14 month old waking early

[Gigis]

Hello,
Wondered if anyone could explain what's happening. Dd used to sleep well, 6:30 to 6/6:30. 6.30 was a natural bedtime for her and the times when we tried putting her later she would get very grouchy, or just fall asleep downstairs anyway and woke still wake at 6 or 6.30 anyway.

For the past 2 weeks shes been waking at about 4.30 or 5. She then manages about 1.5 hours until she crashes and needs a nap for another 2 hours or so. She has blackout blinds, same bed time routine, and windows shut so no birdsong waking her. Why could she still be waking? She is often waking up crying, so leaving her to play wont really work as she cant calm herself down yet. She also recently has been ravenous when shes woken. Could this be a growth spurt? Or a developmental thing? Maybe we need to drop a nap - if so, how? By 7.30 she needs another one, she just walks round crying and rubbing her eyes of not put down!

Try slowly delaying her bedtime to 7 or 7.30. 10 minutes at a time perhaps?

I think losing a nap might help, I gradually reduced mine from an hour to 30 mins down to 10/15 before dropping.

have you tried giving a snack/milk and cuddles at 4.30?

my dd (20mo so older i know) will fall asleep again in my arms after some protest if she wakes early. try not to take her downstairs til 6am as I'm worried she'll adjust her body clock.

Thank you hadnt thought about gradually dropping naps or how to push back bedtime. I think we'll try a later bed time tonight. She's already had her big morning nap today after being up at 5 and nap at 7, so will have to try pushing naps back tomorrow.

I wondered about a snack when she wakes. The only trouble is she doesnt take milk at all, not in a beaker or cup or bottle anymore. So it would have to be a proper snack, if you see what I mean, which I'm worried would wake her up more as shell be actually munching it...

It doesn't hugely sound like she's hungry so perhaps the cuddle and quiet song a
Til she's drowsy again and back in the cot? I know it's easier said then done!

The other thing is how long are you leaving her when she stirs? I always do a count to 100 and even if its loud crying, she often goes back to sleep before I reach 100. It helped us fixed the early wake up. It really did sound like she was up for the day but after leaving her a bit longer than we were used to - probably 30 to 40 secs before - she'd go back off.

I go in to give her a cuddle but shes a squirmy one and thinks shes up for the day and just tries to wriggle out o my arms so its not very calming! We tend to wait 3 minutes before going in

If you can bear it, maybe try 5 mins? But it does sound like you're doing everything right, I think dropping a nap and slowly getting bedtime to 7ish will help!