Author Topic: how we fixed the VERY early wakings  (Read 35212 times)

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Offline ~tess~

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« on: February 15, 2004, 15:28:18 pm »
now we did have issues for 8 weeks so it could just have run its course, BUT, we had no naps and early wakings going on, so some days were less than 9 hours sleep for our son.  he is now 26 months.  was 24 when it started.

i finally kept him up late in the day and put him down for a nap super late.  he would wake at 5am and i tried nap at 3pm.  he slept 2 hours.  i put him to bed at 8pm and he slept til 7am.

what i figured out was he needed more awake time before his nap, thus a later bedtime, and thus HE SLEPT LATER IN THE MORNING!

in the past a later bedtime did not work for us.  he would still wake at the same time but now it helped shift the waking hour.  at some point the kids will sleep later int he morning when they stay up later, so seems our child it is happening now.  we shifted from 7:30 to 8:30 over the period of a week.  he is now sleeping to 7am consistently everyday!  and he naps around 2:30-3pm for an hour half to 2 hours.  yesterday he slept earlier and still went to bed at 8:30 and slept thru.

this was the longest sleep issue time we have ever had, so i hope this works for someone else too.  we did it gradually and it wasn't overnight but it worked and we like the later waking time so much!!!
~Tess~
DS, 13
DD, 12

graciesmom-as guest

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« Reply #1 on: February 17, 2004, 16:50:59 pm »
Tess, this method you have employed is just blowing my mind! :shock:   I am dying to have Gracie sleep later in the a.m., but to put off her nap for 10 hours from the time she awakes just seems to me that it would backfire, i'd have a cranky mess on my hands who would likely be too overtired to nap.

With Gracie, the later bedtimes never worked either, even if we tried it for several days in a row.  As it stands now, she wakes betw 6:15-6:45 and is really ready for a nap by 1pm, which is when i put her down.  She usually manages up to three hours most days, and is perfectly refreshed and happy.  So she wakes at 4pm (about) and goes down for the night by 8pm.  I tried earlier and later bedtimes, and she will frequently stay up and chat with herself til 9:30 on occasion.

I imagine her day nap is simply too long, but were i to cut her off or wake her she is a miserable wretch until bedtime, and still keeps herself up somehow (and yawns every ten minutes or so) and still wakes before 7 just about every day.  I would give anything for a later wake time and would then intend to push her nap off until 2-3 pm and be sure it is only an hour and a half to two hours.  But even then to wake at 4:30 or 5 and go right back down by 8 seems like she'd be dancing around the room for an hour...i know they are all different but why does she take so long to get herself down?

Do you have any suggestions for this one?  I am such a zombie in the morning (although with #2 on the way maybe this is how to prepare myself for less sleep!  :wink: )

TIA!

Carla

Offline ~tess~

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« Reply #2 on: February 18, 2004, 14:29:03 pm »
well that was the thing...andrew has always gone to be super early!  he went to be at 5:30 when he was 6 months old.  but he woke at 5am too!
my rule of thumb was to put him down 12 hours after he woke up, so we had early bedtimes.  it got better as he got older and we moved to 7:30/7 routine.  when these wakings started i knew a 5 or 6pm bedtime wouldn't work, but i will admit andrew not napping led to him going to bed at 6pm for a week.  he slept great.  i knew if i could get his nap back i could move bedtime back to a normal time for us.

andrew also used to nap after only 5 hours of awake time.  i watched it slowly move back to 8 hours!!!!  i just watched him one day for tired signals...and that is how we ended up at 3pm.  i can sometimes get him down at 2:30 if a busy day.  Now i want to say that if we are int he car at 12:30pm for longer than 15 min he will fall asleep.  but he wouldn't do that at home.  only in the car. 

if your dd is going to bed but not sleeping until later than why not hold off bedtime for half hour and see what happens.  it took us 2 months to get a routine back.  but in that time bedtime shifted an hour later and nap 2 hours later.....but we got the later mornings too.  it paid off.  everything changes and to see my child napping so late in the day is AMAZING.  he was always needing more sleep than other kids.  he just grew up!  we too had him resisting bedtime so we tried the later bedtime and everything fell into place. 

good luck figuring out how to proceed.  i didn't want to mess with things but it got so bad we had no choice and i wish i had only seen the cues earlier that he needed those sleep changes.  he is my little boy again with no whining!
~Tess~
DS, 13
DD, 12

Offline momtoava&connor

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« Reply #3 on: February 18, 2004, 20:53:40 pm »
Tess,

That is great news!  So happy for you and Andrew!!!!

Dd is doing better, too.  I have noticed that she will sleep longer (generally speaking!) if I put her down for a nap later in the day, too.  I have been trying to move her nap from 1ish to 2ish...hopefully it will help extend those naps! 
And she did the transition of later wakenings in the morning a couple of months ago (she goes down by 9, up around 7-7:30ish).  She seemed to do it on her own...and I LOVE IT!!  She wakes HAPPY in the morning, instead of crying for me. 

Only problem I have now is that we have moved her into a toddler bed (has gone smoothly so far), but she hops out of bed, opens her door and comes to my room as soon as she wakes (used to play happily in her crib for 30+minutes).  Short of locking her in her room, does anyone have suggestions on convincing her to play in her room until I come get her???
Jenny

Ava 5/27/02
Connor 3/15/04

We find delight in the beauty and happiness of children that makes the heart too big for the body.
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Offline ~tess~

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« Reply #4 on: February 20, 2004, 01:50:58 am »
we put a gate across the door when we moved to the bed.  sure he cried some, but it passed very quickly.  he learned if he cried at the gate he would fall asleep there and it isn't very comfortable! so he would wander the room , then go to bed.  letting him wander in his room alone gave him some independence but the gate set the limits.  hope that option works for you!

since the new baby we now have the door closed and that was a whole new ballgame of transition!!!
~Tess~
DS, 13
DD, 12

Offline CarlyK

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I hope you're still reading this nwtess!
« Reply #5 on: March 07, 2004, 02:20:52 am »
I have had this problem for months now and can't take anymore.  I'm going to try your suggestion, although I know that ds will be soooo tired by 2pm.  He's up between 5:30 and 6:30 most mornings and is falling asleep at lunch somedays.  If I stretch his awake time I may not be following his cues, but will give it a shot.  Thanks for the advice, I hope it works!  Baby #2 is on the way and I need some sleep in advance!!
Carly

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Offline ~tess~

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« Reply #6 on: March 19, 2004, 01:40:55 am »
yes, do try to do it gradually!  we tried noon, 1pm, 1:30pm, 2pm...etc. 

we now vary day to day.  yesterday was noon and he slept 3 hours!  but today was 1:30 and he slept an hour.  he is also starting to tell us when he wants his nap!  and the cues at this age are hard for us to see.  he will yawn but be happy, playful and no interest in sleep.  he tends to suddenly need to sleep.  be playing and then say he wants to nap and nap for hours!
~Tess~
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DD, 12

Offline DaddyJT

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Thank You!!!
« Reply #7 on: March 30, 2004, 07:24:21 am »
Hi, I posted in the sleep forum a while ago about the difficulties we were having trying to get our eldest dd (nearly 3y.o.) back into a good sleeping habit following the birth of her sister. She had been going to bed well as always but had starting waking up crying during the night and getting out of bed at 5:00am !

We tried your method of a longer, later nap and later bedtime and within three days it worked !

Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you,Thank you  :D

Alipav

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early wakings
« Reply #8 on: June 24, 2004, 20:16:51 pm »
We have a 20 month old son, and a 4 month old daughter.  Our little boy settles great at 7pm, but wakes at 5am, crying, will not go back to sleep, and is waking the baby.  Please help.  His nap times are usually 12 noon til 2pm ish.  He is a gorgeous boy, but we are on our knees with lack of sleep with the new baby, and i go back to work full time in a month.   :cry:

Offline ~tess~

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« Reply #9 on: June 29, 2004, 18:40:25 pm »
well my thought would be that if he wakes at 5am consistently you have 2 choices...

either purposely wake the child up before the normal waking time..about 15 min before...then settle back to sleep...do this a few nights....moving the time up 15 each time....the waking should go away.

or accept you have an early waker and put the child to bed earlier....move this slowly...half hour at a time
~Tess~
DS, 13
DD, 12

Offline momofowen

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« Reply #10 on: October 17, 2004, 13:43:33 pm »
I was just coming here to post about early waking with Owen.  He is 2.9 years old and has ALWAYS been an early riser.  He used to wake about 5 every morning ,but that was fine, since he and I would nap about 10 am for 2 hours then again in the PM.  recently (last few months) he has gotten rid of morning naps, and is only taking afternoon naps.  was going down abotu 2:30- sleeping for a few hours, then going to bed about 8.  wakes at 5:30...  he is consistently an early riser, but with a new baby we are trying to get him to stay asleep longer, even to take a nap now is difficult.  I need to make sure that he is down for a nap each day -he has gone 3 days no nap, my fault because I have been out and about and not able to nap him.  any advice.. I would hate to keep him up through 9pm, just because that is usually my time, and I don;t want to lose it :)
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Offline beamama

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« Reply #11 on: October 17, 2004, 13:54:42 pm »
Joseph has been doing this too, but now it is better. Gracias a Dios.
We started charting his sleep and that helped us get a better sense of what was going on.
Have you tried an earlier bedtime? I know that's the opposite of what Tess posted here, but sometimes you have to paly around with things to see what works.
We ahve settled into a good routine now--he is waking at 7 instead of 6, and has even napped the last few days. It is not usual for them to have spurts of not napping (sorry, I know that is no help to you with your dd!!)  :cry: But keep putting him in his room for quiet time. Is Owen having any night wakings? Night terrors? This was a sign for us that ds wasn't getting enough sleep.
sorry i am rambling and now have to go but check back in ok?
hth
Bea
« Last Edit: August 22, 2006, 02:40:56 am by beamama »
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Offline BB

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Early wakings/short naps
« Reply #12 on: August 12, 2005, 21:28:22 pm »
After 2 months of 5:15-5:30 wakings and one 45 min.-1 hr. naps, my 26 month old, Jacob, has finally started sleeping better. Much better! It has been a week and we have had a couple early days/short naps but, for the most part, the sleeping has been great! This change is due to Tess's advice that I read on this message board. She said that pushing back the nap time and, therefore, pushing back the bed time worked for them, so I thought I'd try it. It couldn't hurt! (we are now putting him down between 1:30 and 2:00 for his nap, instead of 1:00 and bedtime is now around 7:30-7:45, instead of 7:00)

I want to say-THANK YOU! I was so exhausted and dejected because we have tried everything we could think of to extend his naps and get him to sleep later in the morning. This was the only thing that worked! Our quality of life has already significantly changed. To anyone who is dealing with the same problem, give it a try. Even if you think your toddler should be napping earlier, try it anyway. It is worth it. As I type this, Jacob is on his way to taking a 3 hr. nap, which he has NEVER done in his short, little life. And-he slept until 7 am this morning. It is a true miracle! :D

Offline AmyGK

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Lamp idea worked for us
« Reply #13 on: September 22, 2005, 10:57:27 am »
Hi all -

Someone on this board suggested using a light on a timer for early wakings for their 2 yo.  Well, it has worked for us.  My DS just turned 2 and he used to wake at 6-6:15am - which was ok.  Then, he started a trend of 5am-5:30am - too early!  (He has had many sleep probs in the past 2 years - which we have conquered for the most part w/ the help of the BW books.)  Anyway, I put the lamp in his room on a timer to come on at 6:10am.  The first few days when he woke in the 5am hour, I would go into his room and lay down on the spare bed - go to him when needed - but explain that we had to stay in bed until the light came on.  He complained a little bit - esp. the days when we had 45m to kill before the light - I was always there with him and acted like I had no control over that light and we just had to wait it out! 

In about 4 days he stopped calling for me and just played quietly, dozed, played his aquarium until that light comes on.  Now, I can sleep while he waits - it has been great.  This has been working for us for about 10 days.  I didn't think it would work - but it has!

Give it a try - what do you have to loose?   :lol:

Sincerely,
Amy
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Offline Carmela's Mom

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how we fixed the VERY early wakings
« Reply #14 on: November 23, 2005, 14:22:43 pm »
Tess - or anyone else, I hope you can help me!!!!!!

My 19 month old daughter's schedule is currently

5:30-7 a.m. wake up (anywhere in those times)
7 a.m. water
8:00 breakfast
10:30 milk and snack
11:30 nap
1:30-2 wake up
2:00 lunch
5:30 dinner
6:00 bath
7:00 bedtime

And at 9:30 is her first cry out and then all night long she will wake at least 3 times and just fuss for a few minutes and go back to sleep.  FINE...well on most nights, she will play/talk for up to 2 hours!  We are up on most nights for 3 hours!!!!!!!!!  She is so loud when she plays/talks that we are up with her even though she isn't crying...(we don't go in to her as then she will start crying!).....so although a later bedtime did not work when she was a baby, I am thinking of giving this a shot now.  With the four day week upon us, I'm thinking of starting it tonight (if she'll nap later)....any advice?  Suggestions?  What time should I extend nap to?  I'm hoping for just an 8:00 bedtime...do you think this will make a difference?

I hope someone still checks this thread that can help me!