I cannot, cannot, cannot start my day at 4.30...but will have to unless anyone can help me.

[snickersnack]

Ds (11 months) has decided that 4.30am is a good time to get up and greet the day. I can normally manage to persuade him to go back to sleep after about 45 minutes of stroking and patting, but then it?s only for half an hour or so?he goes to bed at 7pm and sleeps (usually) until 4.30, when he just doesn?t seem tired anymore.

What?s strange is that even when we put him to bed later (e.g. 7.45 last night) he still wakes between 4.30 and 4.45. It?s nothing environmental ? his room is very dark, and he wakes at the same time whether we are at home or somewhere else, so it?s not noise outside. Even the amount of daytime sleep doesn?t make any difference.

On the one hand, he?s only just stopped waking multiple times in the night, so I feel I should be pleased he?s got the hang of uninterrupted sleep, but at least he never used to wake at stupid o?clock in the morning full of beans.

I?d welcome any advice ? co-sleeping isn?t working, when I bring him into bed he just yells and tries to poke me in the eye. At the moment one of us has to get up and take him downstairs and play with him so everyone else in the family can get some sleep.

Why isn't there a tired emoticon on MN? Surely it would be much used and appreciated.

no answers but huge huge sympathies. sleep deprivation is torture.

I also have no answers but lots of sympathy. My DD did this for about 4 or 5 months and then just stopped. I have no idea why she was waking or why she stopped but I remember that depression that would hit me at 4.40am when I realised that my day had begun and there would be no more sleep.

If you find the answer tell me dd1 was always a 6-630am riser but dd2 is between 4.50 and 5.10am and its doing my head in, we've all got colds and dd1 coughing woke dd2 up last night so in total I had 4 hours of broken sleep. Today we are all grouchy (dh went to work at 4.30am so must be knackered) I am really losing my patience with them plus I have to go and babysit for a friend tonight when all I want to do is eat my dinner, have a bath and go to bed

Hi my son does this, but I refuse to let him get out of his cot until at least 6am! I go in an reassure him or give him a dummy or sometimes even a bottle, but treat it like he has woken in the night. Sometimes this works & he goes back to sleep, sometimes not but as long as he is not screaming I let him whinge! The other things you could try are cutting down naps in the day, and keeping him up later at night. I usually stick him in the bath to wake him up if falling asleep too early!

my children both went through phases like this and grew out of it and returned to normal 6:30 - 7 wake times after about 12 months. lots of symopathy though - its hell when its happening and im not sure why they do it or if you can stop it. i got all kinds of advice but think above poster has the right idea - treat it like a night wakening.

Something someone told me once is if you go in there 20 minutes before they usually wake (yes I know you'll have to set an alarm), and gently rouse them, not enough to completely wake them, it changes their sleep pattern and they don't wake up at that time!

There is also a big difference between waking having had enough sleep (chatting, happy etc) and waking having not had enough sleep. The former apparently is virtually incurable, the second there is hope!

I am having exactly the same problem with my DS! He is 12 months and previously used to sleep until 6.30 - 7.00am but now typically wakes at 5.30 or today it was 5am! He simply chats and babbles to himself so I guess he is simply not tired by then, but it is sooooooooooo annoying. We have been leaving him in his cot and ignoring him until about 6 - 6.30 which has been fine, sometimes he dozes off again but usually only for a few minutes. I know exactly how you feel, it is so annoying because even if you ignore them you can't go back to sleep yourself. I even phoned the health visitor this morning to ask if she had any bright ideas but she dind't! Seems as though we might be stuck with it. If you do find anything that works let me know.

Yet another 5.30 waker here, Ive just logged on to find a solution for my self. I dont think dd has slept much past 6am, she is 7 months. When she wakes at 5.30 I usually leave her for a bit (5 - 10 mins) then give her a soft toy to play with, I used to give her a dummy but she ended up playing with it and banging the sides of her cot with it, then would throw it out of cot and cry for it, so just give soft toy now. I dont pick her up or speak to her until 6.30, then I go in and talk to her, open up curtains and start the day. I have heard about that waking 20 mins earlier as well, Im thinking about trying it, but knowing my dd she will wake up and want to start the day at that time!! If do dare try it I will let you know, dont suppose anyone has tried it have they?

Could it be a hunger/growth spurt related thing? I guess he'd let you know if he was really hungry but maybe your DS is waking because he's just a bit peckish? You could try upping the food intake slightly during the day and see if it helps?

hi same problem. actually only started at about 12months. Now she is 14 months. Apparently it does just stop at some point. She sleeps till about 5, 5.30am. Then has 20 mins naps until we allow her out cot at about 6.30 (sometimes 6.15 like this morning!) Makes no difference how dark the room, how much she eats, drinks etc. Sorry. No solutions. But I do know how you feel. Both my children are terrible sleepers - but good news. My eldest is 3 and now sleeps from 7pm (out like a light) till 7am, sometimes 8am!

My ds2 -20 months -does this as well - every morning between 5 and 5.30 we hear him get out of his sleeping bag, chuck his teddies on the floor anf then shout uh-oh mummy daddy uh-oh till we go in then is up and ready to play! Ds1 never did it and we've not found a solution yet - he did for a couple of monthsa at around a year then went a lot better sleeping till 6.45/7ish and thena bout 6 weeks ago reverted to dawn calls!

its called 'wake to sleep' in BW book. it does seem to work but you have to have the energy to get up and actually do it.

I read this because DS1 was like this - he's now nearly 7. I'm afraid he is still an early riser, anytime between 5.30 and 7 but the good news is that from about the age of 3 or 4 (seems a lifetime away I know!) depending on your home set-up, you can train them to go downstairs on their own, play, watch tv etc. DS1 can fix himself a bowl of cereal now. I'm reconciled to the fact that he has a lot of energy & hates to miss anything.

But I empathise completely with that feeling of sheer exhaustion & despair you get at 5.30 on a winter's morning: I've never forgotten it.

DS2 is quite different, BTW!

What time of day is your DS having naps and how long for?

ds went through a stage of this - we tried everything (although not, I'll admit, getting up earlier to wake him, although I have heard good things of that technique.
He just stopped. Although it took too long before that happened
Coping mechanisms:

• go to bed stupidly earlier
• get a rota so you & dh/dp each do your share of mornings

It WILL get better (we had to wake ds - now 4 - up at 7.45 this morning!)

Thanks everyone.
Swaliswan - when I'm at home, he sleeps for about 90 minutes after lunch. When he's with our nanny he usually has a couple of hours before lunch. But there honestly doesn't seem to be any correlation between nap times/lengths and wakings.
Gordon - I'm trying to summon the energy to wake him up at 4.10 at the moment! I seem to remember doing it with dd when she was a bit younger than this and was waking at 3am on the dot. It worked, in so far as she stopped waking at 3am, though she then would just wake randomly at other times. But maybe worth a go.
For now, we've found that getting to him quickly with a bottle of milk seems to do the trick - before I was breastfeeding him and trying to settle him and either it was getting him over-excited or he wasn't getting enough and was still hungry. But a bottle of formula for the last 3 nights has meant he's gone back to sleep until around 6.30. Which is just marvellous in comparison. Combined with a rota system and earlier nights, we're all feeling a bit better...

is he teething? You have to be pretty adaptable until they are all through in my expereince.

11 months is still v young to be expected to sleep though forever

I would recomend 'naturally nurturing' a company that 'cured' my son who went through a 1 year period of 5 am wakings and he started sleeping till 7 through their advice

try waking him about 20 mins before he usually gets up, then putting him back to bed, meant to help break the cycle

I think you should limit his day time naps to 1 hour and then if that doesn't work to 1/2 hour. That is what I eventually did and finally at 18mths to nothing. When we did that he started sleeping 12 hours per night. Anything before 6 is horrible and I really sympathise. I think the naps in the day is the key. But I don't think you will see results until you do it consistently for 2 weeks.

My 7 month old DS has just started waking at 5am too. This is after a 3 week period of him not going to sleep when put to bed for the night (lots of screaming). So that stopped and now this! He has NEVER been a good sleeper though so this is just another in along line of things to tire me out.

We've been up since 5.30 too, despite not putting DS to bed til 8. No answers but lots of sympathy, I'm trying to make sure I get to bed a bit earlier...

What are his naps like?

I was having the same problem and someone suggested to me that I should cut him down his morning nap. God knows how but it does seem to work.

DS now has his main sleep at about noon after his dinner and usually sleeps for about 1.5 hours. If he's getting desperately tired mid-morning I let him have 10 minutes and wake him up.

His 5am waking now seems to have returned to 6:15-6:30am which I think is acceptable! 7am would be nice but ho hum! Saying that though, he was awake at 5am this morning

Oooooh another 11 mth'r loving 5 am starts soooo not good when I have my exams that day Grrr but they do grow out of it, my other two did anyhoo.