Back to sleep!!

[gigi556]

How do we get our son (20 months) to go back to sleep at 5am. For the record, he is EXHAUSTED. This used to be 4am but we changed his bedtime to 8pm instead of 7pm. He wakes up and sometimes goes back to sleep but not always. This morning was constant tears (because still tired) but he wouldn't go back off. He fell asleep for his nap at 10:30. His nap time is 12:30/1pm!

What's his daytime routine like?

As he’s had such an early nap today you could try a 6pm bedtime? Sounds insane if he is only sleeping for 10 hours but sometimes earlier night means they sleep a bit longer. Might be worth a try.

My 18mo wakes 5-6am, goes down for a nap around 10am for a couple of hours, then bed around 6pm. If for whatever reason he stays up to 7/8pm he’ll still wake as early in the morning.

He needs 10-11 hours of sleep at night so on a good night he wakes between 6am- 7am. We have breakfast and are bathed/showered dressed and ready by 8am. In the morning we are usually out at some kind of toddler group until about noon (except on Tues/Thurs morning when he's at nursery. Nap around 12:30/1 for anywhere from 1.5-3 hours. Afternoon usually have a post nap snack then head to the park. Back for dinner around 5:30. Bed at 8pm.

I put him to bed early tonight (7:15) just because he was up so early and he only napped for about 1.5 hours which is short for him.

Earlier bedtime on a regular basis does actually result in an earlier wake up. He does sometimes go back to sleep but really struggles to despite being shattered (tears all bloody morning!!!)

Daytime sleep seems excessive for his age. - Could you slowly cut his lunchtime nap back?

Few things

Could it be reflux related? Is he teething? Our LO has early wake ups when having a reflux flare up. You could try Gaviscon for this with his bedtime feed (dissolved in 3oz milk or 10ml water)

At that age my ds only needed 1.5 hours sleep and he needed to be up by 2pm in order to go to bed at 7pm. Agree to cutting back daytime nap from 3 hours anyway and keep the nap length consistent so the (later!) wake up will become consistent

You could try rousing him gently at 10pm / before you go to bed, just enough to disturb him but not wake him fully and it will reset his sleep cycle. If it's a habitual wake up around 5am then this may break the cycle. This worked for us

Buy a gro clock. Set it for 5am (or whatever time he is waking) and go into him and make a fuss about the sun shining and starting the day. Then edge the wake up time forward. We started using one at 14 months at the recommendation from sleep consultant and I was shocked he understood it. Since then , even if he does wake up early (unless unwell) he will play quietly until the sun shines

We've been lucky we've had a good sleeper but he has allergies and CMPA so this has complicated things and we've needed to 'train' him a couple of times. The sleep consultant had invaluable advice

Good luck!

Another vote the gro clock, worked amazingly for DS at 19 months and I was surprised because I thought he might be too young but he understood straight away.

He wasn't a good sleeper either and didn't respond well to most things we tried to improve his sleep!

He also has CMPA and reflux and wakes up earlier if he's having a flare up