Up too early

laowaigringa · October 2014

So DD has decided that getting up between 4 and 4:30 everyday is a perfectly normal and acceptable thing to do - except it's not! Her parents are definitely not impressed and we are exhausted! I feel like we've tried everything to get her to sleep longer; we never turn lights on or let the day get started, we keep her room dark and keep lying her down with her paci and lovey. We try to hold off feeding her until at least 5:30, hoping she'll figure out just to stay asleep until then but that hasn't worked. I tried reintroducing a dream feed at 9 or 10 in case she was waking up hungry, thought maybe it would help her sleep longer - no good. And it's not like she's happy and we can just leave her in her crib to play and talk to herself, she is pissed when she wakes up and cries and scream and is pretty much inconsolobale no matter what we do. Most of the advice I've read says if they're waking up too early, try putting them to bed earlier at night - but she already goes to sleep at 6 every day! She's never been a great napper but she goes down for the night with no problems and most nights sleeps through from 6 until 4. Should I just be glad she's getting 10 hours? It still seems like she should be sleeping for more like 11-12 hours at 9 months old though. Anyone have any advice or suggestions on how to get her to sleep later?

candypantsls · October 2014

I'm wondering the same thing as @danaadell‌, if you feed her will she go back down?

I try to take advice from that Healthy Sleep Habits book and my LO wakes up around 4... I feed and put back to sleep till 6 or 7.

Sleeping straight from 6 to 4 is good in my book

. My LO wakes up at least at 12 and 4.

Hang in there, it'll sort out!!!

laowaigringa · October 2014

Yes, I have thought about trying later but the thing is she's such a crappy napper that by late afternoon she's already so tired. Sometimes she's been up since 12:30 or 1:00 already with no other nap so I hate to keep her up longer. She just won't go down most afternoons, she just keeps standing up in her crib no matter how many times you put her down and she cries and cries. And I have also tried feeding her in the morning when she wakes up. For a while she was getting up at 5 so I would feed her then but that plan backfired - that's when she started waking up at 4:30 instead! And she would still only go back to sleep after being fed maybe every third or fourth day, the rest of the time she was up and ready to go. She's just a conundrum!

blue_elle · October 2014

Well the good news is there's a really good chance her sleep pattern will totally change again in the not terribly distant future

Sakura16 · October 2014

This happens with DD sometimes and I just pretend like it id a MOTN wake up and treat it as such. Diaper, feed, crib.

jhjocelyn · October 2014

This is my DD exactly! Only it's 5-6am, I don't work, so we used to sleep in...

It's like her internal clock has just decided it is time to get up. We tried feeding her, snuggling, keeping it dark, not talking(gentle shushes)... Nothing has stopped it so far.

I did find that being consistent with keeping it dark and quiet and waiting to feed her until 6:30 has cut it back some. She's more likely to sleep till 6 now.
She's usually not miserable and not acting hungry, just wwiiddee awake and wanting interactions. I sometimes cheat and give her my phone with a fun app on it so I can doze a little longer...

sunnyplaces · October 2014

I'm in the same boat. I've learned that bad naps can also contribute to early wake ups but I work overtime to ensure good naps and he still wakes early. 5:30am is late for us! I have fed him in hopes that he'll go back down but he's wide awake. I could set the alarm and feed him at 4am but I don't want to risk waking him with that feeding and then he won't go back down.

I'm also nervous about the end of daylight savings. Yikes!!

Maybe this is 9 mo sleep regression stuff... I hope so because maybe the we'll see improvement soon!!

Good luck!

laowaigringa · October 2014

Glad to hear we're not the only ones up so early! As you all say, hopefully it's just a phase. It is true that if there's one thing I've learned so far it's that if something's not working (or if something is!) just wait a few weeks and it will change again! Here's hoping! Good luck everyone!

jeslillyn · October 2014

Were up early too 4-5, so no great advice here..but if you figure something out let me know lol. Good luck! #gotosleepbaby

amt0312 · October 2014

DD always sleeps between 10 to 10.5 hours every night with the rare occasion of 11+ hours. She will frequently wake up around 4:45-5am, but I treat it as a night waking and simply ignore it. She might babble for 10-20 minutes or so, but then she realizes no one is coming to get her and she falls back asleep till 6:30. She goes to be around 8 or 8:30 pm, though.

When she is sick, however, I will always go and check on her. I'll do the same if she's crying pretty hard.

I haven't figured out how to get her to sleep longer at night, but she takes two solid naps during the day, often times with one nap being at least 2.5 hours. Total sleep per day is around 15 hours, so that's what I look at more than anything.

laowaigringa · October 2014

So here's the latest; the past several days have been dramatically better. We basically have decided just to let her cry it out in the morning. Really, nothing we were doing was making her stop crying anyway, so we decided we might as well just stop trying. She has slept a bit later anyway, waking up usually around 5. She kinda cries/babbles/talks to herself for a while, or sometimes it's just outright crying. I'll let her cry for several minutes then go in to comfort her and give her the pacifier, lay her back down, but then leave the room. Yesterday she cried off and on for probably half an hour, but then fell back asleep and slept until 6:30! Today she woke up at 5, cried a little bit but again, went back to sleep until 6:30. I'm keeping fingers crossed that it keeps up, but I do think she's figured out that nothing exciting is going to happen and she's not going to get much attention so she might as well go back to sleep. DH and I are feeling so much more rested, and I feel better knowing that she's getting more sleep, too.

r0zz · November 2014

I had the same prob and my pedi said to keep her up 30min later than her usual bedtime for a wk then an hour later for another week etc.
also to cut out one of her naps. She was napping 4x a day (power naps) and now it's two 1hr~ naps.

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