gro clocks - do they work? and if so, what age?

[Kveta]

2.4 yo DS is being a bloody nightmare at the moment, up and down like a yo-yo all night, and normally ends up in with us by 4am, whereupon he kicks and chatters until we give up and get up. We are trying to work out how to get him to stay in his bed without the use of restraints...

Currently, he goes to bed between 6.30 and 7, and after we leave him to sleep, we often have to return him to bed 2 or 3 times, and he is asleep by 8 (8.30 on a bad night). (we tried a later bed time, but he was KNACKERED, so he does need to be in bed by 7, whether he likes it or not). For the past month or two, he has been waking at 2 and 4, and walking into our room. DH returns him to his bed, and sometimes he'll go back down, more often he won't.

We are redecorating his room just now, but only started that this past weekend, so it's not an excuse, but it won't be finished until the end of the month, so we will hold off on any new regimes until then.

We did the gradual withdrawal method of getting him to self settle last september, and it was brilliant, he slept really well for a couple of months (and DH and I got some much needed respite, so stupidly we are now expecting DC2 in June!! ), but we tried it again for the past fortnight to no avail.

No obvious teething or other issues, he eats well, spends a lot of time running about being active, and has some days with no TV on at all, so can't blame that. His room is warm enough, he has a duvet, comfy mattress, night light (GroEgg), NO excuses.

anyway, it's too late to cut a long story short, but do you use a groclock? if so, does it work?

and what age did it work from?

other methods to get a toddler to stay put would be much appreciated too!!

We have one and it worked/s really well with DD although we did start using it before she went into a bed. Initially, when she was in her cot, she used to wake up and call us even when it showed nighttime but we kept telling her she had to wait for Mr Sunshine and eventually she got the hang of it. I can't remember how old she was when we started using it but she moved into her bed at 2.2 so a while before that.

Now, it works a treat and she does call out if somethings wrong but doesn't get up in the morning until she sees the sunshine.

My method's probably not that helpful to you though as your DS is already in a bed!

We got DS one at around that age. He's now nearly 4 and it still holds its magic. Best £20 I spent! He went from getting up at 6 to getting up at 7 - not a single issue (I did it in 10 minute increments over a couple of weeks)

I couldn't get it to work on DS. We bought it when he was 3.3 and gave up sadly when he was 4.6 .

In all that time not a single trick worked, bribes, rewards, shouting......

He's 5.3 now and stays in bed until 7 most days.

I got DS one last month (he turned 5 on wed) and it seems to be working

I've not pushed my luck too much, have it set for 6am- usually he was up anytime between 4.45 and 5am.

He still calls me sometimes, but I growl tell him to wait until the sun is there.

I love it I do.

Any chance he is cold temp drops in the night, we discovered this was the prob with our DD , her room is over the hallway which is coldest place in the house we now have an oil filled radiator there to keep the temp constant and it has stopped the night waking

Worked like a dream here. DD1 is two and now understands that she has to stay in bed until the sun comes up. We did have to keep putting her back in her room with a few tears in the beginning until she got he idea but not she says night night to the sun and runs in saying sun is up

I got one for twin DSs when they were 2.5 and we moved them to big boy beds. Until then we knew they would wake early but just chat to each other from their cots. We didn't want them coming into our room before we were fully ready for the arrival of Hurricane Boy.

I think it helped that I read the story that comes free with the clock, to explain that getting up too early isn't a good idea. Now they are still, 6 months later, excited every morning & shout 'the sun is up! The sun! The sun! Wakey wakey mummy!'

We set it for 8am weekdays, 8.30 weekends

We tried one for DS1. Disaster. He wasn't a super early riser at the time, maybe 6 - 6.30ish, and I was hoping for 7. He was about 2.6. He loved the gro-clock. On the 2 nights we used it, he got up all fricking night. He turned up in our bedroom about every hour, to announce "It still nighttime mummy. [7/6/5/4/3 etc] stars shining. Mr sun not up yet. DS1 go back to sleep now". I think he sat awake from about 4am waiting for the "sun" to come up. We ditched it after those 2 nights - sleeping 7 - 6am suddenly seemed pretty good compared to the numerous night wakings that the gro-clock induced . Having discussed this with my friends, however, most people seem to really like the gro-clock, I haven't yet found anyone else who has had our experience!

thank you for all the comments!

We had a minor success over the weekend, when we removed his dummy. Friday night he struggled to self settle, saturday, bit less, sunday was down within 30 minutes, and he slept 7.30-7!! So we will see if that is all it needed. I suspect not, and we will no doubt end up trying the gro-clock in a few weeks time :o

Got one for DS when he was about 2.9 and I was pg and knackered. He learnt how to over ride it it in 3 days and then came in every night - 5am ish - for a fortnight to show me that it wasn't morning time yet I put it on a high shelf, and he piled everything up to try and get it down. Worse than useless.

We introduced a Gro-clock when DS1 was around 3 years old and he gradually got the hang of it and we kept reinforcing that he needed to stay in bed until the sun comes up. It took a few months though for him to adhere to that regularly and we'd get a little visitor at 6 or whatever time he woke. Now, aged 4, he's really proud of the fact that he stays in bed until the sun comes up. If only his little brother was so well behaved sigh

We got one for DD aged 2.3 and 3 months later it has transformed our mornings! She comes in and says " the sun has come up on my clock" just after 7, vast improvement from 5am which we were having...shame DS is waking every 2 hours...

Anyway, you can lock it so in theory they cant change the time/override it or whatever. We didnt the first night and DD found out immediately how to make the sun come on...but with the lock bit she hasnt twigged it yet, although it isnt hard so older ones might be able to. Also if you unplug it it loses your settings so they can override it that way, so good to put on a high shelf, as others have suggested.

We got one for dd when she moved into a bed around the 2yr mark. Bloody marvelous it is. She occasionally gets up too early but rarely now.

The groclock can also be used for daytime naps. I can send dd up to her room, set the groclock for half an hour and tell her she can either sleep, read or play quietly and not come back until her clock goes yellow. It's brilliant. It buys me half an hour with DS (4mo) which I currently use to feed him. In time i'll put him down for a nap then too and i'll have half an hour to do stuff which is fantastic.

Sorry to resurrect an old thread but can't see a new one. Would it work for DS, and what time should I set it for? He wakes any time from 5am-6:15, usually the earlier end of that timescale. Am going to order a gro clock today after yet another fucking 5am start but was wondering about what time to set it for? Would it wake him if the 'sun comes up' before he wakes naturally? Was thinking trying a 6am sun time but if he wakes at 5, that's a long time to expect him to wait for the sun and he will have shouted the house down by then. He's 2.7 btw