4.5 month old early morning waking

[Rhiannasummer]

Hi all

I was wondering whether someone could check over our routine to see if there are any tips/recommendations for the early morning wake ups. Ideally we'd like a wake up of 6am as that's when he will need to get up in a couple of months when I go back to work.

4.30/5.00am
My little boy wakes up around this time. He will just happily chat away and wiggle and will doze in and out of sleep. We don't go into until 6am as we don't want any habits forming unless he starts crying but he rarely ever does cry at this time, just wiggles and chats.

6am
Up and dressed.

6.15am
Feed

7.15am
He is very tired from 7am (probably because he's been up so long already). I go up at 7am, change his bum and then have a wind down and then he usually drops off by 7.15am

9am
Up and activity time (some tummy time and wiggling in mat)

9.30am
Feed

10.45am
He is starting to show tired signs at 10.30ish so again I take him up at 10.30am for wind down time and he usually falling asleep by 10.45am

It's 50/50 as to whether this app is great or not. 50% he wakes after 45mins and then dozes on and off until wake up time. I keep him in his cot until at least half 12 giving him the opportunity to doze in and off during these days.

12.30-1.00
Up. Bit of activity time.

1.30pm
Feed and activity time after

3.00pm
Half hour to 45 min nap. Never goes any longer than at even though we have tried and tried

4.00pm
A little bit of food or a drink of water depending on how much he had At lunch

5.45pm
Bath time. He is tired at this time and starts to get grouchy which is why we take him up at this time.

6.00pm
Feed

6.15-6.30pm
Sleep

10.30pm
Dream feed

He sleeps really soundly from putting him to bed until the early morning wake up - sometimes he wakes around 3ish but settles himself back to sleep very quickly.

Really appreciate any comments and suggestions anyone might have.

[Skadiver13]

Hi hun by putting him down at 715 you are reinforcing that early wakeup. He's essentually treating the 430-7 as a night waking and tacking on that first nap as part of his n5ught sleep. I went through this with my son around the same age. 430 wake ups were awful. I ended up having to push through OT and set a nap at whatever his normal naptime would be. So if you want a wakeup of 6am pick what his nap would be and stick with that. 

How old is your litle one?

[Rhiannasummer]

He's 4.5 month. I thought that was what it might be as if he slept through to 6am then I didn't think he should get tired so quickly. Thankfully my husband does the last feed so I can get to bed early so I'm not too much of a walking zombie from the early starts!

So I just have to keep him up untilmhis usual nap time or should I do it in increments over a couple of days? How long did it take your little one to adjust? When your little one was this age what time was his usual morning nap time from waking?

Thanks so much for your help.

[Skadiver13]

So I just have to keep him up untilmhis usual nap time or should I do it in increments over a couple of days? How long did it take your little one to adjust? When your little one was this age what time was his usual morning nap time from waking?

Yeah we went through this too until someone mentioned the same thing to me. I think over ap eriod of weeks I stretched it about 15min at a time every 2 days so as to combat OT because my LO didn't handle it well. It all depends on how well your LO handles OT how fast you can push it. 

My DS is 4.5 now so I can't remember what his a times were but I know he was always on the lower end. He still naps to this day (although short naps and not every day)