2 year old waking early for the day

[brooksieboy]

Hi!

Could someone look at our schedule and tell me what you think? My son has been waking early screaming and wanting to eat. 

5:30a wake and eat
12:00 lunch
1:00/1:30p - 3:00p Nap
5:30p dinner
7:30 bedtime (he goes down easily)

He's never been a long sleeper and usually won't go back to sleep in the morning even if he wakes at 4:30am (has happened a couple of times before).  He's an awesome eater, but lately hasn't been wanting a lot at dinner.  I'm wondering if we should offer him a snack before bed. 

Thanks in advance!

Tara

[sianie]

Hi there..

Waking up from sleep screaming usually indicates OT or some sort of pain/discomfort.....does he have his 2nd yr molars through yet?

Do you think he is genuinely hungry when he wakes early or has it now become a habit if you see what I mean? You could offer a snack before BT if you feel he's still hungry but I would stop the 5.30am feed as this could be re-inforcing the early wake-ups.

Looking at your routine, he has a very long AM A-time & very short PM A-time for his age before BT....I wonder if him waking early could be UT as he just isn't tired enough when he goes to bed. It could be that he's got into a bit of an OT/UT loop. His nap is also quite long for his age, I had to start capping my DD's nap at around 2yrs old as we started to get some EW's.

You could try moving his nap a little earlier to say 12.30pm & cap it at 1.5hrs & then do BT for 7.30pm-ish?

Does this help?

[brooksieboy]

Thanks for your quick reply!  He normally wakes between 6:30 and 7 but recently it has been 5:30 so a 1pm nap seemed right.  We will get him down early today and see if that helps with the early wake-ups.  I'll wait to experiment with snack before bed after we try the earlier nap.  And I'm pretty sure he has his molars.  I'll let you know how it goes tomorrow!

Thanks!

[sianie]

Yes, I would definitely try an earlier nap to curb some of the OT, also give meds if you think he's teething to see if this helps.

Good luck! 

[brooksieboy]

Wow!  It has been quite a weekend and then Halloween.  His bedtime routine has not been consistent this weekend, so I'm hoping we can get back into a routine this week.  He has been wanting to nap earlier which lines up with what you suggested.  Maybe tomorrow will be better.

Tara

[sianie]

Keep me posted & hope you manage to get things back on track!

[brooksieboy]

he did much better last night.  He woke up at 630 instead of 530 and we put him to bed at 7 so definitely an improvement! hope it continues!