Early EARLY starts

[Snowsister]

DS2 is 17 mo and has finally started "sleeping through" from 7pm until 4am which is fantastic but a very very early start for us.

We have tried everything but he will not go back to sleep after this time.
We have tried putting him to bed later than 7pm but he still wakes up between 4 and 430am.
We tried bf and then resettling.
Milk from a cup then resettling.
Rocking and resettling.
Ignoring him for up to 40 mins (very hard he screams the place down)
What else can we do?

He is up and running around from 4am until 7am when DS1 (4yo) wakes up.

Its hard to find things to do during this time that are not too noisy. The days Im home he naps from 8am until 845am when I do school run. the days he is at childminder he has no morning nap and then 1hr or so after lunch. At home he naps for up to 2 hrs. He is exhausted by 5pm.

Any suggestions?

2 hours 45 mintues seems like a lot for a 17 month old. Have you tried reducing his daytime naps? Think if he was mine I'd be limiting him to one nap of 45 mins to an hour or cutting them out completely.

Have you read this book? We used the one for babies and it was very good.

Hiya hun

(((hugs))) for the EW. I have truly been there. My DS has also been an EW'er for most of his life.

When he's at home with you, what time does he take his second nap? And did I read right that he takes 45mins nap in the morning & 2hrs in the afternoon on the days he's at home?

How many days is he at the CM each week?

Well hun, there's no easy answer to dealing with this. I think he probably needs rid of the morning nap that you are giving him at home at 8am. One of the biggest causes of EW can be offering a too early & too long morning nap. His is most definitely too early. And trust me I know exactly why you do it, b/c he is tired from waking early. I did the very same thing with my DS. But unfortunately, offering the nap early will mean he can use that morning nap to catch up on what he missed at night, & he will therefore continue to wake early.

However, pushing him straight to 1 nap from a 4-4.30am WU will be very very difficult for him b/c that's a really long time to expect him to stay awake. I expect this is why he's only napping for 1hr with the CM - b/c he's waaay overtired by naptime. Getting OT like this can in itself cause EW too.

If you can answer my questions I think I can help you with a plan. I have done this & it is not easy, but it does work.

It involves pushing that AM nap gradually later, & shortening it, until it is just a short 10min catnap at around 10am, which will help him last until his big nap in the afternoon. This should help to bring his wakeup a bit later, which in turn should help you to drop the AM nap completely. In the mean time, on days at the CM, would she agree to doing a very short CN in the AM (say in the pushchair if she has activities to go to?) so he has a consistent routine all week? Or if she can't do the CN could she put him down for his nap a bit earlier say 11.30-12? Again if she can't & he does a short nap of less than 2hrs then early bedtime is always a good idea to help prevent OT. At the moment he is going to bed at 7pm & waking at 4-4.30. If he only naps 1hr at CM's & you put him to bed at 6 or 6.30, ok, he may still wake at 4-4.30am but he'll have had 1hrs extra sleep IYSWIM? Or he might surprise you & sleep for longer. I know my DS will often do his longest nights after an early bedtime.

Hi. Sorry to hijack the thread OP but just wondering omama if you think pushing forward morning nap would also help with a much younger baby? My DD is nearly 4 months and tends to sleep from 730/830 through till 4/5 with two feeds in between. Number of feeds fine,was much worse during recent sleep regression,but early starts are horrific! She tends to fall asleep again for nap about 1&1/2-2&1/2 hours after waking.

ds was much the same. i personally found that messing around with naps and bedtimes never made any difference except to make me even more tired as i was missing out on his naptimes.

one thought of consolation the next clock change will mean that your child's internal clock wirings will be a bit more fitting with the clock that you're working on. re: he'll be waking at 5am and you could put him down at 8pm (clockwise but same time for him internally itms) so you'll start winning an hour anyway. then when those naps naturally start to drop it may start getting even better.

ds just got up - this is a big lay in for him (he's nearly 5 now). i remember 5am wakings for a long time. must be tough with another child i was lucky he was my only one.

Thanks for your replies and suggestions.

Last night DS2 woke at 3.20am and screamed to get UP.

I gave him milk in a cup and a cuddle put him back down.
He screamed until 4am.
I gave him more milk and a cuddle and a rock. I could see he was still sleepy.
He then went back to sleep until 6.15!!! progress

omama I think you are right about the naps. We have to cut down on them. So plan is to drop the morning nap today since he slept until 6.15am, and limit the lunchtime nap to 1.5hrs and go earlier on the bedtime to 6.30pm.

Will let you know how we get on.

Snow that sounds like good progress and a good plan .

Ok. So we did as planned. DS2 went to sleep straight away at 6.30pm.
Woke up at 11.30pm. Screamed for 10 mins, went in and gave him milk and a cuddle. Back down by midnight.

Few rumbles around 2am, ignored. DS1 woke up and wet the bed . Up changed bed. Everyone back down until 5.15am!

Is this progress? Im knackered today!

Well 5.15 sounds much better than 4am, although it might not feel like much progress. Lets hope its a bit later tomorrow .

True its over an extra hour isnt it. He only had 1.5hr nap at lunch again today and straight down at 6.30pm.

DS1 back in a pull up tonight.

not long till the clocks go forward so any progress you've made will be aided by that. well done so far.

Hi

I don't have any suggestions, i'm afraid, but just wanted you to know you're not alone. Our DS has been a habitual early waker since he started sleeping through at about 6-7 months. He's nearly 17 months now and we had a couple of months respite at the end of the summer when he would regularly sleep to 6, with the odd 7 thrown in here and there (we still had some 5.30 starts though), but now he's back to regularly waking between 4.30 and 5.30 every day.

We are battling some serious separation anxiety issues as well. After three weeks of patient 'withdrawal' he's finally able to go down to sleep at start of night on his own (and just about for naps), but if he wakes up in night or early morning he will scream and scream until one of us goes in and sits with him. Our naps have gone up the wall at the same time. He used to regularly nap for 15 mins in morning and 2 hours in pm (with no am nap on nursery days) we're now lucky if we can get an hour out of him in afternoon. We've been trying to drop morning nap all together, but it is impossible with a start earlier than 6am, so we've taken to let him have 15 mins max in the buggy at around 10. Sometimes getting him to 10 is a nightmare though!

He's back at nursery 4 days a week this week and that isn't helping either as his sleep is all over the place there! He's a real handful in the morning while we're trying to get ready to get out the house as he is already tired by 7am (which is causing us all major stress)!!

Oh well - I keep telling myself that it will get better eventually, but it's hard. Must be v difficult for you with 2.

I might try the earlier bedtime and see if that helps - but it means DH won't really see him after work which is pretty horrid for both of them.

How did it go last night?

One of the things in the [[http://www.amazon.co.uk/No-Cry-Sleep-Solution-Toddlers-Preschoolers/dp/0071444912/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1325430733&sr=8-6 No Cry Sleep Solution is keeping a sleep log so that you can see how much they have actually slept. It makes your progress easier to spot. It might be worth seeing if your library has a copy.

No Cry Sleep Solution .

Think I had better leave MN for now before I make anymore silly mistakes.

Thanks JJJ. I will head to the library at the weekend and see if I can pick up a copy.

Well things are improving marginally. Last night he slept from 6.30pm until 4.50am. I gave him milk and he got up just after 5. The night before he woke at 4 but went back down until 5.15.

Naps today have been messed up as he fell asleep in the pushchair when I was picking up DS1 from nursery at 12. Came home and put him down at 12.30 and he has resisted. Left him til 1, he fell asleep and then woke up 20 mins later. Am leaving him for 20 mins or so to see if he will settle again as I make that a total of 20mins and 20mins = 40, not really enough to get him through until bedtime.

sigh.

Em, thats our problem too, getting him to lunchtime without a meltdown! Just keep thinking at least he is sleeping through, (up until recently ds2 was waking up at 12, 2, 4am.. Its just so hard to know what to do with them at 4am, its dark, they cant use noisy toys etc.. and its 3 hours until breakfast..

It is hard and I do really feel for you. With our library you can search titles online so that might be worth looking into.

The book is good but its not a quick fix.

As for naps today, how have you fitted lunch in around that?

He had lunch at 1130. He is sleeping now, Im going to wake him up at 2.30, he will have had 1.5hrs then.

Plan is bed at 6.30pm again. The earlier bed and limited naps continue!

Think i'd be really tempted to wake him now. An hour should be enough if he is waking so early.

OK Im waking him now. Thanks for your support.

How did the waking up go? Hope he isn't too miserable.

He was ok, bit dozy but I gave him milk and a snack and he was cheerful enough. Wrapped both boys up and spent time running around the garden this afternoon.
Fingers crossed for a nice long sleep tonight.

Update: last night he slept 6.30pm until 5.00am

Five is early but just sounds so much better than 4, which to me is the middle of the night. Hope he is still doing it and 5 will mean 6 in a few weeks

only just reading this update but IIWM I wouldn't push him straight to 1 nap AND cap it to 1 or 1.5hrs from the outset, as the jump to 1 nap in itself will make him OT - if you start cutting the nap too this could wind up making him reeeally OT. Plus you wont know whether pushing to 1 nap has actually helped or not b/c you've made 2 changes at once IYSWIM? I would more aim for 1 nap & let him sleep for nearer to 2hrs. Stay consistent with your naptime for a couple of weeks & use EBT if he does a short nap of 1.5hrs or less & he will adjust.

Then over time you can gradually push the nap to 12.30 & push BT back to 7pm (or a wee bit later if needed). Once you have the nap & BT at the right time, if he is STILL waking early, THEN you can start to trim the nap down b/c you will know for sure its needed.

I've recently done this with my LO who was napping 11am-1pm, bed at 6.30/7 & has lately started waking at 5/5.30 & I felt sure he needed his nap cutting. I've pushed the nap later by 15mins/week until its 12-2, he's going to bed at 7.15pm every night & he's been sleeping in til 7am & I'm amazed! He's 16.5months

Good luck hun.

When my DS was going from two naps to one, at about 13 months, it took me a while to realise that the nap could be before lunch. So for quite a while his nap has generally been something like 11.30-1pm, or even 11-12.30. We discovered that so long as he didn't wake before 12 he could go through for the rest of the day. We tried to keep him going till 11am if at all possible. He's now almost 18 months and the nap is creeping later - we find it hard to get him down before lunch as he gets too hungry so it's now more like 1-2.30. Could you try to get him down for a long nap at 10.30am - resettle if necessary when he wakes - and then push that later?

Thanks for those suggestions.

Omama I think he is now used to the one nap, and as he is (mostly) sleeping a bit later he is able to go through until lunchtime without a morning nap. That was in response to your suggestions further up the thread so a big thanks for your advice.

woodlands the days he is with CM he goes down at 12, the days he is with me we have to pick up DS1 at 12 so the nap has to be later. Do you think the later nap is better? I could ask CM to do that too.

Last night he slept 6.30pm-4.20am, I gave him milk feed and then he went back until 6.30am

We were at friends this morning and he was fine all morning, not tired at all, so he didnt go down until 1pm for his nap by time we had picked up his brother had lunch etc.

He is asleep now. Plan to wake him at 2.30pm.