controlled crying at 5am???

[dot1]

Our 7 month old ds goes to bed at 7pm without any problems and sleeps through, but only until 5am which is at least an hour too early in our opinion! He's then wide awake and ready for the day. I don't have a problem with controlled crying - did it with ds1 when he wouldn't go to sleep - but will it work so close to getting up time? Seems mean when he's so wide awake and happy... Has anyone had experience of controlled crying working at this time. When we have left him to cry in the past (we did it briefly when he used to wake up at 2am), he can cry for 1 hour +, which is getting up time anyway... But we're turning into very very tired parents who neeeeeeed more sleep..!

It worked for us with DS1 when he went through this stage. Unfortunately our twins have just started this and it is harder to do because they share a room - but I really need to persevere because I can't take many more mornings beginning with 05:....

We are going down the route of going in, telling them it is still sleep time, then leaving them to it. If they still crying 10 minutes later then go in and repeat. Doing this until getting up time. Although I cracked at 5.45 and got them up today - couldn't hold out until 6am.

Hope it gets sorted for you soon.

like throckenholt, it worked for us. would echo all she says. good luck to both of you!

Why not put them to bed later over a period of time - or the other logical alternative go to bed earlier yourself. Sorry but daylight hours and all that do mess with babies as they can't tell the time yet..

We can't go to bed much earlier - currently about 9pm..! (have to tape anything on later than this!!).

Thanks - may have to steel ourselves and just go for it - although I feel really bad about next door, and have to admit I'm a big softie with ds2 and just don't like leaving him to cry...

Daylight changes have not helped, but honestly my DS1 did this at a totally different time of year - I think it is just a phase some kids go through. It did work for our DS1 - once he realised there was no point in being awake he started sleeping through for at least another hour.

Glad we are not the only ones who have to tape anything after 9pm .

Does he have a morning nap? I found that ds seemed to think it was ok to get up early because he'd soon be back to bed for a rest. Moving his morning nap to slightly later and shortening it helped although it took a few days to get the idea (some cc). HTH

I've not had much luck with CC within an hour of a normal wakeup time. But moving a morning nap later, or shortening it, as strawberry says, often sorts this out very well.

What are his day sleeps like dot1? And how soon after getting up in the morning does he go back to sleep again? If it's fairly soon then I'd start moving that morning nap until later and later. My dd has had various stages of waking early in the morning (never before 6 yet thank goodness!) but I've always gauged whether it was too early or not by how tired she seems. When she's up at 6ish she's yawning, grumpy, rubbing her eyes. But even the extra 30 mins until 6.30 sees her up and full of beans. I would never try to get her back to sleep if she was genuinly wide awake but only if I thought she'd woken too early for her. It's always too early for me!!!

It's tricky - he can usually only go 2 -3 hours before he needs another sleep, so he's often back in bed by about 8.30am/9am, for about 1 1/2 hours. Then he has an afternoon nap after lunch - usually about an hour. So not lots of daytime sleep.

If he sleeps until 7am (this has happened about half a dozen times!) he tends to be much quieter - almost dopey all day - much calmer! But at 5am he's chatty and active - not really bad tempered unless we leave him!!