Please help with 15 month old early morning wake ups

[hopingforapeainapod]

Until about a month ago my 15 month old was a really good, high sleep-needs toddler - he had 2 naps for about 3 hours in the day and then slept 7.30pm-6.30am pretty much without fail.

Then mid-December he suddenly went through a big sleep regression - lots of night wake ups, early starts - so we have tried our hardest to move to a one nap day (not easy with the early starts) as we assumed that was the issue.

The one nap seems to have helped the night wake ups, but he is still waking up between 5-5.30am every day without fail, and it’s driving my husband and I mad!

He goes to bed around 7pm and now has a nap at around 12 for 1.5/2 hours (sometimes he has a short bridging nap around 9 as he’s so tired from the early start) - I’m really hoping he will learn to consolidate this nap so it’s more like 3 hours.

We have tried a slightly earlier bed (6.30), a slightly later bed (7.30), and neither have made a difference. He has a big bottle of milk before bed so I don’t think it’s hunger, although sometimes he has pooed which I think could be waking up? We have tried bringing him into our bed but there’s no way he will just cuddle and lie still!

The problem is I’m worried he might be overtired from the long wake windows (eg 5am-12pm and 2pm-7pm)?

If this was happening in summertime I think I would be more accepting of the early starts, but getting up in the pitch black at 5am in January is weirdly getting me down… please help!

It’s long wake windows and difficult transition from two naps to one nap

can you let him sleep at 9 for longer and have a 20 minute snooze at 3 on?

then keep pushing the 9am sleep back linger and linger each day till you hit 11.30 but keep the afternoon snooze at 3pm but never more than 20 minutes and 15 if possible

This is pretty normal for a toddler. My 2 year old gets up at this sort of time most days. My older DC used to do it too but now at school wake ups have pushed back for her to 6.30am finally.

I’m not surprised it’s getting you down, who wants to be up at that time on a dark cold winters morning! From experience and from reading many similar posts over the years, I don’t think it can be fixed but it will likely stop naturally at some point. In the meantime, can you alternate being there for the wake ups with your partner? I think I used to cope by bringing her in bed with me with some milk and toys while I watched some morning telly.

I wouldn't let him have a nap at 9am regardless and I think that 1.5 hour lunch nap at 12, pushing back to 1pm shoukd help. Is there any noise waking him at that time eg. A neighbour banging a door?

@MikeRafone I could try but I think he would really really resist that afternoon nap (this was another reason we made the transition to 1). He can very naturally cat nap in the morning in the pram or car, but absolutely will not do that in the afternoon!

@Jk987 yeah that’s what my mum says - I’m trying to accept it’s just a phase but to be honest it’s been quite a relentless winter with illnesses and teething etc, plus we are actually trying to sell our house at the moment so rather stressed by that, so an extra hour in bed would really really help at the moment!

@mcmuffin22 we could try but if he gets up at 5am there’s absolutely no way he will last from 5am-1pm without any sort of nap in the morning!

I just feel very much caught in a cycle - I feel like even if we could have just one morning where he wakes up at 7am we could ‘reset’ and get back on track. My husband also says that by getting up with him at 5am we are just reinforcing the habit, but I really don’t want us (or our neighbours!) to have to make him cry it out…

You’re not having one nap though, you’re having two, one tiny and one longer

the 9am cat nap is helping him to wake early, along with his poo. Pushing the 9am cat nap later and later would help - but then you’re ling nap will be later

Well that is one tactic.....decide on an acceptable time and then do anything you can to keep him in his cot until then eg.6am. When he is up at 5am does he have food/milk straight away as you may have inadvertently reinforced that he's hungry at this time.

Could you try and get a really long nap out of him one day? Contact nap perhaps? Just to push the nap later in the day and get bedtime back in the right place. The early starts are obviously throwing off the whole day making it hard to fix. Keep him busy to prevent the 9am nap as it'll lower the sleep pressure needed for the proper nap at midday. Then try and get him to sleep until 2ish so you can put him to bed at 7pm. If he goes to bed over or under tired it can cause the early wakes.

10–11 hours overnight is average; that’s exactly what he does. He needs a later bedtime if you want later wake. Sleep needs drop so you can’t expect he’ll always need the same amount of sleep.i wouldnt be pushing for a 3 hour nap; that’s far too much day sleep. 2 hours is plenty.