Is there a way to get toddler sleeping later?

[FTEngineerM]

He’s currently 18 months old and looks tired all the time, it’s only been last fortnight or so but he has dark circles and bags 😭so he MUST not be getting enough sleep but we can’t figure it out.

He wakes up at 5:30am-6:00am everyday then goes down for a nap if we’re at home/in nursery at 12:00-12:30 for 1.5 hours. Then he will go to sleep between 7:00pm and 7:15pm like clockwork.

If I take him out in the car about 9:30 he will sleep for an hour, then we have another afternoon nap for another hour later on.

Is there a way of getting him to sleep longer in the morning?
Our 3 month old wakes for the day at 7:00am ish but is still waking 3 times per night so we’re knackered too 😕😬

They say children of this age need 11-14 hours of sleep a day and he’s getting that. He’s getting 11 hours at night, plus 1.5 hours of nap. If you want him to sleep later in the mornings, you need to put him to bed later at night, similar to what you do when the clocks change

Try putting him to bed 7.30/7.45.

Tranquilliser gun?!!!

But seriously, nothing helped with our son at that age. He's now 3 and is usually up around 6.30. Sometimes its earlier, today because he's got a cold he's only just waking up now!!

Thats great you say? I've still been up since 5.30am because he woke then and my 'D'H woke me as its my turn.

DS went back to sleep after 2 min but I couldn't get drift off, 37 weeks pregnant and couldn't get comfy again!

Can’t help with the early mornings, all three of mine did it and I’m afraid just grew out of it. However if he’s getting enough sleep and is still looking tired it might be worth trying a magnesium supplement, apparently a lot of children are deficient in it, certainly got rid of the bags under the eyes and yawning from my DS.

My daughter is 3 and wakes at 5am. She's been doing this for months. Maybe over a year. When she was a baby she went through a period of waking at 4am. I think she's just an early riser. It makes no difference if she goes to bed late, if she naps/ doesn't nap. She claims to be scared of her gro clock, and she has no interest in using her Tonie Box to listen to a story instead of standing over our bed shouting at us 😆 She wakes at the same time very day. She is also going through a phase of waking several times a night and running out of her room. Which is great.

No point to this post other than solidarity. Try all the things people mention for sure, but also don't feel like you've failed if they don't work. Some kids are just like that 😴

Sorry gang, not much time to get on my phone in a day!

I will try a later bedtime tonight, in the past it hasn’t changed anything but it might now he’s older.

Also, just ordered magnesium chewy things so thank you. We do eat a lot of foods that are ‘rich in magnesium’ according to my Google search; dark chocolate, nuts, legumes, avo and seeds though so I’m not sure if that could be a prob?