9 months sudde ly awake at 5am!

[Wingingit07]

Hi!

My LO has suddenly decided he wants to wake up at 5am to 530am each morning, he lies there babbling to 6am which is when I get him up. Ive tried feeding him, resettling him but nothing works.

Its totally out of the blue for the last few weeks, hes not teething but has learnt to crawl, he gets lots of practice in the daytime.

Our schedule used to be
630am wake
9am bedtime
1015am wake
130 bedtime
245 wake
630pm bedtime

Ive tried to follow the same awake times however he naps the same duration and it means his wake window from last nap to bedtime is long. I have tried a 15 minute power nap but that doesnt work. When he does sleep for 1.5 hrs each nap and his schedule is on track he still wakes at 5am.his environment hasnt changed, rooms still pitch black, white noise on same volume and same place. Same sleeping outfit etc. Same feeds in day

I cant seem to function before 6am and its really knocked me and im tired sooo much and not sure how I will manage work.

Would anyone suggest if little one wakes at 530am I go to 9am so 3. 5 hrs wake time opposed to the usual 2.5 hrs he used to have? Im worried this will result in overtiredness and that will then have an impact! X

[Booboosweet]

Honestly that might be just the time he wakes up for the day. My daughter went through a long phase of waking up at half five every morning. It's just a phase you will get through. By the time they're in school they will get up at a more normal time.

[FATEdestiny]

Since the expected length of the night's sleep is 11 hours, you should be expecting a 5.30am wake up with a 6.30pm bedtime. So if you are keeping the 6.30pm bedtime, you need to work out a longer term routine that fits with a wake up anytime from 4.30am onwards - this will be your normal.

I would suggest a MUCH later bedtime. Anything in the range of 10-12h sleep overnight is normal, with 11h being average. So if you want 6.30am (and would be happy with 5.30am) then you need to aim for 7.30pm bedtime. Personally I prefer a 8.30pm bedtime for babies, to give a morning wake up in the range of 6.30-8.30am, with expected being 7.30am.

As for naps - the aim for 2-nap days is wake windows of 2h to morning nap, 3h to afternoon nap, 4h to bedtime.

[Timeturnerplease]

You may have an early riser. We spent MONTHS experimenting with naps, bedtimes etc in order to make her sleep later than 5.30am.

Nothing worked until she was old enough to understand a Gro Clock, which thankfully was at about 18 months as she was verbal very early. Now at 2.9 she sleeps until the clock sun comes up at 6, but would do 6.30 easily if it wasn’t for us needing to get up for work/her to her grandparents.

Incidentally, later bedtimes made not one jot of difference to her, aside from causing epic tantrums of tiredness.

[Mistressofnone]

Sounds like the 8-10 month sleep regression! Hit us hard with our eldest.

My DD is 9 months and won't currently nap unless held. Springs awake when I put her in the cot! Telling myself it's just a phase.

[CourtneyCox2021]

@FATEdestiny

Since the expected length of the night's sleep is 11 hours, you should be expecting a 5.30am wake up with a 6.30pm bedtime. So if you are keeping the 6.30pm bedtime, you need to work out a longer term routine that fits with a wake up anytime from 4.30am onwards - this will be your normal.

I would suggest a MUCH later bedtime. Anything in the range of 10-12h sleep overnight is normal, with 11h being average. So if you want 6.30am (and would be happy with 5.30am) then you need to aim for 7.30pm bedtime. Personally I prefer a 8.30pm bedtime for babies, to give a morning wake up in the range of 6.30-8.30am, with expected being 7.30am.

As for naps - the aim for 2-nap days is wake windows of 2h to morning nap, 3h to afternoon nap, 4h to bedtime.

Fatedestiny is this the same for a 5.5 month old I assume? Normally sleep by 7pm ish sleeps till 5am ish (sometimes will drop back off about 615am ish in very light sleep till 7) 5 to 530am wake ups means back to sleep at 730am 😂 so if she went sleep about 830pm a later morning potentially?

But then her naps potential of sleeping till like 6pm ish?

[CourtneyCox2021]

Sorry to hijack 🤦🏼‍♀️

[FATEdestiny]

Fatedestiny is this the same for a 5.5 month old I assume? Normally sleep by 7pm ish sleeps till 5am ish (sometimes will drop back off about 615am ish in very light sleep till 7) 5 to 530am wake ups means back to sleep at 730am 😂 so if she went sleep about 830pm a later morning potentially?

But then her naps potential of sleeping till like 6pm ish?

11h overnight sleep (with a 10-12h range) assumes a largely undisturbed night. Could have a wake up or three, but easy to settle back to sleep and no prolonged periods of time awake at night.

2-nap days, with wake windows of 234, assumes 15h sleep in 24h (so 11h night and 4h daytime, for example). So unless your 5 month old is sleeping 3-4h over two naps then I would consider it too early to drop to 2-nap days.

Instead I'd aim for wake windows of around double nap length, but never more than 2h. So more naps per day.

[MrsPelligrinoPetrichor]

He's been in bed a long time from 6.30, not surprising he's had enough by 5am even though it's a.killer. I had 3 years of it, no matter what we did he was just an early riser.

[CourtneyCox2021]

FATEDESTINY what's the 234? She has a dreamfeed about 11 ish. But no other disturbances. I know very lucky 🍀 but I have followed every bit of advice you have given on other talks and it's worked magically. Self settles etc. Except for naps are bit more need for input. She never used to be like this it was all your advise :)
She sleeps about 3 to 4 hours a day 🤷🏼‍♀️ for however long she needs...

[FATEdestiny]

FATEDESTINY what's the 234?

Daytime nap schedule for 2-nap days:
● 2h after waking in morning, be asleep for first nap
● 3h after waking from from first nap, be asleep for second nap
● 4h after waking from second nap, be asleep for bedtime.

It assumes 9h of awake time per day, so 15h sleep in 24h. There are many variations to arrange this. It might be

• 10h overnight, 2h AM nap, 3h PM nap
• 10h overnight, 2.5h AM nap, 2.5h PM nap
• 10h overnight, 1h AM nap, 4h PM nap
• 11h overnight, 1h AM nap, 3h PM nap
• 11h overnight, 2h AM nap, 2h PM nap
• 12h overnight, 1h AM nap, 2h PM nap
• 11h overnight, 1.5h AM nap,1.5h PM nap

(If one nap is longer than the other, make second nap longest)

[CourtneyCox2021]

Ohhhh I see... 🤔 That's good to know thank you. So I'm assuming when she starts to sleep consistently a lot longer on her morning and lunch time nap she goes down to 2 naps? When were out she only does short 45mins naps...

She majority does 3 hours with her first and second nap now. The 3rd she can sleep 30 mins to just over an hour. Usually finishing by 5/530pm.