Early wakers

[Throughgrittedteeth]

Has anyone found anything that works with regards to sleeping past 5am?
In my mind there is this miracle cure that some people know but just don't want to share
So if you know the answer and felt inclined to share I'd pay you in cake or in kind (once I'd had a good nights sleep )

What age are we talking about?

Nearly 2!

I read somewhere on here about the wake to sleep method? I'd be so worried that rousing him an hour earlier would result in him getting up at that time.
I think waking at 4am would tip me over the edge

I've been there! My DS is 2.10 and did this for the first 2 years. I tried everything and the best thing I found was our gro click which now means he stays quiet until 7am every day. Apart from that I think it's just something some children do, they have a tendency to wake early. I assume you have experimented with all the obvious things like bedtime, naps, milk etc. is he/she waking up happy or upset? Does he/she seem tired?

assume you have tried blackout blinds?

iPhone strikes again... Gro clock obviously not gro click!!

Experimented with everything really. He's always has a blackout blind up bit actually it was broken a while ago so we couldn't use it and the light/dark seems to make no difference!
He's mostly happy when he wakes up, I did consider taking the sides off his bed so he could get up and play but to be honest I think that's optimistic, in reality he will probably just come straight in to me at 4am and poke my face or something
Thank you for replying btw.
Vix how old was your DC when you introduced the groclock?

I second the gro clock. Started a thread on here (Feb?) asking if anyone had tried one as I was fed up with my early waker (any time between 5 and 6 was normal). We had black out blinds and blackout curtains and she woke early regardless of time of year so it wasn't daylight waking her.

She was about 2.10 and it was tough for about 4 daysnwhile I sat in the room with her waiting for the 'sun to come up' and she shouted 'Mummy! I want the sun come up! Make the sun come up!' but it is so worth it. Wish I'd bought it ages ago.

She now stays in bed until 6:45, no idea what time she wakes but she doesn't wake me and so I don't care!

I started with the gro clock very early, 18 months. He really loved it from the start but only got it at 2. It was programmed originally to show the sun at 6am, but we gradually pushed it back to 7am by changing it by 10 minutes every few days. I think I could push it back further but I don't want to get greedy!!!

Op - does he still nap & if so, what time/how long for? Posting his routine might help us spot if something is 'off'.

I had an early waker & ime it was always down to his nap being too early - once we pushed it later & combined it with a slightly later bedtime, the EW stopped.

3rd gro clock. We ad early waking from8 months to 18 monts. Gro clock and some sleep training worked. It stopped working after about 8 monts, so DS is nw incentivised with stickers or chocolate buttons to wait for it to turn on.

My DS was like this for months but over the past few weeks there has been light at the end of our tunnel. It coiincided with me stopping his morning bottle and resultingly him eating more throughout the day and also me getting to the end of my tether and one morning when he woke at 5am I switched off his monitor and went back to sleep. He eventually fell back to sleep too and didn't get up until 10am! This seemed to reset his system and now he is up around 7.30-8.15am, but yesterday was 8.30am and today 9.40am!!! He does whimper sometimes around 6am and if he doesn't stop I go in and replace his dummy and he falls back to sleep.

Sorry for not replying sooner. His routine varies slightly depending on whether I'm at work or not (days I'm working DS is with my DM at her house) but it has been like this for over a year.
So on a work day:

5-5.30am DS wakes up
6-6.30 breakfast
11.30 lunch
12-2ish nap
4.30 bath
5pm dinner
7pm story/calm down (TV off etc)
7.30 milk in bed

When I'm off work the routine is more or less the same except we do dinner at 5.30 and bath after dinner 6/6.30. Also I've noticed he prefers to nap a bit earlier with me, usually 10/11-12/1. I know it sounds a bit messy but he knows his routine is a bit different at DMs and all her friends say you could set your watch to his routine with her. I'm definitely more relaxed than she is though so sometimes it isn't exactly like that every single day, but again we've always been like that.

Also he has 6oz milk morning and night and (healthy ) snacks between meals but obviously they vary too. He is a big eater and very energetic so he needs plenty of fuel!

So those who used a gro clock would you say 23mo is a good age to introduce it?

Thanks again for your replies.

Yes defi Italy introduce the gro clock ASAP. I started at 18 months, at 23 months he will be fine.

Only thing I would also ask having looked at your routine (same as ours) is whether he actually naps 2 hours from 12-2. If he does, have you tried cutting that down? My son was down to an hour at that age but obviously they are all very different.

Omama that's interesting you say that about the early naps, for a while we pushed his naps later 12/1-2/3 but honestly nothing seems to make a difference. Food (more/less), naps, a later bedtime, a black out blind, no nap at all etc etc always the same result.
In fact my nana came round on Thursday and DS played outside for aaages with a big bucket of water and a watering can and she said the classic 'he'll sleep well tonight', now obviously he does sleep well as he mostly never wakes up but I still felt a bit

Sorry iPhone strikes again, definitely not def Italy!!

My parents constantly say 'he will sleep tonight' after having him. I find it so annoying, as if I do nothing with him when he's with me!!!

6 months ago when he was going 7.30-7 with several wake ups we'd have killed for his current routine! Now the early wake ups are having their toll on us.
I will get a gro clock and try to limit him to an hour a day.

DS woke up at 4.50am today and I've just come into the living room and he's asleep! What do I do now?! I feel like we're accidentally creating bad habits but I'm not sure how to get out of this cycle now. Wrt a shorter nap, he gets really cranky when he's tired, hopefully that'll get better over time but I'm not looking forward to whiney toddler!

I wouldn't worry too much about naps, my two both sleep better at night if they aren't overtired and that can mean quite late naps. If you find it helps to shorten his nap then great but you may just have an early waker. My DD has given up her naps but still doesn't sleep as long at night as her brother (4 years older).

I try to comfort myself that people who need less sleep often go on to do great things. Or at least they have more time to do things in!

It might not work as he's still napping, but I have found my DS (3.5) sleeps better/longer when he goes to bed earlier, no idea why! We also found the Groclock worked, he was a very early riser so we got to the point where we said 2 stars on the clock, stay in bed, 1 star you can play in the bedroom, sun up you can come into our room. It does get better when they can entertain themselves a bit in their rooms.

Dd (2.1). Sleeps much longer when she is less tired, if she has good long naps ( 2 hours between 2-4pm). And bed at 6.30 she will sleep til 7. Any later to bed or messed nap results in a 6am wake up. Try perhaps a later nap and or earlier bed time, maybe start bath time at 6 and bed at 6.45.

Good luck, I cope badly without sleep.

Another early waker here! My DS has just turns to 6mo, and he has been waking up at around 5am to 5.30am. I've used blackout curtains and it didn't work. He wakes up and then plays in his cot for a while, rolling over, dragging himself from one end to the other, playing with the soft rabbit we put on the end of the bed, crawling along the bars of the bed and raising his little head to peak at us (we sleep in the same bedroom)... Then after about one hour he starts to cry and needs a lot of comfort (sometimes even bf!) to get back to sleep, sometimes not do luck and he will stay awake and gets sleepy really early, like 7.30, no surprise...
I guess groclock would be too early for him, then what should I do to keep him sleep longer? He goes to bed at about 7.30~8pm at night, and I don't know whether I should just feed him to sleep if he wakes at 5am