early morning waking AND night terrors?!

[tuesdaym]

my 2 and half year old is going through a dreadful spell of night terrors (2 months) and also early morning waking. When he wakes in the night he is ice cold sweat screaming and it can take nearly half an hour just to stop him crying. My husband took to lying on his floor until fell asleep, but we have managed to knock that in the head with controlled crying - surprisingly after ten minutes he will be asleep.
NOW the early morning rising. 5am. we have a 1yr old also so scared to wake him. usually needs a wee, but then won;t go back off. AGAIN lying on floor to keep quiet, but when try to creep out he screams again. Do we use controlled crying? make youngest is more wakeful then, so dread waking both up at this unearthly hour.
HELP!

If he's waking for a wee is he out of night time nappies? Maybe a night time pull-up would help in the short term? Then he wouldn't have to get out of his warm bed and might find it easier to drop off again.
We had a couple of months of dd waking at 4.45am every day without fail. Wanted to throw myself out of the window but luckily dh is far more patient than me. Thankfully it was just a phase and ended as suddenly as it had started. After ds was born they both went through a fantastic phase of waking at 8.30am which was just amazing.
I find if I get stressed about the early waking it makes it worse. If I go with it and bring dd/ds downstairs I don't feel half as bad. Could you and dp take it in turns to get up with him?
BTW my 2 share a room and never wake each other, even when ds cries. Don't know why this is though!

hi, it is good to hear that someone else has been through this. I guess i will look back one day and laugh when they are teenagers not wanting to get out of bed!
he is in night time nappies for comfort, but he has never used one. he has a block. i am not sure i shoudl tell him to in case gives wrong message. 5.50 am this morning, so half hour better. would you say better to get up than try crying down? too stressful i think to cry down when clearly all he wants to do is get up. he is SO tired by lunch time though. I am toying with the idea of later bed time, but i love my evenings with husband - is this dh ??? not sure i understand all the short hand yet!

My DS also went through a phase of night terrors and early waking. He's not had any terrors for nearly a year now, but he seems to get anxious about firework noises, so we'll see if the terrors come back in Oct/Nov...

As far as early waking, we also did CC and found it very affective for bedtime and middle of the night, but absolutely useless for early waking as he's just, well, awake.

Have you seen these toddler clocks? The idea is that if the picture of the bunny walking is lit up, then the child knows he can get up too; if the bunny is in bed, then the child knows it's not time to get up yet. Of course it takes some time to teach them to understand the concept (and maybe your LO is a bit young?) but it has really worked for us. My DS is now 3.10 and knows that he can come through to our bed when the bunny gets up at 6.

There is another version of the clock here, but some people think it's a bit sinister

If none of that is any use to you, daisy's advice to go with the flow is wise. I find that if I try and fight it I just lie there listening to him cry and get up at 6, so I don't gain anything by not getting up at 5.30.

Good luck!

I think most children go through the early waking phase. DD gets up anywhere between 5.45 and 7 and is often very tired after lunch. DS has a sleep at this time so I usually put a dvd on for dd and let her lounge around on the sofa for a couple of hours. She dropped her daytime sleep at 2.5 and won't sleep but the rest does her good. By the time ds is awake she's ready to play again.

Hope this phase ends soon for you, it's a killer.

(and yes, dh is husband, I'm still getting the hang of it myself!)

many thanks daisy & stubbyf (!) i think i will invest in the bunny clock. he is 2.10 yrs and is pretty bright minded so may grasp it. seen some on ebay for less money! I also do the lunchtime power nap on sofa, it does help us through the afternoon.
We tried the CC and as you said it worked bedtime and night and without waking other DS (1yr) but totally ineffective in the morning and mroe stress than it is worth! we had 6.20am this morn, which was good and wierdly when at my mum the other night they were both still asleep at 7.10 !!! i was trying to work out what was different and the only difference was that my husband wasn't there!
cheers ladies x