Very early Wakening- 14 month old

[slomama]

my lo has been waking up very early for the past week.  he goes to bed around 8p.m.  i feed him a bottle before bed, change his diaper, read a story.  it is a quiet and relaxing bedtime rountine.  he goes to sleep on his own, in his own bed with his pacifier and his snuggly blankie.  he has been sleeping until about 4a.m. or 4:30a.m. - (which is a huge improvement since we have struggled since age 6 month with several night wakings). however, when he wakes at 4 or 4:30 now, he will not go back to sleep.  i have tried leaving him in there, but he cries and fusses until 6a.m.  i have also tried going in and laying him back down in his bed, with the same result of him crying and fussing, and never returning to sleep.  at 6a.m. i will finally get him out of bed.  maybe my expectations for him to stay in bed until 6a.m. are unrealistic- i don't know?  i feel for us all to be out of bed earlier than 6a.m. is too early.  any advice on getting him back to sleep at 4 a.m.  any advice or help would be greatly appreciated!  Thanks, kirsten

[aidenmc]

I hate those early mornings. My lo wakes at 5 am like clockwork. It is sometimes really risky if he has a nightwaking hear 4 because he will gradually wake up for the day! The only thing I can suggest is an earlier bedtime. I have heard that it can help with early mornings although to be honest my lo seems to wake at 5 regardless of when he goes to bed. The only exception is if he has a bad night and wakes around 3 something and gets back to sleep after 4. Then sometimes he will go till 5:30 or 6. I try to keep him in his crib until 6. Sometimes if he is really fussy I will give him a feed then stick him back in with a bunch of toys (once I know he is definitely awake for the day). He doesn't always like it and often whines on and off but at least e get a few more minutes of sleep. I will follow this to see if anyone else offers good advice,. Is you lo tired at 4? I know some have considered w2s, but don't know if that would help or not. Also, do you have black out curtains? I know it starts getting light here before 5.

becky

[Florencia]

Hi Kirsten,

First of all, it is not unrealistic to expect him to sleep until 6 am... it is the less both of you deserve! Having said that and since he's waking as early as 4 am, i'd like to know how the rest of the day is like. How many naps is he having and for how long? i'm afraid that going to bed at 8 pm is quite late for you guys,since he's waking so early. Many little ones who wake that early is due to overtiredness and you'd be surprised to look at the amount of mommies around here that have found early bedtime to be the solution for their early mornings. Even when lo's are set to be early birds, at least they get more sleep when being put down early in the evening.

I'd like to have a look at your daily schedule to rule out other triggerers as hunger, reflux, etc. But definetly he needs more than 8 hours of night sleep given his age, so let's work on your schedule to get what you both need!

hth and we'll be looking for your reply!

[slomama]

hopefully i am replying on the right place.  if i don't get a response i will try contacting you directly.  i am kind of new to this.  my baby boy, cruz, wakes up, as i mentioned before around 4- 4:30 a.m. i keep him in his bed until 6 a.m.  he nurses when he wakes up, plays, eats breakfast around 7 a.m., goes down for a morning nap around 9-9:30 a.m.( 1- 1 1/2 hours)  he wakes, plays , eats lunch, takes a 4 oz. bottle, takes a nap around 1:30 or 2 p.m. (1 - 1 1/2 hours). after nap we pick up sister from school (school is out on wednesday), play, dinner, bath, books and pj's, bottle, and bed around 8 p.m. he does not nurse or take a bottle to go to sleep.  his overall demeanor during the day is fair.  he is in a good mood after meals.  he fusses and whines a lot during the day, which i feel has to do with a lack of sleep.  the few times that he has slept more at night, he has been less whiney.  he also has at least 2 snacks and a sippy of soy milk during the day. 

after getting your reply, i put him down at 7:30 p.m. tonite.  i'll let you know how that went.  i was previously putting him down earlier and it didn't seem to help.  but i am going to try it again. 

thanks so much for advice.  look forward to hearing from you again.

thanks,
kirsten

[MrGreedy]

aaggghhhh!  so glad it's not just me altho my daughter sleeps till 5-5.30am but this is still too early for me!!!

she is 14 months and has recently started walking so I don't know if this has got anything to do with it - she goes to bed at 7.30pm and has 1 sleep of no more than 2 hours sleep a day (usually between about 11am-1pm, sometimes earlier)...her room is so dark it is like a cave so I can't do anymore there - I don't know if I'm brave enough to put her to bed earlier as it might go to 4am and stay at that!!  help please!!

[imsmum]

McGreedy--you may want to try pushing the nap back a bit to see if that helps.  sometimes an early naptime reinforces an early wakeup.

Kirsten--what was his wakeup time before the early wakings started?  It may be that he is ready to trasition to one nap as shortened night sleep is usually one of the signs.  Molars? Cold?

[slomama]

he has gotten two molars recently.  he was sleeping until 6:30 a.m. on good mornings for about two weeks prior to his early wakings. last night i put him to bed at 7:30 p.m. and he slept until 5:30- which was a lot better.  at what age do babies usually transition to one nap?- you may be right about him being ready for only one nap.  if his early waking continues even with an earlier bedtime, i think i will try transitioning to one nap.

mcgreedy- i also have the fear of an earlier bedtime causing even earlier waking.  in fact months ago when his bedtime was earlier and he was waking very early, i pushed his bedtime a bit later.  it didn't seem to make that consistent of a difference. cruz's room is also a dark cave.  sorry i don't have any advice.  but if you try something and it works, please let me know. 

[imsmum]

My older dd transitioned to one nap at 11 months and my younger at about 16 months.  I think the avergae age is between 15 and 18 months so you are pretty much there.  I think you have a good plan with trying the earlier bedtime to see what happens (he may sleep longer for a little while if he is catching up on sleep) but if the early wake ups continue and you've been able to rule out teething, I would start the transition to one nap.

McGreedy--you may also want to move the bedtime back just .5 hours.  Your lo is going down about 6.5 hours after wakeup which is a lot longer than most lo's can tolerate especially just after transitioning to one nap.  I think Tracy recommends about 4.5 hours and if you look at the toddler schedule sticky I think most lo's go down about 5 or so hours after nap wakeup.  I know with Margot if she wasn't asleep 5 hours after she woke from her nap we would all pay!

[MrGreedy]

oooh right, thanks!!  I will try to wait to put her down maybe until after lunch and see how we go, altho she did that yesterday at nursery and slept for just one hour in the day but didn't seem to make any difference as she was up at 5am today   

I might also try putting her to bed early tonight...I just worry that the more sleep she has, the earlier she will wake!

[MrGreedy]

I meant to say, she's only had one nap in the day (usually) for a good few months now, always in the morning but she's only been getting up this early for a few weeks....

can you please point me to the sticky that you mentioned?  I cannot find it

thanks!

[imsmum]

Sorry Mr Greedy I have been referring to you by the wrong name--time to get those eyes tested!  the sticky is "what does your toddler day look like".  You may want to try just pushing the nap back slowly so that she doesn't get overtired and only have a short nap--maybe 15 minutes for 3 days, then another  15.  Likewise with the early to bed you may want to try just 15 minutes or so at first if you are nervous and see how that goes

[Hsmum]

I think it's down to too much daytime sleep and too late a bedtime. I had same problem, then finally dared to put DS down earlier at 6.45pm - slept for 12 hours!

[imsmum]

I don't know that  the 2 hour nap is too long for a 14 month old--if you believe the sleep experts our lo's should be napping that long until age 2, so if that is how long she naps I wouldn't necesarily cut that short.  I know with my dd a shorter nap doesn't necessarily translate into a longer night sleep--it usually just results in night waking from overtiredness!  But I do agree that he early bedtime may help especially until you can get the nap pushed back a bit.

[MrGreedy]

well how bizarre!!  for the past 3 nights, we have put her bedtime back to 7pm and she has slept much later!!  the 1st morning, she woke at 4.50am and was awake for an hour but she wasn't really crying so we ignored her and she went back to sleep until 7.40am!  Next morning, she woke at 6.10am for 10 mins, didn't even cry and went back to sleep until 7.45am...this morning, she cried for a few mins at 4.30am and then woke up at 7.10am...bliss!  don't want to jinx it but just wanted to say thanks for the tips!! 

[katejude]

Sorry but I haven't read all the replies but I did want to reassure you that it might just be a stage.  My DS went through a stage (lasted about one month) when he was 14 or so months where he woke at 5am every morning.  It was hell - it's so early!  But he now wakes at about 6.30am/7am.  So hopefully it's a stage for your bub too!!!