Screaming the house down 5am

[physicskate]

My 2 year 9 month old has had a chequered history with sleep. But we were at a great place until recently. She was having 1-2 hour nap and sleeping from about 8pm-7am (bath has always been at about 630, bed for about 7, but she rarely falls asleep and wriggles until about 8 or later). Mostly was without wake ups (living the dream after waking every 45 mins until she was 15 months - so paid my dues, I think!!).

Then the clocks changed. Same bedtime but now up at 6.

Then a week ago she started waking about 5, standing at her stair gate on her door with the light switched on, screaming the house down. Dh stupidly got her downstairs watching cartoons the first morning this happened.

I have 8 month old ds up 3/4 times a night (I breastfeed to sleep). Think I have pnd, but struggling to fall asleep and then cope with 3-5 hours of broken sleep. I have both of them alone for about 11 hours a day. I'm on mat leave. Dh does not do feeds in the night, nor does he try to settle ds. So ds is all on me, but he does try to get dd back to sleep by helpfully laying in her bed with the light on while she screams.

How do I get her back to at least 6?? I am currently putting her back in bed and switching the light off but we've been having histrionics and she's super wide awake. Dh gets her up before her groclock goes off. I think we sometimes undermine each other's efforts. Dh is not a very confident discipliner...

When we do finally take her downstairs (around 630), she's obviously still tired. She tantrums all the time now too. She's obviously tired...

I could go on and on, so thanks for reading. Any advice?

In my experience 5am is a pretty standard wake up time for toddlers sadly. They only need around 10hrs a night by 3. I worked on getting my lot to bed earlier so in bed for 6 and asleep for 7 but it took time to get them there. I feel your pain. Youngest is now 5 and gets up around 5.30, the middle ones around 6. It will get better

Agree with Malbec, my DS was a 5am riser, it’s just how he was.

Your DH needs to take responsibility for her, he can take her downstairs and stick the TV on quietly, then hopefully you can sleep.

We had a 5am wake up call for awhile too.

Does she still need the nap?

Odd question but can she recognise numbers yet? We slightly improved this with our kids (after trying everything else) by getting a digital alarm clock and teaching them they could get up at ' 6 0 0'. We then set the alarm clock so it looked like 6am at 5:05am and gradually moving it forward with loads of praise for managing '6 0 0' each time. So for example your husband would go in as normal when she wakes at 5 and together they wait 5 minutes for the alarm clock to change to the pretend right time then up they get with loads of praise. And so on every day. With ours they stopped yelling for us and simply watching the clock for a bit meant they started falling back to sleep.

🤦‍♀️ the reason I'm thinking it's so shit is because it literally started one morning a week ago. Out of the blue.

She defo needs the nap. She didn't have it yesterday as we were out and about (she had a 20 min car nap at about 10am) and her sleep was the same last night. So why forgo the nap?? Plus I use it to get ds to boobnap.

She's still very tantrum-y and I often don't enjoy being her parent. Often enough that I question why I ever wanted kids!! But part of that is probably the pnd talking.

And she doesn't reliably recognise numbers yet... the colour on the groclock, she does though.

She defo needs the nap. She didn't have it yesterday as we were out and about (she had a 20 min car nap at about 10am) and her sleep was the same last night. So why forgo the nap?? Plus I use it to get ds to boobnap

Dropping a night doesn't work instantly so wouldn't feel the benefit for afew days.
But if she still needs it then that's fine.
My DS is 3 now and I still have a 5am rise sometimes.

We had a 5am start for a good few months before ours dropped the nap. It's kind of that age really.

It always changed. Just as one thing (ie sleep) becomes settled - it changes as they develop or grow or become ready for the next stage.

Id just go with it for now. One of you go to bed earlier and one get up . It wont be forever.

And agree its a bit of a weird cycle when they drop a nap. They need less sleep but are still tired in the day unti lthey get over that hump.

Will they ve starting preschool soon?

2 hours nap is a bit too long for her age, and therefore she isnt tired enough to get 11 or 12 hours sleep overnight.
I'd cut it down to 30 or 40 minutes.... this won't magically work the first time as it's like changing the clocks and waiting to readjust, so give it a week or 2 to see an improvement.

Best of luck OP

I don't know how gro clocks work but could you try the same principle? Move the time back by increments? I do get what everyone is saying but with ours, like your dc, they seemed to be struggling with lack of sleep so it seemed worth a try of something gentle.

This is also why she still naps:

https://watermark.silverchair.com/sleep-18-2-82.pdf?token=AQECAHi208BE49Ooan9kkhWErcy7Dm3ZLL9Cf3qfKAc485ysgAAAswwggLIBgkqhkiG9w0BBwagggK5MIICtQIBADCCAq4GCSqGSIb3DQEHATAeBglghkgBZQMEAS4wEQQMJVVy7l04FNjYKkVwAgEQgIICf-EiPtKO6TmnFaiEM4WTNzfnSUekXYe9xPe8r94zY03MOfeBtPYRL5UKM9Ow616BfN5e2SXhdj6s9IsBCUAQ8ne9JimMFSy7zJRSTj0T0WtnxcDQJ9FZsLYk6o9XZZhWLBy21v4PDdhgtB6IRK3vPW5fAzznOQ5pTbF82gRJSB1bL9j9y6yYdhavv1kErWAT0Rxnhjux-xyVkfOWJtrCkgmQM8-mUazzxlEQkh2DiA0Tmh8cp6UMhMgTxV5lD3s9dYu0fABrGGizxa-lu86BVwhYYOvmN-j4iJDirgw-A7Af4d5gtwb--rCYd3Fx04HVP5m7lJWupgs9tHFtQ1am1QJ00KzPPfJEub02iJAAlq1C6e0t7qe8aY9GOOCwD3loD6zfPYXi-sKAcyb0LkhQbgvY89ulJ8cyUnHU4aJ9Oqlja-OMG9EBC4VIdKd50AKI43s0D4uYmJw9VLBOtO-7svzm9MxMNm14uFkohrf0X6vy8QjzAHawLiUDYczp1wkKyJqQczIKZ7ZhHIrWCMJTQ-bpOCw7BiGrjxtKW3yAtWZVeqHf6jgXjCdugGeDbBOuKUH7zQM2KvcMal93dBlhZeyhwD6jsRetEoXgVVqjnPw71pr74jR0Xljcd1qWMzTjlnYtsnfliXJ5ir3qYYVzp_P1uX3E4WIQs8YsVAI-GvKO8yUBgFZZ2yBOgBKIU2Y5RE19yO-QkZ4f9C76X-10f9dNIITapilid-fW7TSEHLCB-VdPQw8J7aoNdW7pEHhpJ2e-b3cR5j1rTi3lw2gqI8rf6xfTOHJSXf0t03ILxtH0RRepucT9xAPZGbi1uDqyuEW54BiLQ5F9kqQ

Obviously all children are different. But she's a right grump almost all the time (or maybe that's me?). She also at the age where everything feels like a fight... sleep, food, what clothes to wear, etc...

Yes she goes to preschool 2 mornings a week. The sessions are just over two hours, which gives me enough time to walk home, get ds to nap then walk back to pick her up... gets me out of the house I suppose? But they have two weeks break now...

Both of my dc now aged 9 and 18 years always woke up at 5am ish at that age. Gradually they do sleep later and later but unfortunately it is a very normal wake up time for many toddlers.

All three of mine wokr at that time for years, I'm afraid.

I think you and your DH need to start the loads much more fairly, obviously you still need to feed DS during the night so he just does the early mornings, as DS sleeps busy and wakes less in the night you tag team so nothing on, morning off.

There is a special kind of depressing being up before cbeebies starts for the day.

It doesn't feel like it but it will get better, for us it was when we could trust LOs to get up and go downstairs on their own. We would put pre breakfast snacks out (pot with fried cereal and dried fruit with perhaps some fresh fruit in)

Bought us precious extra 30 or so minutes

I have a 3 year old and s 4 year old and don't agree that they need 10 hours of that a 5am wakeup is necessarily normal. I appreciate that all children are different.

Have you tried a Gro clock? Worked a charm with my first and pretty well (alongside some good old fashioned bribery with my second). Both from when they were about 2.

A friend of mine just bought one for hwe 4 year old who was getting up at 5am. He immediately stayed in bed til 7am.

I got mine on FB marketplace for £8 but make sure they still have the book. The story is a vital part, especially for a 3 year old.

Good luck! I also have a 6 month old and my 3 year old is in a very difficult stage (also tired and tantruming). Its not fun, especially with sleep deprivation chucked in.

Groclock story??? Tell me more!! We have the clock, but dh gets her out of bed before it goes off, so yes, I need to reset it for earlier and get dh on board (and convince him of a lot of other things too 🙄, but that's another story).

This is the story. Basically it tells a story about a tired pig who needs more sleep and explains the colours of the clock

When I was googling to find a picture I noticed Gro have some videos. So if you don't have the book then maybe theres a video?