Early wakes. Please help.
Show your support
@Blair thank you. If he wakes before 5.30, I keep him in his bed in exactly the same conditions as night time, trying to get him back to sleep, but it's like his body just knows it's not going back to sleep as he acts completely different to how he does for a night wake. But anything after 5.30, I try for 10 minutes to get him back off and if he doesn't go off, I will turn the sound machine off and the light on, but we stay in his room until 6. I don't know what I can do regarding naps, because a nap any earlier, will result in an earlier bedtime and an even earlier morning wake 😩 He has only just started sleeping better, he has always been an early riser, but was up every 2 hours until 8 months and then still 3 or so night wakes until a month or so ago. But we had 2 weeks of consistently sleeping through until 5am a few weeks ago and then it all went to shit again 🤷🏼♀️
Yeah, sleep isn’t linear unfortunately 😔 Why would an earlier bedtime result in an earlier wake? That’s a common myth, but actually earlier bedtimes tend to lead to later wakes. It should also be noted that you have to do something consistently - exactly the same - for at least two weeks minimum to see if works. So you can’t just do an early bedtime a couple of times, see early wakes and think an early bedtime means an early wake as it doesn’t work like that. In your position I would be doing a 7pm bedtime, with an 11am nap, for 2-3 weeks to see the change xx
@Blair thank you. We only moved to the 1 nap on Monday as I have some time off work, so I was going to try this consistently for 2 weeks and see how this goes and then change it if it still doesn't seem to be working. He doesn't seem overly tired by 12 when I put him down and he is in a lovely mood all afternoon. I just don't know. When I am at work, he has to he awake by 6 anyway so that we can leave the house by 7. And then we don't get home until 5 and have to cook tea, wait for my husband to get home at 6 and then start the bedtime routine. It's hard
My daughter has struggled with early waking as well. The only thing that worked for us was a later bedtime. She’s on the lower needs sleep side so she has never slept 12hrs overnight. Even now, she’s 4yo if she goes to bed before 8pm she wakes up at 6am (no naps during the day). If she goes to bed between 8/8:30pm she wakes up at 7/7:30am. I know this contradicts the other comment but unfortunately not all babies are the same. You need firstly to understand if your child is on a lower/higher/mid needs sleep. I tried to follow the standard advice about sleep windows and 7pm-7am overnight and I was constantly fighting early wakings (4/5am) and my daughter didn’t seem overtired (it’s VERY clear when she’s overtired as she becomes extremely agitated and silly and prone to cry).
@Simona thank you! I honestly am not sure about his sleep needs, but put it this way, in his whole life, he has never ever had 11 hours overnight. He struggles to nap for long during the day, the longest period he has ever done in 1 stretch without me resetting him is 1 hour 40 🤷🏼♀️
Take a note of the total sleep (day and night) for a few days and try to understand if he’s generally overtired (even too excited, active can be sign of over tiredness), if he’s happy and calm I’d probably say he’s not overtired. At 18mo the average sleep is 12-14 TOTAL hours (day and night+ night), if he’s on a lower needs sleep and he sleeps 1:30hr during the day, he won’t sleep more than 10/10:30hrs so if he goes to sleep at 7pm he wakes up at 5/5:30am.
@Simona thank you. He gets a sudden 'burst' if every during the run up to bed usually! But typically 9.5 hours is the most he gets over night due to bedtime and the early rise, so maybe bedtime needs to be earlier. I really don't know. But the whole thing just makes me upset as I am very tired, but I want to get it right for him, I don't want him feeling tired like I do! Xx
Overtiredness causes night wakes and early wakes. If he’s waking up that early, it is too long for him to wait for a nap until midday. That wake window is far too long and should only be about 5 hours in the morning, 6 hours between nap and bed. My youngest is only a couple of mo the older than yours and has had the same routine for a long whirl now. She wakes 7am, naps 11-1 and has bedtime at 7pm, and she sleeps through the night. (My eldest is a different story, however, woke every 2 hours every single night for 2 and a half years and still wakes 1-2 times a night now at 4.) One night wake at this age is amazing - you should think yourself lucky! Multiple night wakes are natural and normal until well into the toddler years. For a wake anytime before 6am, that isn’t an early wake - it’s nighttime. So I would treat it the same as if they woke up at 1/2am and we wouldn’t be getting up for the day. If you give food/play/screens any time before 6am you are encouraging early wakes x