How do I get my 11 month old to sleep an hour extra in the morning

[SunshineAndFizz]

11 month old goes to sleep about 7pm and sleeps until about 5am (I know this is great - we've had to work hard to drop bottles/self sooth over many months to get to this point).

Any suggestions for how to get him to get sleep just a bit longer to after 6am? I just can't stretch another hour. He wakes his older sister then too.

He has two naps during the day, and bottles first thing and before bed. Eats well. No other issues. We have blackout curtains.

What do you do when he wakes at 5? We spoke to a sleep consultant who said treat any pre-6am wakes as you would any other middle of the night wake, and try to resettle. We had 5am wakes for a while but with perseverance of resettling (in his cot, even though the temptation to just dump him in my bed was overwhelming) we now have a 15mo who wakes pretty reliably between 6.30-7am, which is manageable for us. If he does wake earlier he is usually quite happy to babble to himself for a while, I will only go and resettle if he's crying.

My little one is nearly 11mo and has been an awful sleeper from day one. No matter what time he goes to bed he will always be up at 5. And it's not because he's getting too much in day as he has 2 20 min naps all day. Some babies just don't need as much sleep

Good question, I don't do any of the usual nighttime settling tricks (which for us has been pick up, cuddle on my shoulder and then put down when relaxed and leave) at that time, I guess because I've assumed it's too close to wake up.

I usually let him have a wiggle for a while to see if he'll go back to sleep and usually go in when he starts making too much noise.

I can relate. I'm reluctant to push his bedtime back because of this.

All children are different.

Exactly. At 11 months mine dropped to one nap of about an hour and a half

I had a similar problem at 11m, and my HV said to try moving to one lunchtime nap instead. Maybe worth a try? It worked well for us and fitted in better with nursery when she started too.

7pm-5am is 10 hours and some kids won't ever sleep longer than that overnight. Nap schedules will do nothing to help that if his nighttime sleep need is only 10 hours, it'll only make him crankier in the day. So if tweaking naps doesn't help then a later bedtime might.

Also lol hard at an earlier suggestion of what a schedule "should" be! At 11mo mine was on one nap at 11-12.30 and bedtime at 6.30. He didn't sleep 10 hours though, he barely slept 3 most nights before his first wake 🙃 He's now 10-11h overnight kinda guy at 15 months and thankfully does sleep through now! The nap is still the same.

Definitely try to engineer one longer lunchtime nap. My DD was exactly the same, always woke at 5pm. It would drive me crazy.

I started by reducing her morning nap slowly which in turn extended her lunchtime nap. By the time she was 14 months she was sleeping 12-2 and then going to bed at 7 and waking at 8/9. She ended up sleeping more in a 24 hour period, not less.

Sorry, meant to say always woke at 5am

Thanks, I think this could be the route we go down.

You've achieved the sleep dream - congrats!

@SunshineAndFizz he started sleeping better a bit after his first birthday around a week after I night weaned. Until then we had wake ups every 2-3 hours! Some of which lasted 1-3 hours 😴 now we only really get wakes if he’s teething or unwell.

You don’t, they usually get up with the sun & a nappy that needs changing.
cut the naps to one a day but really, your kid sleeps 12 hours straight be thankful.

Google wake to sleep. My friend used this to move her child from 5 to 6.
I wouldn't change anything else you are doing as that is clearing working for you. I have always had my kids nap longer in the afternoon. They natrualy do that if you are doing stuff in the morning but as your isn't it probably won't work for you.

Honestly both of mine are early risers (5-6am) and no matter what changes in napping or bedtimes or eating we tried implementing, they get up early.
Even when we visited family abroad last summer and due to the different lifestyle there they went to sleep around 9-10pm for 3 weeks solid, it did not change to their waking time.

Oh love, I fear you're so caught up in sleep training culture that biologically normal sleep seems like a problem. Infants can't self settle, it's scientifically impossible. And they should be fed on demand that young, milk is their main source of nutrition.

Please read about actual baby sleep, not sleep training nonsense, actual evidence based information... BASIS is great, and Sarah Ockwell-Smith. The Beyond Sleep Training Project is great for information and solidarity.

Easier said than done but second nap could do with being slightly longer at this age. Have you tried blackout and white noise etc. Early morning wakes are often caused by overtiredness. Residual cortisol can wake them in the lightest stage of sleep; early morning. Saying that my boy dropped to one 3hour nap at 13 months. He did sleep until about 7am at this stage though

My kids have always been 10 hour night sleepers. They just don't need more than that. You have to embrace it!

My son actually dropped the second nap entirely before his first birthday, dropping it might help

My older boy (now all grown up and with his own baby on the way) was an early waker. All attempts to get him to go to sleep later just resulted in him waking up at the same time but miserable because he was tired. I had to adjust my lifestyle until it worked itself out when he started nursery. Sometimes you have to go with the flow.

Thankfully mine weren’t early risers but then again they didn’t go to bed til 8 / 830. I couldn’t have coped with anything before 7!

On the odd occasion they woke earlier, I treated it like a night waking.

My son is 10 now, so this is a long time ago, but generally if he wasn't sleeping when we wanted, it was because he didn't need as much sleep as we were trying to give him. Put him to bed later, or drop or shorten one of the naps so he needs a longer night.

i think the first nap too long! I would try push for the long nap to be the afternoon one! usually if they wake early they try use the morning nap to catch up on sleep

so 45 mins in morning and 2 hours max at lunch

5am is very early wake up so would try for a morning nap by 9 - 9.45 then main nap about 1 - 3

bed at 7

Hi OP,

When was DS was your age, he did the same. The only that worked was delaying the first nap. At 22 months, he still needs at least a 2hr nap a day but it's normally mid afternoon. He goes to bed at around 7pm and wakes up at 6am. I'll be honest though, the time he goes to bed makes no difference to when he wakes up, he could go to bed a midnight and still wake up at 6am!