I must have done something really bad in a past life to be punished like this ..... early mornings are doing my head in [sad]

[ghosty]

My children are always up, dressed and having breakfast by 7am. In fact, 7am is a luxurious lie in. One day last week I was up, showered, dressed, making packed lunches while my two darlings happily gobbled up their cereal at .... 6.15am
This morning (Good Friday) both children were awake at 5.30am ... and ready to get up.

DS can and will stay in his bed quietly until 6.30 when he can get up and play quietly but DD (2) doesn't understand that concept yet and if she wakes up that is it for the whole family ...
It would make sense if they went to sleep early but DD goes to bed at 7, but not to sleep till 8pm ... DD goes to bed at 7.30 but not to sleep till nearer 8.30pm.

The only plus side of this is that we never ever ever have a rush on school mornings and we are never late for anything.

This morning I told DH that I hated my children

Am seriously pissed of about this ...

Sorry for rant ...

with sympathy ghosty, my DS (3.5 yrs) gets up anywhere between 5.30 - 6.30... my 5mth DD is following in the same footsteps with a 5am wake up call. I read recently that wake up times can be hereditary and actually both me and DH are early birds and find it difficult to go back to sleep once awake (but that was when we decided to be - BC!!). We have bought DS a bunny alarm clock from blooming marvellous and now although DS still wakes early he knows to remain quiet until bunny wakes up... this is usually backed up by a chocolate coin as a reward!

I know how you feel, none of my kids sleep later than 7pm. They are like me, once awake, can't sleep.

ghosty - mine too. DD is 7 and DS is 4 and usually wake by 6am. We're never late for school either! I do go to bed early to compensate and I cope better some mornings than others.

oh ghosty - early mornings suck dont they.

Hi Karen ...
Thanks for the sympathy ... it is much appreciated . My DS is 6 now and had a bunny clock when he was 2 and a half. It worked up to a point ... but the thing is he is the type of child that he would wake up early in order to see if the bunny had woken up yet! When he was 5 we cracked it by giving him pocket money for sleeping later. It worked really well and proved to us that he can sleep later but for some reason if he has no reward he wakes early again ... because when he knows he is getting pocket money he will actually SLEEP!
My DH has the early bird gene but I don't
I thought DD was like me ... from newborn she was a fab sleeper ... but since she turned 2 and is trying to drop her daytime naps her sleep has turned to custard (kiwi phrase!). If she sleeps in the day she wakes early ... if she doesn't sleep she will sleep longer at night but is really grouchy during the day at home ... so she can't cope with too many days without a nap.
The problem is at the moment is that DS, can be soooo good with playing quietly in his room but DD can't and if she has to get up then it isn't fair for DS to have to stay in his room ...
Hence the whole family being up on a bank holiday at 6am, DH and I being grouchy to eachother blah blah blah ...

The other problem is that it makes DH and I not want to bother to get babysitters and go out anymore ... because we are so tired and don't want a late drunken night that means we will feel doubly $hit the next day ...

dd1 decided to chat up her cuddlies. at 4.36 this morning.

then she woke again at 6 to greet her toys again.

she fell back to sleep, but then dd2 woke at 7 for her morning feed.

yeah, and i was the girl who didn't get HOME until 6AM from a night out.

Thanks to others too ... slow typing today

ha ha expat ... I remember those days ... there was many a time that I came home as my neighbours were going to work ...

my dad got us bad SO badly when we were teens. he'd come into our rooms on some weekend mornings around 7 or 8 w/his old army horn thing, play that damn 'revelrie' tune and make a bunch of noise, flick the lights on and off, throw the curtains open. all whilst shouting, 'rise and shine! payback time is mine, mine, mine!'

My sympathies to you Ghosty. I know how you feel. My two ds love to get up anytime from 5am onwards. It really is hell isn't it? DH and I can't be bothered to go out because we know we'll pay for it the next day. The awful thing is, we got a chance to go away for 3 nights recently without kids and neither of us could sleep in past 6am. It seems we have lost the ability to relax.

Sympathies Ghosty! DS1(almost 3) is back to waking between 5.15 and 5.45. TBH he does play quietly in his room for a while but is just so tired by mid morning that he's a complete pain in the bum by 11.00!! I do sometimes wonder if he is actually up earlier than the time we think and are seriously thinking about hiding the baby monitor in his room to see just what time he does start his day!!!!

I think I've had to accept that it's one of those things as black outs, special clocks, stickers etc just make no difference and he's just ready to start his day at the crack of dawn! Looks like I'll have plenty of time to get ready for work in a morning when I'm back after maternity leave with DS2!!

hi ghosty the same thing has been doing me in too. Some time before christmas i changed dd's cotbed into a bed and ever since then she's up between 6-7am, before that it was between 8:30-9:30am!! (She was prob awake earlier but happy in her cot. damn wish i'd left it as a cot!!) She used to be in bed by 7pm, now by 7:45pm in a vain attempt to make her sleep longer. But, I am so SICK of feeling tired and usually having no more than 6 hours sleep. That's partly my fault for not going to bed at a reasonable time, but if i did, i would have hardly any time to myself at all. (I'm a single sahm) So although all i have the energy for in the evening is to get into bed & watch telly/dvds, i usually manage to stay awake past 11. If I do get to sleep early, it seems dd knows this and chooses those nights to get up in the middle of the night making it hardly worth it! And i too have gone off arranging nights out. i have a boyf and i dread an invitation out as he is still having drunken nights out etc which i just can't handle any more - it is hard enough when he is just over and we make the most of the evening ie staying up till past midnight!

The alarm clock is an interesting idea & had occurred to me before, but dd is a bit afraid of sudden noises etc so i think she would most probably wake up scared of it going off! I can treat her like a snooze button actually, if she is up before 6:40am i put her back to bed & she stays there for 10 mins quite happily. But i feel as if i am giving her the message i just don't want to see her at all :(