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Attachment Parenting
Need some suggestions for 4 a.m.
DD has been sleeping in her own room since she was about 9 months old (co-slept before that). She does really well, and we used some Ferber during the transition. We don't really use Ferber anymore -- if she fusses, we go pat her back until she falls back asleep. It's usually not a big deal. She goes down at 7, fusses once around 10 sometimes, nurses at 1ish and goes back down easily, and then starting at almost exactly 4 a.m., she starts fussing A LOT. We pat her back to sleep and 15 or 20 minutes later, she's fussing again. If we try to let her fuss it out, she escalates. Ditto for trying Ferber's technique.
I can't figure out what her deal is. I do usually nurse her around 6, and wondered if she was just wanting to nurse earlier. This has been going on for about 3 months, and now that I'm pregnant and exhausted and DH is working longer hours, it's really hard for us to be up with her from 4-6. I would just bring her into bed with us then, but she and I don't sleep well together anymore; it's kind of a mess. I've tried Tylenol and Mylicon in case she was uncomfortable, but that had zero effect.
If you help me figure this out, I will be forever in your debt. 
Please and thank you!
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Re: Need some suggestions for 4 a.m.
Little Rose is 2 1/2.
I guess this would be a bad time to mention that for a full year my DD thought that 4:30am was a great time to get up and start her day? Some kids are just early risers. We feel lucky now that she sleeps until 630 usually, but it took a long time to get here and I don't know that we did much that changed it. By the time she turned 2 it was more like 5-5:30 wakeup time.
Maybe try feeding her later, right before she goes to bed or nurse her at an earlier waking? Give her a sippy cup of milk/BM at 4am? I think we did have some luck with giving DD a sippy of milk when she woke up super early.
Oh my gosh ... brilliant! This made me remember that Ferber talks about that in his book, so I cracked it open again, and guess what! We're trying to make her sleep TOO MUCH at night. I haven't really changed her schedule much now that she's a year old, and was still trying to get her to sleep 7-7, with two one hour naps during the day, which is way too much sleep for a one-year-old. He says that the average 12 month old sleeps about 9-10 hours a night. So I counted from 7 (her bedtime) to what nine hours of sleep would be ... 4 A.M.!!!! This is revolutionary to me! I feel like we might have some hope here ... back to bury my tired face in Ferber, but THANK YOU SO MUCH for that suggestion! It may have started us on the road to sleep!
ACK! I'm praying she's not that much of an early riser! I will keep the sippy cup idea in mind too ... anything for an extra hour or two!