, but just because my kids are in bed doesn't mean it's my time. 8-9 is lost policing actually being in bed almost every day.

That said, I agree more with you, because as much as I like to say, "oh I could be doing x or y if I weren't caring for my kids," in reality, I probably wouldn't be doing much differently. Maybe I'd go out a few more times a month, but oops pandemic.

Bed time used to be 8:30pm but a few weeks ago she just turned the age where she absolutely needed someone to be beside her until she falls asleep. All hell breaks loose if we don't, and I've thought about implementing cry-it-out but looking at her mode of crying I'm not sure that's healthy. Anyway, I'm staying with her for 2 hours until she falls asleep (she does take that long) because my spouse already cares for her all day and is exhausted, besides, she has a part time job she has to do some work in the evening for. 11pm is not an exaggeration and it's how it's been in the past 6+ weeks. I have hopes that things will be different at 3~4 years old, but not right now.

It won't change until you change it. Kids that age don't have a concept of feeling guilty about burdening anyone else. Cry-it-out can seem cruel but it doesn't take long. The other thing about kids that age is they have short memories and adapt to change quickly. Talk to your pediatician if you need reassurance.

That's a totally unsustainable routine for you and for your daughter... I'd strongly recommend hiring a great sleep coach!

Similar story here with soon to be 4yo and a new baby, bed time has been bleeding into later times and sometimes it's easier to sleep together to calm them down. It's a phase and I'm not too stressed about it, but it totally limits me time.

You didn't mention how old, but I want to re-emphasize putting in the investment now. This problem will only get worse and the joys of parenting a child on a routine are vast

Try going in and out with increasing gaps.

Considering that I don't have kids and feel the same, I'm not surprised by OP. Depending on your commute and chores, that's not so crazy. Of course as someone without kids, I have way more time, but if I cook a dinner and do chores... There's also overhead and time spent overwhelmed. You can work harder, and take less breaks, but that's the rub. Being a flurry of constant activity burns people out.

My free time starts at 10pm. But time is 12pm.

If I don't get a solid 2 hours a day I get very unhappy, very fast. So long as I get that, I'm good. But that's about all I can manage these days.

Out of curiosity, what’s the minimum hours per day that you must spend on keeping the kid alive and well? (Minimum hours assuming you don’t get someone else to take care of the kid.)

Every moment they are awake and not explicitly in the care of another for the first few years.