Early waking

[caz_hills]

Im after some advice please. Our eight month old has started waking at 530 every day. She is teething but it seems to be her wake up time.

We have made her room dark, she isn't wanting a feed - she is just up! Any advice in how we can help push it back a little?

Thanks x

 

[minties]

No idea, but if anyone ever finds a cure for this, I would pay them! Sophie's 4.5 YEARS old and has always gotten up about 5am.

 

[caz_hills]

No idea, but if anyone ever finds a cure for this, I would pay them! Sophie's 4.5 YEARS old and has always gotten up about 5am.

Argh you're kidding!!!!!! It's not the end of the world but if i find a miracle cure i will let you know

 

[Left wonderin]

No cure here either , I've one of those !!!! The days are endless .......... Lol

 

[sunnydee]

Haha I'm looking for a cure for my toddler too! Ive pushed bedtime later but he still wakes at the same time, just grumpier that he's sleeping less!

 

[MindUtopia]

I think the trick really is just going to bed earlier yourself (so you cope better with the lack of sleep), responding as quickly as you can (because sometimes they will go back to sleep if they don't wake too fully) and just riding it out. We co-slept (but even when she moved into her own room and would come into us very early), about 50% of the time I could get her to go back to sleep in bed with us and I'd get an extra hour of sleep. That helped. But I don't think there is a magic solution. It will come and go over the years and it's not just a baby thing. My 4 year old goes through spells of getting up at 5am still. She'll craw into bed with us sometimes and will lie with us (while we a little bit doze rather than actually sleep), or sometimes she'll play a bit in her room and give us an extra 30 minutes, often after waking us up very grumpy and tired to be awake so early. But going to bed earlier (you, not her) does help a lot when it's night after night of it. I often think it's due to something developmental going on or big changes or just something being a bit off, but sometimes there's no obvious explanation.

 

[abitnervous]

My two year old does this. I run in as fast as I can and give him milk, no fun, and tell him to go back to sleep. It works about once a month. The key is how fast I can get to him ��

 

[donnarobinson]

I have early risers to 😩 X

 

[xdxxtx]

Unfortunately, it's very normal for a baby to wake up very early. However, sometimes, the solution to getting them to sleep a little later is actually to put them to bed a little earlier. It sounds crazy, but it's true. This trick might work better on older babies/young toddlers, though.

 

[blablamana]

What time does she go to bed at night? It is suggested (in several books that I have) that early waking could be due to a too LATE (yes, LATE) bedtime. Or too much awake time before bed (our baby does well with 3.5-4 hours before bedtime. Not more than 4. Definitely no less than 3)

As xdxxtx says basically. Sometimes babies are too tired to sleep properly. And will thus wake up earlier. This is the same for naps, it makes no sense to skip naps in the hopes that baby will sleep through the night. In fact, this might work initially for a while.. but most babies will sleep WORSE at night as well. Overtired means less sleep means a bad cycle you can't get out of.

My baby used to wake between 7 and 8. Now that he is transitioning to two naps (most days) he wakes between 6 and 7. Since he is almost 8 months too, our babies might be dealing with too little or too late sleep... or the 8 month sleep regression.
Babies are hard to read when it comes to sleep sometimes.