16 month old 4.30 wake ups everyday - any experience pls?

[RugbyWidow7]

Has anyone been through this and have the benefit of experience? We really need to know of other techniques that have worked pls.

We have a 16 month old who is up every morning at 4.30 am for the day. We've tried feeding at bedtime, later bed time, milk in the morning, leaving milk in his cot, leaving him to cry (v difficult as like others, my husband needs to sleep as he gets up for work at 6am) ...but nothing seems to work. I'm tempted to try the 'wake to sleep' method but it is a big leap of faith as we're tired enough already without introducing more wakes into our night! Has anyone done it successfully?

I feel like we've been here before and he's gone back to his usual 6am waking pattern eventually so maybe we just need more patience as its another phase. I should also say he's only having one daytime nap at midday now of 1-2 hrs - I wake him at 2hrs so he'll sleep in the evenings.

I'm sure others must have been through this so hoping for some wisdom please. Thank you!

[topsi]

No advice only that it will pass like everything else. DS went through a phase of 5,30 wake ups it nearly killed me but it passed. x

[Iggly]

Could he be overtired? I'd give him a 30-45 min morning nap as well. Which he must need if up that early. Try for a week.

[Tolly81]

DD been waking up everyday 4:45 -5:30 (used to wake up 6-6:30). Dreadful. Tried wake to sleep first night at 4:30 - didnt work as she was stirring already. Second night she woke at 3 and only back asleep at 3:50 but still woke at 5:30. Third night didn't bother and woke at 4:50, finally after trying for an hour managed to get her back to sleep for an hour in bed with us. This morning woke at 3 and gave some some ibuprofen as noticed top teeth coming through. Went back to sleep pretty quickly and slept till 7:15! As a result have no idea what she will do tonight. You could try an earlier bedtime before trying wake to sleep - could he be overtired?

[kawaii123]

My son 12 months has been doing the same. I know it's awful but have you tried really committing to leaving to cry? It has worked for me after lots of pain.

Also agree about possibility of over tiredness. My ds sleeps terribly if he hasn't slept well in the day. Then he slept four hours in the day recently and slept through!

[CecyHall]

Yes, my Ds2 is/was like this. He's always been a bad sleeper and was up at 4.30am for a long long while.

We had advice from the health visitors (they had a special sleep clinic) but to be honest nothing worked, he would not play along to anyone elses tune! We tried everything short of crying it out as I really don't agree with that (and I don't care if anyone was I made a rod for my own back!)

Then all of a sudden we had a few blissful months of 6am, it was lovely.

However for the past month it's gone back to 5am, feels psychologically better than 4.30 but still ridiculous. He's also stopped napping in his cot, he'll just crash out eventually and a pin dropping would wake him. He is 20 months now.

I have just had to adapt and go with it, however horrible it is. and I thank my lucky stars he was the second as I'd not have another if ds1 was like this!