18 month early waking

[Sillymummies123]

Hi all

I should preface this by saying I am very fortunate. DS sleeps soundly from bedtime to morning, but the morning has over the past few weeks crept an hour earlier and I’m absolutely losing my mind.

Toddler starts stories and milk at about 18:30, in bed at around 18:50 and grizzling but then asleep at 19:00.

Fast forward -> crying starts at 05:15. I don’t think he’s fully awake but it’s constant. I don’t go in until at least 6 but I am also wide awake because he’s half asleep crying, and then eventually Awake crying.

I’m pregnant and I’m struggling. Please tell me how to get him to sleep longer / long enough.

@Sillymummies123
Hi, I realise that this thread is months old now and I hope that it’s a distant memory for you! I’m writing though because your posts are so familiar to me at the moment. Luckily I adore babies and have a very close bond with my 16-month-old son but his sleep has unraveling and I feel like I’m going insane. I also find myself getting so frustrated with him that I feel like I just want to walk away at times. It’s horrible.

It’s the same situation that you described. Waking at 5am inconsolable but still so tired. If he has a morning nap he rejects the afternoon one and if he has one nap he’s overtired and won’t go beyond 1hr 20 mins.

I’m beyond exhausted and it makes me so anxious. I would love to know if you did anything that helped or whether it’s a case of ride it out.
Thanks so much 🙏

Hello! We rode it out, I'm afraid. He's still a very emotional toddler, very anxious of new things, but he has started waking happily of late. Still 5am sometimes, but sometimes 7am now. He's 26 months now.

It is better, overall, and my confidence with children is growing over time. But it's slow

@Sillymummies123
Thanks so much for getting back to me. I feel we may have to ride it out too as nothing we try seems to help. Out of interest, can you remember if you persisted with one nap or did you keep trying two?
I’m so glad to hear that it’s easier now, that must be a great feeling. Really hoping that it doesn’t last too long for us!

Hiya - by this point it was securely one nap a day, but we did start absolutely pushing for as much sleep as humanly possible. That seems to have helped. He typically naps 2.5 - 3 hours a day now, and then goes to bed 7pm and wakes between 6-7. I don't think it's anything we did per se, more the march of neurological development. He did have a HUGE regression halfway between this thread and now, and we had to do a month (literally, a month) of going in, shushing, patting etc., but I think he's old enough to understand that there's a bed that he goes to, sleeps in, and that that's okay. (He's still very non-verbal, but if we're slow to start at night he'll say 'g'nigh mummy, g'nigh baby' and ill find him on his story chair in his room).

Time, love and patience, with a plan in hand, is all I can advise.

Rereading your post, I can tell the lack of sleep is getting to you. Everyone has their own preferences, but for us, being quite anxious about sleep even BEFORE our first was born, we knew that we had to have a line in the sand drawn from day one. For our own mental wellbeing, and, we honestly believe, for our children's, we stayed consistent with the Ferber method through thick and thin. We have never and will never acknowledge night wakings beyond a quick visit, kind whisper, pat and 'goodnight my love'.

This may be irrelevant to your situation but ours does, though problematic in a million other ways, not need to get up at night.

@Sillymummies123 Thanks again for writing back and got your generous responses.
You’re right, the sleep does get to me abs makes me very anxious. It gives me hope that your situation improved over time but as you say, consistency and boundaries are really important.