Early morning wakings - tips please

[Underworld345]

So we did cc (kind of) with my 11mo. Only one night of crying really and the second night on and off crying for a couple of hours but now is not waking at 3am.

Instead, he’s now waking at around 5am but I know he still wants sleep ( waking crying rather than being happy). This is kind of worse as it’s so much harder for him to go to sleep at 5am!

So again this morning, I tried cc but instead he just on and off cried for 2 hours then just sat up happy at 7am. I don’t think he got any sleep in those two hours as the crying was around every 10 minutes.

So I decided to just get him up and treat it like morning. So he still wasn’t fed to sleep.

Does anyone have any experience of this? Don’t really know what’s best to do? I want to stop night feedings all together but 5am just seems like the wrong time for any sleep training to work...any suggestions?

I had a 5am riser and nothing really worked I'm afraid. I just accepted it and went to bed early myself to deal with it. We went through all kinds of dropping naps, earlier bedtime, later bedtime and sadly it was not till now she is 3.5 years old that she sleeps till 7am. I think that age is to young for a gro clock but it might be worth a try. Hopefully others will have better success stories...

I don’t believe he’s actually ready to get up though. He wakes crying then lies back down as in trying to get back to sleep but can’t.

If you find out let me know, my two year old still wakes at 5/5.30 most days. Things I've tried:

• earlier bedtime
• later bedtime
• more food before bed
• dark room
• light room
• gro clock
• not getting him up til 6
• more daytime napping
• less daytime napping

Nothing has worked. I've learned to accept it and just go to bed earlier.

Mine is generally crying and grumpy when he wakes too, I think some kids are just like that. Mine is despite the fact he sleeps 10.5 hours at night and 2 in the day, so clearly he's not tired.

Also what time is bedtime? They say early waking can be a sign of tiredness so it's possible his bedtime is too late.

DS is 16mo and usually wakes at about 6am, but on the occasions he wakes at 5am (still pretty often) he will not go back to sleep by himself so he times in with us and either wakes again at 6am or more usually 7am. I can't cope with co-sleeping for more than a couple of hours as he will only sleep on my arm and it's uncomfortable, but if he wakes before 5am he will settle himself back in his cot.

I don't think that bringing him in at 5am makes him want to come in with us every time - if he can self settle he always will, if he can't then he comes in with us.

Might this be an option for you?

He goes the bed at 7pm. Yesterday morning was the same, woke around 5am but I managed to get him straight back off by stoking his head. This morning, that didn’t work, but I could see he was trying to sleep, so I just left him to it to see what happened. Cue short bursts of crying for two hours in between laying down and looking asleep 🤔🤷‍♀️

@bangpipplego he doesn’t associate our bed with sleep, he thinks it play time and will laugh and crawl around.

But I may have to accept that if me stroking/patting is not working, that he won’t sleep. May as well get on with the day.

I was just wondering if anyone had successfully managed to do cc at 5am wake up. But in my case, he doesn’t really cry.

It is often the result of the first nap being too early. What’s the daytime routine? You don’t want to reward an early wake up with an early nap

Are you using blackout blinds?

I do remember that when dc1 finally sttn, he did wake up earlier for a short while but it passed. He also only needed 11 hours so bedtime was 8pm, not 7 but it does sound as though he’s still tired.

He’s possibly hungry and might take a couple more days to adjust to not having night feeds

@rockinrobintweets he normally has his first nap 2 hours after waking by if he woke really early, I try and wait till 8am so sometimes longer.

Like you say, may just need some time to adjust. Will see what happens tonight!

It's a long time since I did this but we had a 5am waker and pretty much nothing stopped it. He is now a teenager who I have to drag out of bed!
My only thought is that I am pretty sure we were starting to try and drop the mid morning nap by this time, but can't be sure.

If you’re wanting him to wake up for the day at 7, I’d not do a nap before 9am. As he gets older this will need to push back. I think at 14 months we were doing lunch at 11, nap at 11.30 so it changes quite a lot at his age.

Oh in that case I'd try moving the first nap to 9am at the very earliest.

www.mybabysleepguide.com/2013/02/average-sleep-charts-by-age.html?m=1

I always used this chart. So if wake up is ideally 7, naps at 10 & 2.30 would work

Google Wake to Sleep method

Could he be hungry at that time? Maybe a feed would help him sleep for longer?

Agree with the above. My DS (unless going through slight regression/ill/teething etc) on a standard night gets up between 4-5 am for a feed and then back to sleep till 7-7.30. We did try and drop the feed- not cc but rocking/rubbing etc for a few days but like you it resulted in being unsettled/crying untill practically the morning even though I knew he was still tired . So In the end it just resulted in less sleep for everyone and a grumpy baby as he was not ready to get up. At this stage I’d rather one late night feed instead of an early wake everyday.

I will try shush/patting for a few nights I think or stay in his room while he self settles which I do at bedtime.

If not, I think you’re right, I’ll just feed him but the 3am feed was definitely habitual, he’s dropped it so easy withr just a little push from me. Just worried the 5am feed will become habitual.

He quite often wouldn’t settle after his 3am feed for up to an hour sometimes so just wanted him to drop it as I was getting fed up.

I guess with him 5am wake up, if he doesn’t resettle, even after a feed, it’ll be up for the day 😴😬😬