Hi, I feel like I am in an endless viscous cycle of overtiredness and rubbish sleep at the moment and I need help. We’re all
miserable!
My son is 16 months and since starting nursery at 11months his sleep has been awful. Current routine goes something like:
- Wakes for the day between 4:45am-5:15. Nothing gets him back to sleep. We try leaving him, then timed intervals, eventually milk. It is obvious he is just awake for the day.
- He then has to wait until nursery nap at midday, usually he goes for about 1 hour 15mins. On weekends this can stretch to 2ish.
- I collect him at 5pm by which time he is clearly shattered so I end up putting him down for 6pm. He is sleep trained and easy to put down. He goes down awake and settles himself.
- He wakes anywhere between 1-4 times a night, I usually ignore for 10ish mins, then if he’s ramping up I do a Ferber type thing for another 10ish mins, then often I crack and give milk and/ or calpol. He always has water in his cot.
I feel like his early bedtime is contributing to his early wake up- but I don’t know how I can keep him up later as he is then so overtired he wakes more often through the night.
I don’t think 11-12 hours total sleep (including broken night sleep) is enough for a 16 month old?!
Any advice at all much appreciated!!