Awake at 4:30 am for the day!

[ondrea]

This is my first post, but I have read the book and the interview with Tracy and will be revisiting those tonight as well. 

My son is almost 6 months old.  Up until the middle of last week he would go to bed between 6:30 and 7 pm and wake up at 6 am.  The last 4 mornings he's woken up at 4:30 am and wants to be up for the day.  I'm not sure why this sudden shift to earlier, but it's havoc for us.  He isn't really hungry - we've fed him, but he eats around 4 oz.  Normally if he sleeps until 6 am he'll have 8oz for his morning bottle.  He is only having formula no cereal or solids due to allergies (we'll start in a few weeks). 

Any suggestions please?  Does he need to go to bed earlier? I wouldn't think later as he is tired and rubbing his eyes at night.  We do have a nighttime routine starting at 6pm. Which is bath, into pjs, read in the rocker and a bottle then to the crib.... 

[Wiki]

Do you have blackout blinds? Our LO went through weeks of waking between 4.30-6.30am, and its been a lot better since we got the blinds..

[teezee]

could you post your routine and any other relevant info please??

[ondrea]

Sorry - thought I had put most of the routine in there.

This is when he's up at 6:00
6:00 awake
6:15 - eat 8 oz
8 am - nap until 9:45 or 10 am
10 am - eat 6 - 8 oz
12:15 - eat 4 oz
12:30 nap *this one is usually a struggle sometimes 45 min other times 90 min
3:00 eat 6 - 8 oz
4:30 - 45 min "dinner" nap
6:00 bath
6:15 pjs
6:30 - last bottle
6:45 - 7 to bed and sleep

Hope that helps to clarify.  When he wakes at 4:30 - everything is just shifted earlier with 2 hours awake and trying for 2 hours asleep.

[teezee]

it sounds as though you just need to tweak lo's routine a little!

you may want to start extending A times slowly 15 min or so at a time and keep xtra A time very low key so lo doesn't get overtired or overstimulated in that time before sleep.

you really only need to feed your lo 4 times during the day at this point - say 6-10-2-6 if you can go a little longer or need to go a bit shorter than do it but you def don't need a fifth feeding at this point .. unless it is a night feeding.

if lo is waking at 6 am i would put lo to bed at 6am b/c the routine should be based on a twelve hr day kwim?

the early waking in every way signifies to me that lo is getting too much sleep and you probably need to cut out that catnap at the moment...you could try cutting it down in time but i think it would be easier just to be rid of it and you may possibly have to put lo to bed even a bit earlier than what i had suggested for lo to be able to make it through and not get overtired...but with extending A times it should push the day up some and make it a bit more realistic.

the second nap may be  a struggle if lo isn't tired enough to stay asleep...try extending all the A time slightly and slowly and see if this improves any.

hth! let us know how things are progressing