Anything you can do about an early waking toddler?

[snowboarder]

Seriously IS there anything one can do? As I do every morning I have been awake since 5am listening to 17 month old hum and moan and try to get back to sleep. He hardly ever does. Getting up threshold is set at 6am so I don't go to him until then unless he's screaming. He seems to wake at this time regardless of light/dark mornings, the presence or not of planes, irrespective of bedtime or previous days naps. I'm tired. He's tired and struggles to get through the morning to his nap. He can't be hot or cold as have swapped between 1 and 2.5 tog gro bags. He has a bottle of water in his bed for if he's thirsty. In despair.... I know it's a million times better than 6 months ago when he 3/5 times through the night, but I just feel fraustrated that I can't do anything to help. Any ideas anyone? Even gina ford been no help...!

[Fuschia]

I think it's just a stage and many toddlers are larks..

http://www.pantley.com/elizabeth/books/0071444912.php?nid=446&isbn=0071444912

[The Nappy Lady]

Sympathy - I had same thing on & off from January until about a month ago. You're doing right to leave him, I finally did the same or just went in & said it's too early go back to sleep & the time has improved - now 7am usually .....at last, but only in past month I'm afraid.

I hated those 5am starts with a vengeance.

[randomv]

Are you sure it has nothing to do with naps? My LO will wake early if he's had too much sleep but equally will wake at 5.30 (like today) if he goes to bed overtired - yesterday he had no nap and a slightly earlier bedtime. Its so easy to swing from over to under tired as one is tempted to give more sleep to compensate.

Only other suggestion is a bunny clock. At 2 years my LO still hasn't quite grasped the concept but I'm using it and referring to it every time just to get him used to the idea.

[Belle]

I struggle with these bloody early mornings too. I want to do your approach Molly - but my little boy starts screaming when he sees me (if he wasn't already) - but then feel cruel not going in if he's starting to sound upset.

[alieh]

I had months of this, I'm afraid. I doubt that anything I tried actually made a difference and it is probably just a phase, but here are some options (mostly already said by others)

-Bedtime a bit too late, even 15 minutes can make a difference for us

-Or nap too long/finishing too close to bedtime

-Simple version of the bunny clock idea, which some kids might understand at that age....put fairy lights on a timer and reinforce that they don't come out until the lights come on

-Leaving them if they're just grumbling; if upset, I would go in and lie beside the cot shhing and pretending to sleep until closer to 6:00 to at least send the message (ha ha ha) that it wasn't morning yet

-Pitch absolutely PITCH black room. I literally have a black sock over our monitor so the light doesn't flash!

-Fan on for white noise

-Locking cats downstairs as they tend to kick off and think it is morning as soon as they hear him

We are mostly past this phase now (21 months) and haven't seen a 5 am start in months (please continue!). The one problem is that he still sometimes peeps/groans at 4:30 or 5:00, enough to wake me up, but at least these days he always seems to roll over and go back to sleep until at least 6:15. Sometimes I really struggle to get back to sleep myself, but at least I'm in my warm bed and reading a book rather than sitting bleary-eyed in front of Cbeebies (which actually doesn't even start until 6:00...where is the justice??)!

[snowboarder]

randomv Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Are you sure it has nothing to do with naps?

I really don't think so unless I'm just doing it all wrong. We quit the morning nap recently as internet/book sleep gurus suggest that could help. No help. He now sleeps for a max of 2 hrs (if I'm lucky) from about 12.30 - 2.30. He's tired by bedtime and lights out at 7. He practically falls asleep over his lunch. He won't sleep for longer! So basically has a max of 12hrs sleep in a 24 hr period.

Oh well I'll just keep going. Just wish I didn't hear him wake! I do know it could be (and was) a lot worse....Blimey when I think back..!!

[Gussy]

Hi we had a similar thing which lasted about 3 weeks when we dropped the morning nap. I'm not sure how long it has been going on for you? I always find with my daughter that the more sleep (but not too much) she has in the day the better the sleep at night, and longer sleep in the morning. It took us a fair while to adjust to not having a morning nap. I had to bring lunch forward a little to get to the nap faster and then keep things lo-key in the afternoon or she would get overtired. I actually found it a really tricky balancing act for a few months to be honest, but it did improve and no probs anymore. Like everything with these littl'uns it will pass, but its hideous when you are in the midst of it and knackered.

[Polly D]

Turn the monitor off!

snowboarder Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> randomv Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

> > Are you sure it has nothing to do with naps?

>

> I really don't think so unless I'm just doing it

> all wrong. We quit the morning nap recently as

> internet/book sleep gurus suggest that could help.

> No help. He now sleeps for a max of 2 hrs (if

> I'm lucky) from about 12.30 - 2.30. He's tired by

> bedtime and lights out at 7. He practically falls

> asleep over his lunch. He won't sleep for longer!

> So basically has a max of 12hrs sleep in a 24 hr

> period.

>

> Oh well I'll just keep going. Just wish I didn't

> hear him wake! I do know it could be (and was) a

> lot worse....Blimey when I think back..!!

[snowboarder]

It IS off now!! (on silent and turned away from me - next door child screams and I need to know that it's not mine at 3am!)

[Polly D]

Ugh, bad luck.

How about if you put some books in his cot at night so he might look at them in quiet for a bit in the morning? Sadly (and unhelpfully) I just don't if there's an answer. R has been waking and crying loads in the night lately but I suspect/hope this is a tooth thing.

[ClaireClaire]

Hi Snowboarder, I feel your pain. Our daughter (now nearly 4) was an early riser as well, and I did everything I could think of to try to get her waking up later. Nothing worked. In the end we just brought her into bed with us where sometimes she would doze off; and even if not, we could get another half hour or so of semi-sleep while she just played with a toy in the bed or something. But you know, I think some kids are just like that; certainly, nothing that I tried worked, and I tried hard. It was only after she turned 2, and dropped her midday nap, and it was winter so dark in the mornings, that AT LONG LAST she started sleeping to around 7am.

Good luck, I really sympathise. I am going through it all again with our second one (14m), but usually I just plonk him in front of the TV until 6am when I consider it an acceptable time for a human being to get out of bed :-)

[canadianlisa]

Earplugs... You will still hear him if he really yells.. The silicon ones from Peckham boots are particularly good.

[gufflings]

Urgh, resurrecting this thread in the hope that the OP or any of the other posters have some sage advice.

My daughter is 13 months, is in bed asleep by 7.30pm and currently wakes at about 5.15am. Like Snowboarder did with her son, I leave her in her cot until 6am unless she is screaming her head off. And sometimes even if she is I send Mr Gufflings in to shush her in the hope that she'll go off again (this strategy never works if I'm the shusher). In fact, it hardly ever works. I seriously believe that she doesn't need more than 9 hours 45 mins tops at night.

I have tried:

- Later bedtime, say 8pm-ish (still wakes early, thus has less overall sleep)

- Moving tea closer to bedtime (makes no difference)

- Moving the morning BF to after breakfast (makes no difference)

- Paying a sleep consultant for help via Baby Sleep Answers (makes no difference and leaves me out of pocket)

I have not tried:

- Wake to sleep

- Keeping her up super late to jolt her out of her existing routine

I am back at work 4 days a week and the situation is now killing me because there's no longer the option of sleeping when she does in the day.

Her total nap time is around 1 hour 45 mins/2 hours: 20-30 mins morning nap at about 9am (because she's up so blooming early) and around 1.5 hours at about 2pm. Is it feasible she may actually need less nap time? Will life get easier when she moves from 2 naps to 1?

Does anyone else out there have a kid this age who exists on 11.5/12 hours sleep per 24? A straw poll amongst her baby mates makes her a freak as far as I can tell...

And, no, she's not discernibly tired/overtired on her current routine - and trust me, I spend most of my waking hours in 'observation' mode. Should I just accept things and Move On?

Weep. Sob.

PS - She's been walking since 10.5 months and all that expended energy seems to make no difference to the length of her sleep.

[alieh]

Would you be willing to brave the thought of an earlier bedtime? Like 7:00 or even 6:30, just to see if you can break the pattern? My thinking with the early bedtimes was always to try to get as much sleep as possible in him, and sometimes we would get lucky with a later wake up from an earlier bedtime.

Will she go down any earlier for that PM nap? Things might get better when she drops the morning nap, but she is very young to be doing that already. Also make sure there are no distractions in her room - literally the light from the baby monitor was enough to convince my son that he was ready to get up at 4:45.

I do think it is probably just an unfortunate phase, but you can still try a few more things just to feel like you are doing something at a minimum!

We still get the 5 am starts here whenever my son goes to bed overtired (he's over 2 now!), but they are quite rare. Maybe a few a month.

[snowboarder]

I can only report back that 6m later things ARE better in the snowboarder household - mainly because little sb has got better at lying quietly in his cot until we go and get him! We persevered with not going to him before 6, and gradually it just got a bit later. I now actually have no clue what time he wakes up, and sometimes I think he goes back to sleep for a bit or dozes. Occasionally at weekends we have managed to lie in until 7.30!! Sometimes he's quite cross when you go and get him and I think maybe then he's been awake a while...but I have come to the conclusion that there's very little you can do!

It took us quite a while to get down to one nap because of the early waking - I would keep going with the 2 until it seems to be taking ages for her to fall asleep each time. Even now we have a late morning 'danger' period before lunch when lsb could fall asleep in the buggy/car if not careful.

[womanofdulwich]

On a longer term note, I did not go through this stage- mine would not go to sleep easily and have never been good in the mornings- night mare when they have to get up early and go to school/nursery. My friend who had girls that woke early always went to bed easily and are generally much better in the mornings. SIster in law is AUstralia always had this.

If it does not get much better you might have to start thinking about changing your lifestyle- go to bed earlier because we know No 2 will soon be with you!

[charlottep]

My boy started waking up very early at 14 months. I dropped the morning nap at that point so he didn't have an opportunity to make up for sleep later on during that nap. I brought the lunchtime nap forward to 12-2pm and bedtime remained at 7pm. Initially it was hard for him to get through to 12 and we had to keep out and about, but within a couple of weeks he was coping well and it did stop the early waking for us. We're now at a point where we desperately holding on to his lunchtime sleep, which he doesn't really need but which we rely on for some down time.

[gufflings]

Aaaand she's asleep - and I'm tucking into my second breakfast. No wonder that baby weight's not shifting...

Hooray! Great to hear there's been some progress in your camps, Alieh and Snowboarder. Congratulations! Cor, I dream of 7.30am...

Womanofdulwich, gah, the thought of another like this scary. I do go to bed pretty early - 10pm - and days when I'm knackered then it's 9/9.30pm. I feel cheated out of my evening though! [Much brattish foot-stamping.]

When my daughter was tiny she would conk out for the day by 6.30/7pm - it took a long time initially to stretch her to 7.30pm - so I have wondered whether we should revert to her 'natural' bedtime and see what happens/hope for the best. It's worth a shot, Alieh. I do remember a few months back, the night when the clocks changed, I shoved her into bed at 7pm (because she hadn't slept brilliantly in the day, I think) and she did 11 hours! Although, of course, because of the time change that STILL meant a wake-up of 5am. Haha. A cruel twist of fate.

In terms of the PM nap, we've had to cut the morning one short to make sure she goes down at 2pm or thereabouts. Otherwise it's approaching 3pm, she sleeps until 4.30pm and then bedtime is tricky. I do think (although she's young) the morning nap is on its way out but, like Snowboarder says, until morning wake-up is later - or she can stay awake longer - it'll have to stay.

Groo. Would dearly love not to have to think about this stuff any more. Roll on no napping!

In the meantime I must look out a sock for that monitor...

[Gussy]

I am convinced that the less sleep they have the earlier they wake up - well with my two that's the case anyway. My first went to bed at 6pm until a year old and slept until 7pm, but if I put her down later for bed she woke earlier. My second also goes to bed a 6pm and sleeps until 6pm, but if I put him down at 10mins past 6pm or he doesn't nap well then he can wake from 5am. I agree with the poster who said veering from overtired to too much sleep is a really fine line. This would also fit with that tricky time of when they start to drop the morning nap....It can drive you mad thinking/observing it all and in the end you just have to get on with it until they grow out of it I guess.

[gufflings]

Charlottep, that's all sounding very familiar. I do think that's the answer for us, too. Am relying on the childminder to make the change though - likely to be far more entertaining than Mummy! How old is your son now?

[gufflings]

Gussy, I agree - it does drive you totally nuts. Early waking has been a problem for us since we dropped the night feeds (ages ago now). I know this because I kept a log of all her feeds and sleep from birth to about 7 or 8 months (yes, I am a control freak). She never did sleep more than 10/11 hours in total overnight (i.e. between feeds and resettling) even when she went to bed at 6.30/7pm. That's why we pushed her to 7.30pm. I do think some kids are just predisposed to be like this - I vividly remember my sister and I getting up from 5am-ish when we were little, so it's probably all my fault.

I'm willing to be proved wrong though. Pay you to come round to my house and show me how it's done! :-)

[alieh]

Yes, we definitely have the easy bedtime/early start situation, which has its benefits especially after a long day! My son had a natural 6:30/7:00 bedtime since birth basically, and has always slept better when he goes down early. These days we can usually get away with 7:30, but if it's been a bad nap day I still need to revert to 7:00 or else I get hit with a 5:00 am overtired wake up.

If you've been worn down with enough 5 am starts like we were, anything after 6:00 will seem like bliss. So if you have a 7:00 pm bedtime and get 11 hours, that might be as good as it gets for a while!

Also should have said that teething always brings us back to 5:00 am, and the teeth that came from 12-18 months (molars and canines) were the worst of the bunch.

[crystal7]

I sympathise grufflings! E still (at 2!) goes through phases of waking at 5-5.30 and it's painful. We're going through one now although this morning she squeaked at 5 then went back to sleep until 6.30 (latest in ages)but of course I didn't...There never seems to be a pattern such as different naps, eating habits etc she just starts doing it again. I haven't tried just leaving her until 6 because I'm a bit rubish at 'tough love':-$. Bedtime is 7 here (in cot by 7.15 usually) but she takes ages to get to sleep some night not until 8 so is only getting 9.5-10 hours at night then about 1.5 hours in the day- not enough accrding to the books. Sorry no advice although dropping the morning nap helped for a while (but yr little one is a bit young maybe).

[Olga]

Any chance there's some other explanation like does the heating switch on around that time, sometimes radiators can make a noise when this happens or sounds from neighbours getting up/alarm clocks.