If you did controlled crying what did you about early morning wakings?

[reddaisy]

I started CC with 7 month old DS last night and for the first time since he was born he went four whole hours without a feed which is amazing.

But what should I do when he wakea up at 5am? I bfed him and then left hoping he would settle back to sleep but he didn't and he ended up crying on and off again until it was time for us to get up anyway. He doesn't normally get up for the day until at least 615am.

Advice needed please.

Hi. I did CC at 7 months and in 3 nights transformed my ds from waking every hour for a feed to sleeping through. He slept (and still does at 20 months) from 7-5am. Nothing (literally nothing) has helped with the early starts and I've tried everything.

I just go to bed early and thank my lucky stars that he sleeps for a solid 10 hours :)

My experience is that controlled crying doesn't work in the mornings. I have only done it at bedtime when we have walked out of the room and our 18 month old used to cry and not settle. We used controlled crying so now at bedtime we put him in his cot, kiss goodnight and walk out. However, he has taken to early waking anytime between 4am and 5.30am and controlled crying has not worked for us. I have tried and he just cries and cries and cries. There is not indication that he will put himself back to sleep either, unlike when he cried at bedtime, when his cries would subside and you could tell he was falling asleep.

I don't know the answer. We just usually get up, give him a bottle and often he will go back to sleep for an hour or so until say 7am. However, this isn't ideal and I have posted separately on my issues with this!

That is what I thought about the early wakings, that it might be a trade off for him sleeping a bit better. If it is then I will happily accept it as he has been waking at least every two hours and often far more than that and I am wreck.

Did you try CC in the morning or just at bedtime? I don't want to try and fail at CC in the morning if I just need to bite the bullet and get up with him. So glad it worked for you, I am determined to stick with it.

I think this is one of those odd stages.

I remember DS2 going through stages of early waking. Waiting for cbeebies to start in the morning was a low point of parenting .

I don't think controlled crying works though. They are not tired enough to go back to sleep.

I can't remember what happened, which isn't helpful, but it was a phase that passed.

EmmyLou - 4am? Urgh. Sorting out their sleep is a nightmare isn't it? I want him to sleep through but it is like making a deal with the devil we could end up swapping one sleep for another!

Iwantanoompaloompa, I know how you feel about CBeebies. I remember taking DD to the park at 530 just to get out of the house.

Yep yesterday was 4.15am but often 5am or 5,30am. Last night was 2.30am and then he slept until 7.30am this morning. My issue is I get up at 5.30am anyway because I work full time, so when he wakes at 4.30am and then goes back to sleep at 5am I don't really fall back asleep before my alarm goes off.

It's brutal....

and I have added guilt because we give our son a bottle and now he wakes asking for it and so we have created a nice little habit there that we will have to break. I am just hoping he grows out of it. The funny thing is he doesn't do it every morning. About 4 mornings a week and then we will have two mornings where he sleeps until 6.30am from 7pm without a peep...

Well what I've tried works best if your LO still sleeps in your room, but if he wakes early I don't get up. I stay in bed and just quietly 'shhh' him. I don't put the light on, if I speak (and I only needed to do this in the early days - shhhing is enough on it's own now), I do so in a whisper. He knows I won't get up until gone 6am and generally he sleeps from 7pm-6.20am, which is fine.

The basic premise I used was that he needed to get used to what I'm prepared to do (and not do). Getting up before 6am comes high on that list. Reading that book 'French Kids Don't Throw Food' helped because it details how you get kids to sleep through from 7-7 and how, seemingly, the entire population of France achieves this.

My DD used to wake at 5am every morning and it went on for months. The only thing that worked for us (and friends of mine) was sorting out daytime sleep. My DD was having too much (4hrs a day at 12 mths) so I cut it down and she started sleeping to 7 or later and has done ever since.

Sometimes overtiredness can cause the same thing and it can be hard to work out what's going on!

Hope that helps. I know those early starts can be really debilitating, esp in winter.

Daisy, good advice. Our DS is having around 2-3 hours during the day so I don't think he is having too much. He goes to sleep around 12.45pm and is woken around 3pm if he doesn't wake up. My DM and MIL look after him though and sometimes it is hard to get them to stick to routine, particularly the MIL who once let him sleep from 12pm until about 4pm!!!!!

I think it is overtiredness in our case as sometimes he sleeps for a max of 40mins during the day so he certainly isn't too much!

reddaisy - 40 minutes?? How on earth do you get anything done?

I don't and I am utterly desperate and exhausted tbh. Poor DD is parented by shouty and stressed mummy and when I was crying on and off yesterday from pure exhaustion I decided that I had to do something hence the snap decision to start CC. I want and need quick results before I go mad!

Red daisy, what time does he go to bed? A really early bedtime (6pm) can help to deal with the OT. I've tried it and my DD didn't wake any earlier, which is what I was expecting.

He goes to bed by 7pm. I could try an earlier bedtime but I would be worried about him waking earlier like you said. He is in with us still as he will eventually share a room with DD but the nightfeeds wake her up. He is currently crying in his cot as I am getting strict and every time he goes quiet and I think he has gone to sleep, he pipes up again

I haven't tried controlled crying but also suffer from early waking with Ds (7.5months). I find that whatever time he goes to bed he wakes up at the same time -5 am (although occasionally he has woken at 3ish or 6ish). There doesn't seem to be any correlation between how much he sleeps during the day and what time he goes to bed in the evening and the time he wakes up in the morning. Have you tried putting your dc down at 6 and getting an early night yourself?

Oh and putting him in a room on his own helped a lot with nightwaking. He generally has a dreamfeed and then sleeps til 5ish

BTW, it took us over a month before we saw any change. I was about to give up but managed to stay the course and suddenly she started sleeping later. In our case, there was no quick fix and I remember being really disappointed after the first few days that she was still waking at 5!

BTW, it took us over a month before we saw any change. I was about to give up but managed to stay the course and suddenly she started sleeping later. In our case, there was no quick fix and I remember being really disappointed after the first few days that she was still waking at 5!

A month?! I am not sure I can wait that long!!

He was not happy at bedtime tonight, it was really hard

I know, it feels like forever at the time! I only say this because some people make changes and then assume they're not working if they do see any effect in a couple of days. What happened tonight?

Sorry, don't not do!

Well I was only intending to do the CC for when he wakes up after he is first put down to sleep. So I tried to bfeed him to sleep as normal but he just wouldn`t sleep as he kept pulling off to cry and getting worked up.

Normally it takes me ten mins to feed him and for him to go to sleep at 7pm. But I ended up doing CC as I couldn`t settle him the normal way and it took him an hour of crying to go to sleep.

The good news is that he woke up 45mins later, DP went in to settle him and he went back to sleep in six minutes whereas normally he would need another bfeed and a cuddle so that is progress I suppose.

Did you do it for naps too? Or should I tackle one thing at a time?

Reddaisy, we did controlled crying at bedtime when our DS was 12 months. We had got to the point where we couldn't get him to sleep and he were pushing him around in the pram at 9pm at night to get him to sleep. It was horrible. I got a sleep consultant in who came around one evening and helped us through. Basically we did the normal night time routine and he went into his cot at 7pm. He cried for 30 minutes. It was awful but she sat there with us and taught us to listen to the cries and she said every time you hear a pause, you know he is ok. And once there is a pause, you start the clock again, so you start timing from the pause. Then the pauses become longer and gradually he fell asleep. It seemed like the longest 30 minutes in the world but it was just looking for those pauses that was useful.

Once we did it once I had the strength to do it the follwoing night by myself. That night it took 20 minutes. Then the following night it took 5 minutes and now he goes to sleep at 7pm without an issue.

We didn't do it for day naps but they seemed to sort themselves out when we got his bedtime sorted and sometimes during the day I will let him cry for 5 minutes as he settles himself to sleep. Now that I know how to do the controlled crying it makes it much easier.

Which is why I know it doesn't work for us in the middle of the nigtht or at 5am. I can tell from the crying. No pauses.

and yes I would tackle one thing at a time. Start with the bed time. As I said above - once we sorted bedtime, naps just sorted themselves and he now reliably naps from 2-3 hours at lunchtime every day (unless ill in which case he sometimes only sleeps for an hour).

(I feel a bit silly giving advice BTW given the issues I am currently having!! I am clearly no expert on the sleep thing!)