Early Riser

[haggered]

Need help - advise.
My Ds is now 3.5 and been waking up between 5.00 and 5.30 since birth !! goes down at 7.15 pm now lasts most of the day without nap ( I am keeping him on a 20 min max) Doctors say try Phenergan but I dont really want to try that route as getting him off at night isnt the problem !. Any ideas ( I have read through old threads no joy )

Do you have blackout blinds, and cut out as much daylight as possible coming into his room?

Also, can you bear to extend his bedtime at all, say 8:00 p.m. (which has always been ds's bedtime, he's nearly 6 now). Just keep him up 5 minutes a night longer, over each night in a week, see if that extends the time in the morning.

Ours has always tended to rise early (unlike us) and we did manage to extend it to nearly 7:15 !!

However, we have now tried for no trainer pants, and his bladder seems to wake him at 6:10, so we're not that chuffed. We're going on hols soon, all sharing a room, so I can see some frayed tempers on the horizon re mornings.

For DS1's 3rd birthday bought him a digital CD / radio thing, set it for 7am and told him he couldn't leave his room until the music came on, turned out he is deaf so couldn't hear the music (a different story) but he did learn to recognise seven, nought, nought on the clock. He is now pretty reliable about not coming into our room until his clock says seven o'clock. He is often awake, but I can even hear him telling his sister(2) its not 7 o'clock yet so she can't get up. He is 4.

I'm having the same problem with my 19month old - bizarrely, one of the pieces of advice given frequently is to put them to bed earlier!

I'm seeing postings on other boards to state that it does work. I haven't tried it yet, but certainly a later bedtime for mine makes no difference, so will try putting him down at 6.30 for a night or two. Can't hurt I guess!

The other thing you could try is 'wake to sleep' by the babywhisperer. About an hour before they would normally wake, you disturb them a bit to bring them out of deep sleep. They then go back to sleep and the disturbance helps to re-set their sleep cycle and help them sleep later. I did it for my dd when she started waking at 5.30am after normally sleeping till 6.30/7am. She was still in the cot so I disturbed her by changing her nappy while she was still asleep. She moaned and shifted about (and turned onto her tummy, which wasnt helpful!) but didnt fully wake. She started waking at her normal time again. Its advised to try it for 3 nights but it can work in 1.

I fought with this problem for over a year with my son, now 23 months. The thing that made the biggest difference was the blackout blinds. Easyblinds.co.uk make blinds that don't let in any light at all, and I'm sure it confused my ds into sleeping later. That along with the kiss and retreat method means my ds now wakes up at 7.30-8am! I am now a believer in miracles!!! If you want any more info on any of this, let me know, I can sympathise with your situation entirely!

jerikaka - how can i do this with a 3 month old thinks 5.30 is an acceptable time to start the day?

I wouldn't like to say with a 3 month old. I find it hard to remember what my ds was doing at that age. I can tell you what I have done with my ds though.
If you have heard of the kiss and retreat method, it works really well and is great for those who aren't so keen on the controlled crying method. It took me a while to get the hang of it as my health visitor only gave me sketchy information about it. I think you have to work it round to suit your own child as well. The aim is to reassure your child that they should stay in their bed/cot without them getting too upset. You start off by going in and rubbing their back/head (whatever comforts them) and saying something along the lines of "time for night nights". It really doesn't matter what you say, as long as it is the same thing every time. After they get used to that, you gradually remove the physical contact and just say to them "time for night nights". We got to the point where you don't actually go in the room, but say it from outside the door. We are just in the next room, so we can say it from lying in bed and he goes back to sleep. At the time which you have decided to get up with them (e.g. 7am) you go in and open the curtains (doesn't really matter what, but you have a specific morning routine like ou would a bed time routine) and start your day. Whatever you do, you shouldn't pick them up or give in to them, try and be as consistent as you can (which is very hard when you have had very little sleep!)
I really don't know if this would work with a 3 month old. My ds was still wanting a feed in the night at 8 months and getting up at 4.30 - 5am every day for a year or so. My health visitor told me that babies sleep and eat when they want to. Don't entirely agree with that anymore, and I definitely would not do the same with my next baby. It's only now he is nearly 2yrs, that I have got him to the point of sleeping 12 hours!
Dr Richard Ferber does a great book called "How to solve your childs sleep problems". I can highly recommend that, as he recommends moving my the morning nap further into the day which did help him sleep longer, though that didn't really help when the mornings got lighter. The blackout blinds made the most amount of difference (i.e. no light in their room at all), but i think it was a combination of things that sorted it out.

God I jumped at this thread to see if I could get any clues to make ds2 sleep longer! Age 4 and up at 6-6.15am!! Need the toilet, what can I do......

One of the problems with getting my ds to sleep longer was a smelly nappy. Not sure which type of toilet you are referring to. If it is the same as my ds, then I tried moving his meal times around. All the books I read said to give them their main meal at lunch time, and jst carbohydrate at tea time, but i found the other way round with my son. He sleeps better and tends to do "it" at other times of the day if he has his main meal in the evening. I also feel that he has a fuller stomach when he goes to bed which could help him sleep better.
Nadene, and other parents of early risers, I forgot to mention that if you don't want to try going the whole hog til seven, you could try delay getting them up by 5 - 10 minutes every day and delaying their nap times by 5 - 10 minutes every day so that you adjust their body clock gradually. Anything is worth in my experience!

oops, anything is worth a try, is what I meant to say!

not really advise but my 2yr old is the same...I just thinnk he is an early riser and thats that...maybe when they can understand a bit more they will amuse themselves? Good luck with it! but if he goes down at 7:15 till 5amish thats a good stretch....I never found putting mine to bed later any help!

Oh GOD i am desperate!
4.30 yesterday, 4.15 this morning full of beans, absolutely raring to go.
Put him back several times, then we went downstairs for a warm drink of milk and we have been up since!
he has just gone down at 11.30 for a sleep.
We have put him in a big boy bed about 2 weeks ago....what am i going to do?(he is 2)

put him back in the cot!

dont just put him back several times - put him back as many times as you need to. I have done this for an hour or more when I've had to. If you give up too soon and take him away from the bedroom he will get the message that it is ok to get up at that time and will carry on with it. Altrnatively try wake to sleep as I described a couple of posts below.

Yes, you are right.
No good putting him back into the cot, we changed it because he climbs out and comes into us.
Think im going to put a stair gate across the door way and put him back 10000 times if necissary.
Wish me luck.....

Good luck. We tried putting our son in a big bed and gave up after 4 months as he got out of bed and kicked the door against the stair gate repeatedly! We ignored him hoping it would not reinfoce this behaviour, but no luck. Drove me bonkers!
It's only since we put him back in the cot that he's been sleeping longer. I don't want to put him back in the bed now, sure he's still going to be in his cot at 18yrs!

Well, I tried the earlier-to-bed routine and it worked for us!

We'd been operating on the theory that he's an active toddler and didn't need the sleep, but it seems the opposite was the case. Giving him a bottle at 5am was a mistake too, as it was reinforcing that early wakeup.
So we did this; not bottle or breakfast til 7am; no overly active afternoons for a while; earlier bedtime, between 6.30, 6.50pm.
At the moment, touchwood this lasts, he's getting up at 7.30am! It seems they get the message if you're consistent and determined...