Dear Abby: After-hours texting keeps retiree up at night

Dear Abby,

My wife and I are both recently retired. Our 19-year-old daughter lives 100 miles away at college. My wife has an elderly mother. My problem is family and friends who text early in the morning.

When I was working, I had to get up at 4:30 a.m., so one of the biggest rewards of retirement is no alarm clock. My wife keeps her cellphone next to the bed because of our daughter and her mother, so putting it somewhere else is not an option.

When a text comes through, I automatically think the worst. My adrenaline kicks in, and I can’t go back to sleep. One person even sent me birthday wishes at 3 a.m.

Why do people know not to call at those hours unless it’s an emergency but still text? How can I gracefully let people know that even though they are up, I am enjoying the rewards of a well-earned retirement and would like to be able to sleep until I wake up on my own?

— Late to Rise in Pennsylvania

Dear Late: Notify your friends and family that unless there is an emergency, they should please not text before 10 a.m. because it wakes you up. Repeat that message as often as necessary. And do some research because there may be features on your wife’s cellphone that would enable ONLY texts from your daughter and mother-in-law to come through, while you blissfully slumber.