At my wits end...please help!

[Sabine]

Hi,

I wrote a while back about my 33 mo old.  We were fighting bedtime and naps and while we were on vacation we dropped the nap and for the whole week we were away and the week we returned home, he was sleeping 630-630/7am.  For the last few weeks, things have been wonky with his sleep.  He hasn't been consistent at all.

He has now been waking anywhere from 5-6 am (and sometimes as early as 430).  We have tried putting him back and sometimes will fall asleep and other times not.  He won't take a nap the days he hasn't slept because he refuses.  He won't do any NW just early waking.  We have tried adjusting bedtime earlier and still not working.  I am sure it has something to do with the fact I am pregnant and he is an EXTREME mommy suck now.  DH and I need to sleep and break this cycle as it has been going on for over a month now and I am literallly at my wits end to get some sleep.  At least when he did nap, I could nap too.  Now that's gone too. 

Please help.  I wrote about this before and was told it would just work itself out after dropping the nap but it hasn't and has been over a month.  I need some advice on how to get him back to sleep and adjust his sleep so this stops happening.  Our marriage is suffering too.

 
Sabine     

[Layla]

Sabine, sorry to hear things are so rough at the moment.

Can you please tell me what time he goes to sleep? What do you do when he wakes that early in the morning? Do you get him out of bed or do you leave him there?

Is he in a big bed? If yes, you could try introducing a nightlight with a timer on (which is what I have done with my dd). Some buy a bunny clock. Whenever Isabella wakes up before the nightlight goes on, she will still wait for it to come on before she calls out for me.

She is very prone to early wakings when she's overtired. When you say you tried the earlier bedtime... did he tend to wake even earlier or did he still wake at the same time in the morning. It might be a case of getting him to catch up on his sleep debt and then pushing bedtime again.

Layla

[Sabine]

Thanks for the reply. 

If he wakes b/w 6-630 we usually put him down by 630-645 and he usually falls right asleep.  If he wakes before then we aim to have him down and asleep by 615-630 and a few times even 6.  He will usually wake even earlier sometimes and occasionally do a NW if this happens.

He gets out of bed and we usually reinforce its night time and try putting him back to bed and he'll just keep coming out.  Sometimes I cave and have him snuggle in bed with me (bad I know but when you are tired you try anything) and he usually doesn't fall asleep, he'll just lie there.  We look at the clock with him and say we aren't getting up until 6 oclock but that doesnt work either.

I don't even know what time to put him to bed tonight and he's been up since 430.

[Layla]

If he's been up since 4.30pm, I would probably do no later than 6pm. Also on a day like that... I would take him for a drive to get a nap in (if possible). Could somehting else be waking him up? Is he too cold/too hot? Could he be teething his last molars? Maybe he's used to the early morning cuddle? If its about the same time every morning then you could try w2s... What about a gate at the door to stop him from coming out.

Seriously, try putting something in his room to act as a cue when its time to wake up. Is the clock in his room?

[Sabine]

No it's in our room.  I am willing to try anything so I will try a clock in his room too.  He was able to sleep this afternoon (ony 45 min though) but I put him down for 630 and he fought me until 715 and asleep by 730.  Hope tonight is better.

[Layla]

Fingers crossed for a good night!!! Glad he took a nap... 45mins is enough to take the edge off.

Definitely a good idea to have a clock, or something he can go by to see when is the appropriate time to wake up or not in his room rather than in your room or anywhere else.

Keep me posted