EW 24 month old

[Freckles1981]

Hi, my soon to be 2 year old has been waking up between 5/5.30 for the last couple of weeks. When he wakes, he seems happy enough and chats away (loudly!) to himself until we go in, so this can last for a good hour.

We've not changed his routine, and he always used to sleep until around 6.30. He goes to nursery 4 days a week so his day sleep can be a bit disruptive, sometimes he'll sleep for 40 minutes, other days he'll sleep for 2 hours, and he goes for his nap between 12 & 12.30. They always wake them by 2 for their afternoon snack.

When he's home, he's usually shattered by around 11.30 so we struggle to get lunch into him before getting him down for a nap much closer to 12, and we let him sleep until 2 and always have to wake him.

Bedtime starts at 6.30 as he is quite grotty at this time (especially on his nursery days), and lights out at 7. It often takes him 30 minutes to fall asleep but we don't need to help him as he's happy enough chatting away.

Any ideas for us to try to get him sleeping a little longer in the morning?

[Scottishmummy]

Hi there!

EW can be caused by a few things, it's a bit of trial and error sometimes to work out what's going on.

It could be a phase thing, maybe due to a developmental leap, which usually occur around birthdays and half birthdays, or it could be teething as the last set of molars often come in around 2yo. If it's either of these, he should settle again once the teeth are through or leap has passed.

The other thing I wonder is whether the EW is due to a bit of over-tiredness? Sometimes LOs sleep is worse when very tired, If his sleep is so variable on nursery days and he's always woken from it, could he need a longer nap on home days to catch up? It sounds like he's very tired on home days by nap time & everyday by bedtime, which suggests he might have some OT build up to me. What would happen if you let him have a longer nap on home days? I might be tempted to give him up to 3hrs & see if that helps catch up on some sleep?