Getting my 6months old baby to go to bed earlier

[Jemmayyy]

mums- I need advice please!!*

I’m going back to work in like 8 weeks and I really need Ellie (my little girl) to go to bed earlier as I’ll be up at 5:45 to go to work. At the min she will not go to sleep any earlier than 10.30/11.00. I bath her at 7ish because I’m trying to get her to have a bottle afterwards then go to bed. The other night she fell asleep after for ages as when I put her down she just woke right back up and was up until 12am/12.30!

When she goes down she is great and I have no problems there and she sleeps in her her cot great it’s just getting her to go to sleep like much earlier than she is?!

Any advice please??? 😩

What time does she wake up in the morning and what's her nap schedule?

Why not try working slowly backwards from 10:30 rather than doing bathtime at seven i.e. get the routine a bit shorter and then change the time.

So start with bath at 9:00 aiming for feed and then asleep by 10:30. After a couple of nights move it back by fifteen minutes so bath 8:45, asleep by 10:15 and so on.

You might be doing this already but I also find giving the last feed in the bedroom with the lights dimmed, white noise on and low voice/minimal talking all helps get my son ready to sleep. There’s nothing interesting happening so he will give in and sleep!

Will she be starting nursery? My DS was so tired out from it he naturally started going to sleep earlier when I went back.

She usually wakes up about 9am - 10am just depends when she goes to sleep!

Yeah I get what you mean by working back I will have a go at these! Yeah the darkness may help as she is such a nosey little madam! I usually had just fed her in the living room just because that's where I was! Need to change that

No she's going to be going my my partners gran and grandads! Saving us nursery fees for now!

I agree with PP suggestion to move her schedule back in increments. This might mean waking her up early for a few days to get started. So if she wakes at 9, gently wake her up at 8:45 and therefore each nap will be 15 mins earlier too, and also bedtime. Don't try and jump straight to an earlier bedtime, just do it in stages. She might be a bit grumpy if you move things too quickly but it doable.

I had the other problem - my DS was desperate for bed at 5:30pm, which meant waking for the day at 5am which was too early for us. Over the course of about 6 weeks we've pushed his bedtime back to 6:30pm, just by moving things back 5 mins at a time for a few days.

Good luck.

Thank you Fireside Treats! I will start my journey on Monday fresh as her granny has her on Saturday so I'll get a good night sleep anyway lol!