EWs:Tips on teaching your child how to sleep past 5:30am :(

[Grants]

No. He can't have long naps everyday as he start to have long NWs due to UT. That's why I only do it once or twice in the week 

[Shiv52]

{{{hugs}}}}}

Have you ever done a consistently later bedtime?  The only other option I see apart from accepting the EW and working on him waiting longer in the morning is to do a later bedtime and push his wake up later that way?  Or am i forgetting you don't want a later bedtime?

[barbaraz78]

So difficult to give an advice. You have tried almost everything. But if the problem is that he's tired already in the morning, he needs more sleep for sure. You could try to let him having a longer nap for 1 or 2 days more. What do you think?

[shivi]

have you tried longer naps and a much later bedtime to push things out...like nap as much as he pleases?

With Oscar, we did this to "reset" when things got ridiculous from time to time (like pre 5am wakings). so he'd nap till 3 or even 3.30pm and then a 8 or even 9pm sleep time meant we were guaranteed a 7am ish wake-up. Granted, Oscar was a LOT older when we tried these antics...like heading for 3yrs ish.

s x

[Grants]

Hi ladies,

We had an awful night last night. One very long NW ( 2 hours) !   We haven’t had a night like that in ages After the bad night he still woke up at 5am and He waited for the sun, which was set to 5:30am.

Long NWs for us mean UT and/or teething.I think he is teething as his cheeks were really red this morning.  He could be UT for sure as I let him have a longer nap yesterday (1.5 nap and he woke up by himself), bear in mind this was the third longer nap of the week. I had already given him 2 longer naps. One on Thursday( this is the only day I allow him to nap longer since it’s the day at home after 2 days at nursery so I give him a very early and longer nap).  And one on Sunday as we had a birthday party so I wanted him to be rested for the OS of the party). So yesterday he had his third day of 1.5 hour nap and only had 6 hours A time before bed. He normally needs between 6.5 or 7.5 dependent on the day.

Have you ever done a consistently later bedtime?  The only other option I see apart from accepting the EW and working on him waiting longer in the morning is to do a later bedtime and push his wake up later that way?  Or am i forgetting you don't want a later bedtime?

have you tried longer naps and a much later bedtime to push things out...like nap as much as he pleases?With Oscar, we did this to "reset" when things got ridiculous from time to time (like pre 5am wakings). so he'd nap till 3 or even 3.30pm and then a 8 or even 9pm sleep time meant we were guaranteed a 7am ish wake-up. Granted, Oscar was a LOT older when we tried these antics...like heading for 3yrs ish.

I have done this ladies, He just doesn’t tack on:( .  He would go to bed at 8:45 even 9pm and still be up 6.15am the latest. He was having really short nights just to add 30 mins or 45 mins to his mornings. His total was also shocking! Like 10 hours or 10.5 hours including the nap. He was only 21 months then. I just don’t know how he coped with so little sleep.  

You could try to let him having a longer nap for 1 or 2 days more. What do you think?

I don’t think that is the answer either. Yesterday was his third day of longer nap and look what happened???

One thing I don’t understand is the fact that he was in an incredibly good mood this morning??? So is this kid happier with less sleep??? I don’t get this??? He has been sleeping through the night for 10 days or so, with only 2 bad nights in between. On STTN days he was a bear in the morning with this horrible long NW he was super happy this morning. I really don’t understand DS and his sleep patterns

[barbaraz78]

With DS I often find the same: when he sleeps better, he seems more tired than when he has short nights and NWs. I think it is the same for us (for me at least): I can go for several days without sleeping enough and don't feel it, but when I relax and sleep better then I feel all the tiredness I have accumulated. It's the same thing, I guess.

Anyway, we had a bad night too, with a NW of more than 1 h  (the last time we had this was several months ago), but this morning F woke up with fever (38 °C),  so I guess this was the problem. Tomorrow I have to leave for two days for a work travel, and he seems not being ok. Why do things happen always at the wrong time??

[Grants]

Teething suck!!! DS woke up at 4:50am this morning

[barbaraz78]

So sorry Grants! We had a 9h night too, due to fever. Teeth are very bad anyway

[Tweakster]

F went to bed at 8, asleep sometime after (I could hear him rustling).  At 5:45 DH put the monitor on and he was waking, rustling, sighing, moaning.  He can't seem to get back to sleep. 

I'm not saying not to try to work this out but I'm just saying sometimes you just have to live with what you got.  And lord knows I hate that answer and am always looking for ways to 'fix' my kid.  What Shivi did for Oscar hasn't worked for F - yet.  We just get the same EW with a shorter night.  The only time F will tack is with an earlier bedtime.  He'll usually sleep until the same EW.  We've gone back to a long nap with a short night because it puts him in a better mood at the start.  But he shaves as he goes so now we're slowly cutting the nap again.  Still fussing around with sleep at 2.5.  It's mind-blowing actually how a kid who is reasonably developmentally ahead in most areas struggles so much with the sleep thing.

Getting all teeth through did help, at the very least we could rule them out.

[*Becky*]

oh hun, hugs! FWIW we had many issues with EW's when H was teething. It did not seem to matter what we did he would wake early. I think until they are through just manage as best you can because routine tweaks do not always help or work when teeth are involved. Have you tried a df meds?

[shivi]

It's mind-blowing actually how a kid who is reasonably developmentally ahead in most areas struggles so much with the sleep thing.

still struggling with sleep at nearly 5.5 here...and probably always will.

S x

[Grants]

So sorry Grants! We had a 9h night too, due to fever. Teeth are very bad anyway

I hope your DS gets better soon Barbara. x

F went to bed at 8, asleep sometime after (I could hear him rustling).  At 5:45 DH put the monitor on and he was waking, rustling, sighing, moaning.  He can't seem to get back to sleep.

(((((Hugs )))))) on the short night Wendy. That's exactly what M does.Why won't they sleep?? It doesn't make sense

Have you tried a df meds?

Yep. We do the meds and everything. Teething it’s one of those things we need to ride out I suppose.... *sign*

still struggling with sleep at nearly 5.5 here...and probably always will.

Thanks Shiv, you have made me more depressed LOL

[Tweakster]

Yep and he was a miserable so and so this morning.  At about 6:50 when DH went in to get him he was lying there in the dark seemingly trying to sleep.  He just can't.  It seems like a developmental block.  Whatever it is, we have no control over it.  No Gro-clocks, no routine tweaks, no strategizing seems to make a difference.  All we try to do now is maximize overall sleep.  So even if that means a long nap, so be it.  If he starts dropping his overall sleep then we tweak again.  Sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't.  But we are always in a state of combating OT with this kid.  It's been a 2.5 year job for us.  And if I believe Shivi, looks like another 3 to go lol

[barbaraz78]

Thanks Grants. He resulted having throat Infection. Antibiotic for 10 days. And I'm in another city today and tonight.

[shivi]

we do get AMAZING sleep from Oscar sometimes these days. Quiet, low key evenings last two nights (DH away and no tv rule, eating tea at the dining room table all three of us etc etc) and showering on entering the house and not last thing (so we get in at 5.30 ish, shower and into jammies, fed and in bed with books by 6.15 ish and then lots of low key cuddles etc.

Last night we got sleep of 6.40pm to 6.05 am  - amazing for Ozzie. Hasn't done many 12 hr (or even 11hr) nights since he was 2.5.

Hardwired earlybird here....took me a while to catch on to the fact that he COULD do 12 hr nights if I let him tag in the evenings. Also, I had a newborn, baby and then toddler with MUCH different spirited sleep needs (with her crazy hours always being 7-10pm since birth) and a very jealous Ozzie when I'd try and put him down before her...

I was the same kind of kid as Oscar. Always in bed at 6pm as a kid, always up at the crack of dawn. ALWAYS. Even as a teenager, a lie on for me was 8.30-9am. I much prefered (and still do) early nights to lie ons.

A MAJOR issue for us in this sleep battle has been an ongoing process of nighttime wetting/dryness learning. I really think its been a bigger factor than I wanted to believe. Its been in the past 3 nights of AMAZING sleep (usual for us is 10.5-11 but it can be because DH is home and desperate to spend an hour with the kids in the evening and Oz gets to bed and sleep rather around 8pm and ALWAYS wakes at 6-6.30 unless we move him out over hols) that Oscar has gone the whole night without a dream pee but actually waking himself to pee around 11-12midnight.

I really do wonder whether this is a factor for us....(for me too as I was also wetting the bed as a 5 yr old) as well as the earlybird wiring we both seem to have.

S x