Am I doing something to renforce early wakings?

[clareharley]

Harley is asleep by 6pm or soon after and he now usually sleeps until 4.30/5am. If he wakes at 4.30 I think he goes back to sleep for half an hour or so. Occasionally, he'll wake up at 5.30am but maybe he's woken up before this but I haven't woken up to know about it.
The problem I've got is that he'll have his morning and midday nap - usually a total of 1 1/2 but that means then then goes from 1pm - 6pm without sleep. I need to find a way to shunt foward all the sleeps to close this gap a bit but until he wakes up later, I can't do it because by 8am he's more than ready for a nap and likewise by midday.
I think he's now waking early, not because he's overtired but because his body clock is set that way now. He's a happy little thing during the day - until it comes to getting him to sleep and he is less so! - and only starts getting cranky around 4pm which is when he always used to have his afternoon nap. I can't even get him to sleep in the buggy anymore. He just cries. I'll have a look at some of the schedules for when you drop down to 2 naps and see if there's a way of spacing them out a bit better.

[emmas]

Hi Clare,

I've just been reading your new post - didn't want to add to it as I want you to get some advice/help.  I've got the 4.30 monster back too and its taking me nearly an hour to get him down for a nap so I'm feeling your pain......

H is still ill (having tests now) so I feel really bad trying to pat him to sleep when all he wants is me, I've even had to start feeding him when he wakes up at 4.30.

You still sound fairly positive (I don't know how!!) which I'm sure must be getting you through the day (or looking forward to the glass of wine in the evening lol).  I really hope you get some sound advice it must be really hard on you with just 2 half an hour naps and hard on Harley too. 

Take care
Emma x

[clareharley]

Thanks, Emma. I'm just reminding myself it won't last. Having said that, he slept for 1.20mins this morning. He hasn't done that in a while so I thought we were back on track. However, I've just given up trying to get him down for his lunchtime nap. He gets in to such a state that I can't bear it!
I'm really sorry to hear that your little one is ill. So, they don't know what's wrong or are they testing him for something specific? At least that explains why he's waking up so early. I hope he gets over whatever it is soon. It's exhausting, isn't it!?!

Take care, both of you.
Clare.

[emmas]

They think he might have developed a lactose intolerance due to having a bad stomach bug, but need to rule out him having an infection in his gut first.  He is fine in himself, just keeps projectiling from both ends - which you're right is exhausting - I don't think my washing machine can cope with much more!!!

I don't know whether this is any help to you, but I've discovered that Harry will only sleep at set times regardless of what time he wakes - even so its still a battle to get him down.  He seems to want to go 5 hours without a nap, I'm sure its just a phase (A VERY LONG PHASE.....) I just think myself lucky that he does actually sleep through the night until the early hours so it could be worse.

I don't know about you I feel like I'm upsetting him so much almost forcing him to nap - I quite often end up with both of us crying and then I just give up - then I get the biggest smile when we leave his bedroom - if he could speak I'm sure he'd say Ha, told you I'd win!

[clareharley]

Yes, exactly! Harley's face goes from contorted howling to an instant 'ha ha I've won face' as soon as we leave the bedroom! We can't force them to sleep, can we. Like you say, the fact they're sleeping through the night is a saviour. I'm just worried that if what's left of the day time napping disappears completely or we carry on with not much more than an hour a day, the night time sleep will become disrupted. Still, one day at a time.
I hope Harry's bug gets sorted out soon.
Take care,
Clare.