10 month olds 4:30 starts are killing me, please help

[sososotired]

My DS has never need great at sleeping but for a few months we had only one night waking and starting the day at 5:45 since I've been back at work he is waking 6/7 times a night and gets up for the day at 4:30.
He has 1 two hour nap with his childminder from 10:30-12:30 and then in bed asleep by 7.

Anyone with advice or a similar experience? I'm shattered!

Thanks for the ray of hope Suz (and sorry so for hijacking the thread a little). Sadly I've ruled out the light mornings as a cause for DS waking, but hey you never know.

I might try the toy idea, as we've exhausted all other options. He has a little teddy in his cot but that's probably not interesting enough.

We put him to bed at 7.30 last night, as his last nap didn't finish til 4.15. He went off easily, nice and sleepy and not overtired. No night wakings. So why on earth was he was up at 4.30 this morning?!

He's such a cheery little boy 99% of the time, so I'm fairly sure that the amount of sleep he's getting is enough for him. As an adult I've never been a naturally early riser, so this must be some kind of payback for all the 'wasting the best part of the day' I've done!

It will get better! It could well be an age thing, as my boy was about 10 months when going through this. He still has the occasional very early wake up, but I just trudge in with a sippy cup of milk and a couple of cars and tell him 'it's not morning yet' and he stays pretty quiet until 6. I don't know what it is, but 6am is definitely the point at which my body can accept it's daytime - even ten minutes earlier and I feel like death warmed up.

And hey, even if he does wake up at 5 for the next two years, soon enough he'll be old enough to just amuse himself rather than waking you up, so it really won't be like this for that long!

Sorry for disappearing there we all ended up with a sick bug!!

Thanks for the tips about the drink and toys suz I will give that a go once were all back to normal for now though Peppa pig DVD in my bedroom has bought us some time to snooze!!

noisy does your baby self settle?

Oh dear so you have my sympathy we had it a few months ago.

DS self-settles in as much as we can put him down awake at nap times and bedtime, but he has to be very drowsy.
If he wakes in the night, as in fully awake, he needs to be rocked to sleep and be properly asleep before we put him back in his cot. I've no idea why.

We had another 5am wake up this morning. The toy kept him amused for about 5 minutes! Perhaps I'll try a different one tomorrow.

My DS is exactaly the same when it comes to self settling!
I wonder why some babies can do it and others can't??

I haven't tried the toys yet but will do!