21mo EW - teeth, illness or routine change???

[Lou'sMum]

Hi,

My LO has never really been that consistent sleep wise and I feel I seem so tackle one problem, alls well for a while then something else crops up… but i'm sure thats all part of being a mama!!  

For the past wee while things have been great, and our routine was somethings like this (most days):

wake: 6.20
Nap: 12.30 for 1.5hrs
Bed 7.30

Naps are (date I say it out loud…) great. Down without a struggle and I have to wake him almost every day. BT is much the same. This is after a few hard months of GW right enough.

Anyway, he seemed to be doing great on this but over the past few weeks we've been getting EW ranging from 4 (!) to 5.30. He used to chatter to himself for 10 mins then go back to sleep but now he will lie there for AGES chattering away and won't go back to sleep. He then gets fed up and starts crying. Im reluctant to go in and see him until his old wake up time, so leave him unless he does cry.

I just wonder if its something routine wise going on? I'm not giving him longer naps when he's having the EW - could it be OT? He is also getting canines in (finally!)  and there are loads of colds been passing around too. AND the damn clocks changing last week didn't help much.

I also wondered if a groclock might help?

Your thoughts are as always appreciated!

x

[~Karen~]

I think he might be a bit young for a groclock but someone else might chime in who's used one from this age.  My ds2 is 21 months as well and don't think he'd get a groclock at this age!

How has he generally been with sleeping?  Does he tend to be high or low sleep needs?  My ds2 is reasonably high sleep needs and he's general routine is:

630/7am Wake
1230-230/3 Nap
730 Bed

Teething and illness obviously don't help things though but it could be a bit of OT as well.  Would he still go down ok for the night with a 2 hour nap? 

[Lou'sMum]

I did wonder about him being too young for the groclock but might give it a go anyway. I'm obviously biased but he is super clever so maybe he will, haha!

TBH i've never really sussed how high his sleep needs are, we've always in the throws of something or other that there has never really been a 'normal' time to think about it! I personally could sleep for Scotland but DH is always an early riser so I think there is a little of it coming from him… he gets the blame anyway!

I might give him a longer nap for next couple of days and see where that takes us. I really don't want to push BT any later as we only get a few hours as it is before having to head to bed ourselves.

Last night was a bit different. Has another nasty cold working on him but sleeping for 7pm, then a coughing fit woke him at 2am but I managed to settle him in 1/2 hr i think then that was him till 6.20.

So maybe it is just the teeth and cold combo, and will pass soon!

Thanks for replying. x

[~Karen~]

Don't blame you on not wanting to push bedtime later!  Hopefully if he naps 1230-230pm then he'll still go down at 730pm if he's a little OT and needs to catch up a bit.