Pre-5am wake-up call from 14 month old - HELP!

[WalkingDead02]

Morning all

I'm a long-time lurker and first-time poster. I have tried searching threads for advice but I really can't find anything that fits my situation, so I'm hoping someone can help or has some advice.

For the past 4 months or so now my 14 month old has started waking before 5am (normally around 4.30am, sometimes as early as 4am) full of beans and ready to start the day. In the hope that it was a phase I just went with it and carried on as normal.

After a few weeks it started taking its toll and showed no signs of improving, so began to explore the options as to why he was waking up so early.

At the moment he has 3 meals a day and snacks in between. He has 8oz of milk on waking and 8oz before bed. He's ALWAYS on the move during the day and constantly 'into' something. Bedtime is at 6.30pm and he goes down awake with minimal fuss (most of the time).

Here are a few things we have tried without success:
More/less food during the day (have also tried 'supper' about 30 minutes before bed)
Earlier/later bedtime (either still woke around 4.30am or earlier)
Making sure he is warm enough/not too warm
Tiring him out with crawling/walking around the house
Reducing day sleep

Absolutely nothing has worked. He is teething like a trooper but isnt crying during the night and doesn't seem particularly bothered during the day.

Does anyone have any advice? Or has anyone gone through this before?

Hi, this sounds painful. My son (now 2.5) sleeps fairly solidly now from 8.30pm to 7am, but I do remember him still waking quite a lot at 14 months (I was still breastfeeding then, which may have been part of the issue), including sometimes early in the morning (though he wasn't ever a dedicated early bird like your DS ).

You're probably already doing some of these, but here's what we found made things better:

• Lots of fresh air and outside time walking and crawling in the park or woods. Before DS could walk, he crawled and I put large dog paw protectors on his hands to protect them and so he couldn't eat leaves and stones. He absolutely loved crawling around in the grass and it really tired him out. I think people underestimate the amount of physical exercise this age group needs, especially if they are not walking yet and it's tempting just to keep them in the buggy (even more important now there's no toddler groups/soft play to tire them out!).
• Regular evening routine from 6pm with dinner, bath, bed, stories, teeth then lights out.
• Telling him when he woke up too early, "no, it's still sleep time, back to sleep".
• Toys/activity centre on the side of the cot to keep him busy if he did wake up. Often, he'd play for a few minutes then go back to sleep.
• Just not going into his room until 7am unless he was clearly upset. If he was just awake and chatting, we left him to it and often he went back to sleep.
• Blackout curtain over window.
• Weather-appropriate sleeping bag so he couldn't throw the blankets off and wake because he was cold. He's now got a duvet, though, and loves it but he's only had it for a couple of months.
• For the evening meal, definitely lots of protein. Scrambled eggs, omelette, baked beans, cheesy pasta with veg, three bean chilli all popular choices here.

What never improved things for us was cutting back on naps or later bedtime. He just got overtired and would wake up earlier in a bad mood.

Ugh much sympathy for you. My now 3 year old went through a (long) phase of this at the same age and I’m afraid it lasted until he was about 18 months old. Hated it so much. I do not have any good parenting tips to deal with it, but I used to put cartoons on my phone for him next to me and go back to sleep. Couldn’t cope with 4.30am. I’m normally very strict with screen time but bollocks to it all sometimes I say

Mine all went through a similar phase.

I’d say 6:30 is too early for a bedtime. Nhs recommend 11 hours of night sleep at 12 months www.nhs.uk/live-well/sleep-and-tiredness/how-much-sleep-do-kids-need/ which would be a 5:30 wake up (obv depends on naps and individual child) but they can get into the habit of waking earlier which is a killer.

At that age mine went at 7:30 or later, but shifting bedtime later is hard. I did the same as when the clocks shift. Try to change meal times first as your body uses them to set bedtime. So on day 1 have breakfast 15min later and other meals 1/2 hour later. Have bedtime 1/2 hour later too. Then move another 1/2 hour two days later. It can take a week to work so just take it slowly.

Also try to get good blackout blinds and have low light mornings and evenings. Your body also uses light to set circadian rhythms. If mine woke early then I’d put them in bed with me and try to doze a bit - no lights or activity or food until the right time.

Every baby is different but hopefully some of the tips here will help.