Toddler DD1 very tired but getting less sleep each day. Any ideas to reset her clock?

[TickledOnion]

DD1 moved from a cot to a big bed a week ago.

She goes to sleep OK (after a few problems for the first few nights), but she wakes in the middle of the night and comes into our room multiple times. I put her back and she goes without a fuss but then comes back in anything from 5 to 20 minutes later. This lasts at least 1 hour then she goes back to sleep.

She has also started waking in the morning earlier each day. She used to wake after 7, today it was 5.45.

Also she now refuses to nap unless she is in the car or buggy. We can transfer her from the car to the bed which makes things easier, but she won't nap at nursery so only naps max 3 days a week.

She seems tired and grumpy all the time understandably, but we can't seem to work out what to do to help her. We've been putting her to bed 30 mins earlier, but that hasn't made much difference. We used to limit her naps to 1 hour, but perhaps on the days she manages to nap I should let her go as long as possible.

Does anyone have any good ideas that might help?

Interesting as my daughter has started waking early despite having no naps (generally). She has been ill and I think is going through a growth spurt so I'm aware these things can of course affect sleep. We only used to have early waking problems when she was napping too much in the day and I was always able to resolve them by reducing her daytime sleep.

My concern is that her sleep 'deficit' continues to grow and she is clearly irritable a couple of hours after waking. I've decided to get her to nap if this is the case and just leave her as long as she needs in the hope that she will catch up. I'd take your LO out in the car if this will encourage her to sleep. Overtiredness is a major cause of waking early and waking in the night.

Having said that, your DD has just gone through a major change of going into her bed which mine hasn't so the causes are probably different for each of us. You could try putting her back into her cot if you think she's unsettled by the bed - a lot of children go through this - and then try again in a couple of months.

How old is she? DS is 2.5 and naps once a day.

Regardless of early wakings or bedtime trouble, we always give him a nap as he goes down for that pretty easily at 1pm and the last few months it feels like he should drop it but he goes back to sleeping properly again.

I'd go for a much earlier bedtime - an hour earlier and try giving a sip of camomile tea after tea.

Also what time are naps? If we nap much after 1 (even 15 mins), it's difficult to get ds to sleep as he gets a second wind (then crashes a bit later).

Moving into a bed didn't make him wake early or stop napping but did take ages to settle at bedtime and he'd wake at night as he'd fall out.

Thanks for the replies.
She had a nap yesterday and ended up having nearly 2 hours.
However, it took 40 mins of putting her back to bed at bed time. Followed by about 10 trips into our room from 1 to 2:30. Each time I put her back and she went without a problem only to come back 10 mins later. Then she woke at 5:45. Put her back once then DH got up with her and took her downstairs.
Luckily 8 week old DD1 (and DH) slept through the night despite the interruptions!

She used to have quite late afternoon naps which didn't affect her going to sleep at all, but maybe this has changed. She's at nursery today so probably won't nap at all. I'll keep trying longer earlier naps over the next few days and see if that helps.

She is 2.5.

My DD is 2.6 and I think we've almost seen the end of daytime naps. She does still nap in the car if we're out in the afternoon, but that would usually be after a particularly busy morning of dog walking or running about. If she hasn't napped and is obviously tired, I do a really early bedtime, as early as 6pm if necessary and it doesn't seem to affect how early she wakes in the morning. In fact, just like when she was younger, she wakes earlier if she goes to bed too late.

Agree with belinda about early bedtimes. If my DD is really tired, it works against us to keep her up until usual bedtime of 7pm. I'll put her down at 6.30pm and this rarely (if ever) affects her morning wake up time - it usually extends it.

I might try a really early bedtime tonight as she won't have had a nap. I never thought of doing that.

At about 18 months, she started waking up earlier and we restricted her nap to 1 hour and put her to bed 30 mins later. This worked really well up until recently.

Seems odd to have to do the opposite, but hopefully it will just be temporary until she can catch up with her sleep.

It was probably the combination of cutting her nap and putting to bed earlier that worked. She wasn't having too much daytime sleep and she also wasn't going to bed overtired, both of which can cause early waking. I don't count the early bed as extra daytime sleep, it doesn't seem to affect them in the same way.

Getting a bit desperate now.

Thursday night had just 2 visits to our room then awake at 5.30. That day she had a 30 min nap (3-3.30) and an early bedtime (6.50).

Then yesterday she had a 2 hour nap (1-3) then a very late bedtime (9.30) as we were out at MILs. She then woke up and came into our room about 20 times between 1 and 4. Slept till 7.

Had a 1h30 nap today (2-3.30) Struggled to go to bed tonight. Put her down at 7, eventually went to sleep at 8. Not looking forward to tonight.

It doesn't help that everyone thinks I am doing the wrong thing by giving her more sleep in the day.