How can i make my 7 month old sleep longer!

[claire&kaid]

Hi,
I have a 7 month old son who has been a wonderful sleeper since he was born.  for the first month it was, as normal, a bit frantic but after that, he settled in to a pattern of going to bed at 7.30pm and waking up at around 6am everymorning.
For about 2 months now, he is waking up somewhere between 4.30 - 5am every day.  At this time, i have to give him a feed and then he's wide awake, so our day starts at 5am now.  I'm keen to get him back in to his original pattern of waking up at around 6am or later.  I have returned to work and it is essential for me to have more sleep !
If anyone has any ideas - i'd love to hear them.
Thanks
Claire

[Johno & Aurelias Mum]

I have an early waker and we've never really cracked that because that's just him.

However, the rule is that 6am is the earliest start.  Everything before that is treated as a night waking so I didn't feed him, chang him etc.  I just did pat/shh or pu/pd (whichever was appropriate for the age he was at) until he went back to sleep.

Some weeks were complete nightmares but without wishing to depress you, what I'm trying to say is that it was usually just a phase of a week or so.  The most important thing was not to start a bad habit.  So, I wouldn't feed him, I would put him back to bed and treat it like you would a night waking.

HTH