Very early waking

[Timmsy]

My 8 month old has always been an early waker (around 6 am) but is now waking at 4 when the dawn corus starts. I'm at my wits end. I was happy with 6 as she goes to bed at 6 and we get up early anyway but 4 is just horrible. We have tried black out blinds etc. but nothing seems to work. I now go to bed at 9 in order to get enough sleep.
Sometimes she'll go back to sleep if I rock her in her pram for a bit (I usually leave her murmering in her cot for about half an hour first before she gets grumpy) but by 5/5:30 she's wide awake. I've tried pushing her bedtime until later but it doesn't seem to make any difference. I do think babies are very in tune with the seasons. I'm sure she'll wake later when dawn breaks later but if anyone has any ideas then I'd love to hear them.

I'd like to hear them too - mine 8month dd goes to sleep at about 6.45pm and then can wake anywhere from 5.30-6-30am. I'm thrilled that she does sleep that much, but would love to be able to get her through to 7am. At the moment I leave her chatting away to herself in her cot until I get up, but the noise wakes me. (Lazy mummy!) I think she gets uncomfortable in her sleeping bag, I always find her contorted like a circus performer in the mornings.
Sorry to hijack Timmsy. Hopefully help will arrive

x

Hmmmm we had similar problems with our ds at 18 months, but it's a different story then because they can understand things (well, some things).

I read a brilliant book called something like "Solving your child's sleep problems" and it recommended going in when they cried, but just saying firmly "Go back to sleep, it's night time". Obviously this will provoke a major league tantrum in a child old enough to understand it, but you just ignore this and walk out, then go back in after a certain time and repeat the procedure. It DID work after 3 days, which is exactly what the book said it would do.

I don't think this would work for an 8 month old, and I don't really know what you can do other than cutting down on daytime sleeps. You say you've already got black out blinds - have you totally blacked out the edges of the windows or are there gaps? We had to use blackout curtains as well.

Hi Timmsy. Could she be hungry when she wakes? Do you think she would go back to sleep if you gave her a bottle/bf?

Might be a bit obvious, but putting her to bed later (moving her daytime naps, meals and bedtime accordingly) should help, I'd think.