EARLY morning wake-up - any advice??

[TxCat]

By early, I mean DD is generally waking up between 4:30-5:30 and this has been going on for about a week and a half.

A little background... DD is now 7 mos. We Ferberized at 6 mos., and it worked pretty well after 5 days. Prior to that, she generally had 1-2 wake-ups/night, and would get up for the day between 6 & 7 am, and she kept that morning schedule when we initially Ferberized. Then she started this 4:30-5:30 am business. It's killing DH and me. If she wakes before 5, we try to ignore her and Ferberize, but she'll cry for up to an hour, at which point I usually need to get up for work anyways.

We usually start her bedtime routine around 6:30pm, so when all is said and done, she typically is falling asleep between 7:30-8:00pm, which I don't think is too late. Even if we try to put her down earlier, she almost always rolls around and mutters on her own until that 7:30-8:00pm period anyways.

What's concerning me more now is that with this early wake up, I just know she's not getting enough sleep. She's always been a bad daytime napper, so she typically only sleeps 2-3 hours total during the day. Now, if she only sleeps 8-9 hours at night, that's typically 10-12 hours/day - not enough at her age.

Any advice?

[chottumommy]

Not sure about how to deal with the 4:30-5:00 wake up but just wanted to let you know that there are children who might not need as much sleep as most books recommend.

My son starting at 6 months never slept more than 11 hours. Now at 2+ he sleeps about 9-10 hours on average. Nothing we do changes that and one day I just made peace with it. He's a light sleeper, doesn't need much sleep and is a happy, healthy toddler.

It sucks because I need atleast 8 hours of sleep but luckily DH functions best with 6 hours of sleep.

[truly scrumptious]

We had the opposite experience of the PP.

At 7 months, DS was going to bed at about 6:30/7 and started waking at 5ish. We tried Weissbluth's advice about bringing the bedtime earlier (20 minutes at a time) and it worked! For the next two months, he went to bed at 5:30 and woke up at 7!

ETA: He was also a bad daytime napper (but a champion nighttime sleeper!) Didn't need more than a few minutes of soothing when we put him down at night.

[TxCat]

Not sure about how to deal with the 4:30-5:00 wake up but just wanted to let you know that there are children who might not need as much sleep as most books recommend.


I know - I've thought about that - she's always been on the low end of "normal" sleep requirements, but now she's almost falling off the curve - on her worst days, she's getting 10 hours total if we're lucky. Also, she seems more irritable now during the day - not every day, but at least every other day, which makes me think maybe she's getting overtired/sleep-deprived?


We had the opposite experience of the PP.

At 7 months, DS was going to bed at about 6:30/7 and started waking at 5ish. We tried Weissbluth's advice about bringing the bedtime earlier (20 minutes at a time) and it worked! For the next two months, he went to bed at 5:30 and woke up at 7!

ETA: He was also a bad daytime napper (but a champion nighttime sleeper!) Didn't need more than a few minutes of soothing when we put him down at night.

We're going to try this starting tonight - I started her bedtime routine at 6:00 instead of the usual 6:20-6:30, and I had her in bed by 6:28, but she STILL didn't fall asleep until 7:20. She's killing me! And I feel so bad for her because I know she's really tired at that point (she's not necessarily crying a lot - just fussing/babbling and rolling around in the crib). Oh well, I guess 7:20 is better than 8:00