To dread winter with my toddler?

[Summermeadowflowers]

Since DS started sleeping through, which was around 18 months, he’s woken early and this is often around 530. Tweaking bedtimes and naps doesn’t seem to make any difference to this. Sometimes he’ll have a spate of 630-7 wakeups but then will start waking earlier and earlier until you’re back at 530, or earlier.

It was miserable enough last winter but now we have a baby as well. Last night I woke to express milk at 230. Then DD woke at 330, I got her settled again at 4, then bloody DS woke at half five.

DH does take him when he can but if he’s working away or even if he’s in the office he has to leave at just before 7. It’s the longest morning ever before we can go out then we go out somewhere then DS gets really tired and stroppy in the afternoons because he is so tired.

No point to this, just a moan. I do love DS very much but I hate this particular habit he has so much, and I worry about DD as it inevitably disturbs her and the last thing I want is her being in this awful pattern too.

That sounds really hard. How old is your ds? Does he still nap? But I’m glad to hear that your dh is the one getting up with him whenever he can. And that should be as much as possible to help you eke out as much rest as you can for the day ahead.

I think I'm missing something, but what's winter got to do with it?

Sympathies OP, my first DD was like this and I remember the dark mornings being up at what felt like (and still sometimes was) the middle of the night.

Could you maybe prep some activities the night before ready?

Looking back my mistakes were riding it out feeling like I was waiting for it to be 7am, which psychologically put me in ‘this is a massive hardship’ mindset. Now I’d be more ‘good morning, what shall we do with this extra hour together that we have?’

It’s a trick of the mind which works for me. Like with newborn DC2 I changed night feeds from ‘let’s get you back to sleep’ to giving him loads of kisses and ‘let’s spend a lovely hour in the quiet nighttime house together.’

It night not be the same for you but for me it changed everything, I stopped feeling like I was surviving / failing to get them to do the thing I wanted them to do.

Xx

It’s the ‘when he can’ - that’s not often. I just put that in there to explain the issue is my toddler not DH! (I’m not suggesting DS does it on purpose.)

Naps are variable. He doesn’t nap with me really although he will nod off in the car and this is where it can be a real nuisance if you want a day out. But he does nap at nursery (three days a week) for about an hour. Naps have never made any real difference to his wake up time though.

Early starts are so much worse in the dark!

Dark mornings, dark evenings. Cold, wet and dark means more time spent indoors with two little ones.

How old is he OP?

@Nopenopenopenopenopenope its really bleak and cold and miserable being up at half five on a dark winter morning. Ten times worse than summer. But you’re right in a way, it’s crap winter or summer! I just find I have to be a lot more inventive when it comes to keeping DS entertained in the winter and is a VERY long day when I have a solid fourteen hours of him, particularly when the weather is bad.

@NuffSaidSam he is three in December. DD is 10 weeks so I know I’m really in the thick of it. Hopefully this is the last winter this will be an issue <prays>

Why are you waking yourself up at 2.30am to express milk? This is something I did when DD was in NICU but I can’t understand why you’d do it otherwise?

Leaving that aside… yes early mornings are soul destroying especially in the dark. I never found a solution but definitely DH should do them when he can, you’ll have been up in the night with the baby.

Ok, so old enough to introduce a gro-clock!

Get one immediately and enforce its use. Start with a very short period, maybe 10 minutes and increase from there. I don't think you'll get to 7am, but 6am or even 6:30am is probably doable.

He’d never understand a Gro clock @NuffSaidSam , honestly. And even if he did he wouldn’t comply with it. I’m hoping he may understand next winter but he wouldn’t just at the moment.

And @minipie - it’s her milk, we never really got the hang of breastfeeding.

I feel your pain! My toddler is an early riser and I have a baby too.

Have you tried getting him to play in your room for a bit in the mornings? I rotate a couple of toys that are only available to play with in the mornings (to keep them exciting) and make sure I have a drink at the ready… that usually buys me a bit of dozing time.

I don't think it's a habit, sadly - I've got a 21-month-old who sleeps until 6:30 but seems to be an absolute anomaly, his baby friends are up at 5 or 5:30, and most people at baby groups seem to say the same; especially when they sleep through. Shifting bedtimes does usually work but it has to be a pretty drastic change, 30 minutes doesn't tend to do much - you basically need to work out how much sleep he needs and work from there.

So if right now he's going to bed at 8pm and waking at 5:30, he naturally needs 9.5 hours sleep; so to get him to wake at 7am, you'd do bedtime at 9:30pm. You'd need to nudge that back by 15 minutes or so a day if he struggles, but then you should get a later morning. That does sacrifice an evening, though; and if he's a natural early riser, he may have a cut off that he won't sleep past anyway. You'd think need to take into account that on nursery days, he's already had 1 hour of sleep, so then he only needs 8.5 hours overnight... It works well but it takes some keeping track of.

Otherwise, it is rough, but almost every toddler owner is doing the same thing.

Do you need to express in the night? If you can avoid that and give yourself more sleep, I'd do that. If not, I hope that's an option soon x

Plenty of toddler just wake at 5:30.
All you can do is stop framing it as a “bad habit” and just accept it. Go to bed earlier particularly while you are getting up in the night with the baby.

Are there SN at play as well?

Oh Op, I feel for you. I had this age gap and a similar early riser with the elder when you just want to sleeeeep! Trying to remember what I did. I think I did TV first thing while I made coffee etc then sometimes I would make him a big bubble bath with loads of toys. Does yours like the bath? All the while I was feeding the little one or she was snoozing. I used to try and leave the house by 10.30 for a good walk with the buggy/newborn in sling and go to a cheap stay and play, the playground or long walk and cafe. Luckily I was near a massive westfield shopping mall and that was good for a wet morning (John Lewis cafe and they had a little play area).

I found once I was home for lunch I had ‘broken the back of the day’ and it felt more manageable. Luckily my older one would nap in his cot in the afternoon which gave me a break.

hang in there as it does get better. I made a bit of a routine (out by 10ish) and had a list of things to go to each day (library rhyme time was a big one!) but luckily my newborn wasn’t colicky or anything too difficult so she tagged along.

i know some may not agree but for early mornings something nice and calm on a screen to watch will start the day slowly then you can have breakfast etc and plan a nice autumn/winter walk to burn off some energy, we found that mental stimulation, fresh air exercise and naps in the fresh air improved night sleep so much.

I used to make ‘busy boxes’ each week for the week ahead for days dh was at work so that my ds had a shoebox full of ‘stuff’ to do each day, sometimes nothing really fancy just stuff I had (eg one day I put in silicone cake cases, paper cake cases, plastic dough cutters, a mini rolling pin, a plastic egg timer then some crayons and paper I’d cut into different shapes , another day I put in some different squares of material and toilet roll tubes I’d painted and he would match them up just stuff that would keep him occupied for 1-2 hours)

Id set up his little table with an activity like puzzles or play dough each night too so there was always something to do

I had a double buggy so we would go to the park wrapped up and then he would run about and I’d time it so he would nap on the way home as the fresh air helped so much .

Another idea if you can afford It is nursery for a couple of days a week and get a cleaner so you get a real break !

Don’t know about OP but DD couldn’t latch and I had low supply so I had to express milk 8 times a day. Looking back it was absolute madness, through the night I was either feeding her, making up formula, sterilising things, changing her, pumping, or rocking her back to sleep so I basically didn’t sleep for the first few months. But pumping at night does do wonders for supply.

Very few toddlers will magically follow a gro clock - it's something you have to be firm with and keep referring to until they do get it. My toddler wakes just before 6 every day but I make her get into bed with us even though she wants to get up. She lies in the dark and wriggles; occasionally she will go back to sleep but not always. I don't get any more sleep but it's making the point it's not time to get up yet and we're not getting up early so that we can switch the TV on. My older child was the same and they do eventually figure it out.

@Bubop - we do have some toys up here, it’s just he’s so loud 😩 he does love a crashing, bashing, sort of game!

@YouveGotAFastCar - it honestly makes no difference what time he goes to bed. I think actually the later he goes to bed the more likely he is to wake ridiculously early. Bedtime used to be 7 but it’s been between 730-8 for months. For a while he was waking 630-7 and I was so happy but then it was edging earlier and now we’re back where we started. Waking 530 and going to bed at 930 and no nap - that’s way too little sleep even for toddlers who don’t need much sleep.

@Hufflepods I go when DD does, I can’t do much more really. But even if you go to bed at 630 in the evening 530 on a winter morning isn’t much fun. It isn’t just about lack of sleep, it’s also a very very long day.

@NuffSaidSam who knows at this stage? Hopefully not but he wouldn’t comply with a Gro clock, I know that much. All that would happen is that he would cry until the sun came up.

The only thing I can say is that they work through their various phases, and gradually it gets easier and you get a bit more sleep. I always found that stretch from 4-7pm very difficult in winter, we looked like such weirdos playing in a totally dark playground.

Anyway, the Gro clock won’t work. If you do a search on here you’ll find plenty of NT toddlers don’t comply with Gro clocks so it would be good if the thread didn’t descend into just that. I know it works brilliantly for some but it just won’t here. For one thing, DS always wakes up crying - I suspect because he’s still tired - there is absolutely no reasoning with him when he’s like that, you just can’t get through to him at all. Telling him no, wait for the sun or whatever would just get him hysterical.

I would give the Gro Clock a try, started using it around 2.5y with DD and over time they do get it. The other thing you could try is audio books/music to keep him in bed and happy? We have a Yoto player and it's great - you can cap the volume for whatever you decide nighttime hours are so it wouldn't disturb the rest of the household. Tonie boxes also look good but I think they'd grow out of them quicker so a Yoto was a good long term investment for us. Plus cheaper in the long run as you can make your own cards.