Help...I'm So Tired

Change his diaper and remind him it is still dark out and not time to wake up then give him a sippy cup of milk and put him back in his crib. Try to do this with as little light as needed so the lights don't wake him even more. And as the others said I would adjust his naps before I would adjust his bedtime and see if that works first. I prefer my son go to bed at 730 rather than 9 or 930 just becuz I need that time in the evenings for me and my husband. Especially if I have been tending to my son since 6am that day(which is when mine gets up everyday). Just like another mom said it could be just a phase due to a milestone, that makes sense.

Hi S.,

I agree with the others who have suggested either cutting his naps shorter, making them earlier in the day, or putting him to bed later. Babies tend to go through phases of sleep. Hopefully this is just one of them! My youngest has been my worst sleeper. I have had to rearrange his naps schedule and bedtime several times when we've been in those phases. This too shall pass!

Start putting him to bed later. Then don't get him up in the morning if he wakes too early. You are doing nothing but shooting yourself in the foot by bringing him into your bed. He will wake on purpose just for that alone.

Dawn

Two suggestions - first try a later bedtime. If your child naturally needs 8 hours of sleep, then later bedtime will result in later wake time. Leaving him to cry as one person suggested will do absolutely nothing constructive if your son is an 8 hour kid.

If that doesn't work - and this sounds counter-intuitive - put him to bed at 6:30 or 7:00 and see what happens. If he's actually not sleeping enough at night, putting him down earlier will make him sleep longer. Sounds weird, but it works.

You might leave some toys in his crib for him to play with or get an aquarium mobile that he can turn on. Around age 1 they are learning so many things that they are restless. Try not to start the habit of getting him up so that he knows it is still "sleep time". Leave him in his crib and let him figure out he can entertain himself and/or go back to sleep. I know it's hard, but like everything in baby/toddler world, it's temporary.

I am sorry. My son was just like that. Nothing worked. If we kept him up later, he still got up early, but was just miserably crabby.

I started going to be earlier so that I could get up with him. On weekends, when my husband got up, I went back to bed.

After several LONG months, my son started sleeping later. He now, as a three year old, gets ____@____.com's just an early riser by nature. I guess we will be happy when he starts school and we dont have to drag him out of bed.

The only way I managed was to go to bed when my son did.
If his bedtime is 8pm, so was mine.
And if he sleeps through to 4am, then you've had 8 hrs sleep.
Try to catch a nap for yourself during his nap time, too.
Sometimes catching up on sleep is more important than trying to get anything else done.

Let him cry.
He needs to understand that night time is for sleeping.

It's probably a growth spurt, but you need to make sure you don't create a habit by going in there. And unless you WANT to start cosleeping, taking him into your bed is a bad idea - regardless of time of day. :(

What time is his nap during the day? Is he still taking 2 naps? If he is taking 2 naps a day you could try cutting out the morning nap. If he's only taking one nap a day maybe that nap should be earlier? For both of my kids it has never worked trying to put them to bed later, they will both actually wake up even earlier when I do that. I have a 15 month old she goes to bed at 7 and wakes up between 6-7. She is just starting to take one nap a day from 1-3. A few weeks ago she was getting up at 5 every morning and that was too early for me so I would change her, hold her for a minute and put her back to bed. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. Good luck.

Definetely put him to bed later. I don't understand the obsession with getting young children, who don't have to wake up for school into bed by 8. If your child's natural body clock dictates an early hour, then go for it. But in cases like this, you child is sleeping a good 7-8 hours which might be just right for him at this point. It will change...don't worry! Put him to bed at 9 or 9:30 and see how that works out.

Try pushing his bedtime back by an hour or so... If he goes to bed at 9, and wakes at 5, that may be a bit better. I also like the idea of having a couple toys in his crib for him to play with.

Good luck!

What time are you going to bed? Your son is actually sleeping a good 8 hours a night. He is hungry and probably soaking wet. Maybe you could adjust both of your bedtimes, his a little later and yours a little earlier.

I don't really have any advice, except to say that my daughter did the same thing around that age and it passed in 2-3 weeks. Nothing really worked, we just ended up having to leave her in her crib, she would cry and whine off and on, and yes we were sleep deprived! It sucked ;-) Eventually she went back to her normal self, sleeping through. I wasn't sure if it was teething, or that she was learning to walk, etc. (Sidenote, at 2 years she went through a 2 week stage of not napping. However, she would stay in her crib the entire 2ish hours talking/singing to herself. Then one day she was back to napping as normal)

Does he cry (hard) when he's up? Even though he doesn't go back to sleep, if he's not crying, could you just leave him in there til morning? Granted you won't be getting more sleep. Sometimes they just go through weird stages, hopefully that's all this is & it will pass soon! Hang in there!

I always had early risers. I was happy that they slept until 5:00 to 5:30 in the morning. Once they were up so was I. Diapers were changed and breakfast was served. When nap time came we "all" went to sleep. That way we could enjoy the whole day without meltdowns (on either side).

Bed time was around 8 to 8:30 pm and they slept through the night. Unless one was sick and then I would spend the night in their room on a make shift bed so that they would have mom nearby. My room was close but not close enough to hear them the way the apartment was set up so that is why the make shift bed.

As one person put it it is all temporary. Just go with the flow and take naps when the little one does during the day. Make yourself a daily schedule calendar and that way you can pencil in the nap time and the cleaning time and be caught up on a clean house. It does work.

I never had to break the co-sleeping problem with them. They of course were in the bed if it were a real problem or a bad dream but they had their own rooms and beds. In fact I lost my own child one night to find her sleeping in her bed because she was tired and went to bed. Go figure.

The other S.

PS Welcome to parenthood. No one said it would be easy. You have House Beautiful once the children are in school full time.

When my son went through this we did two things:
1. Shortened his mid-day nap and made sure it happened earlier in the afternoon.
2. Put him to bed later when he was exhausted. We started "slowing down" around 7:30. The lights were dim by 8 so we could cuddle on the couch and read. Bedtime was 8:30 and sometimes closer to 9 if he wasn't sleepy.

It didn't help every morning, but most mornings he slept later. We did learn from our pediatrician that kids will only sleep as long as they need to. If he's "awake" when he gets up, he won't go back to sleep. If he needs a total of 10 hours of sleep per day, then adjust accordingly!

Good luck- it's a phase and it will pass!

When my on did this at this age, I got him out of bed quietly & gently in
the still dark room.
I would chech his diaper & change it if necessary then rock him back to sleep.
However, I think the biggest problem here is he is going to sleep too early.
At that age my son did not go to sleep until 9 or 9:30.
So I would adjust his sleep schedule: letting him stay up later so he will sleep through the night longer.
Hang in there & good luck!

Read up on the Dr. Ferber sleep training. Sounds like you've tried a wealth of things, but all of them have you going in and interracting with him. Since you have the video monitor, don't go in for the first 5 or 10 minutes. Then, if you must, go in and do nothing more than lay him back down, pat his belly, say nite nite (or whatever) and leave. If he cries (and he likely will), go back in 5, 10, 15, 20 (increasing intervals). Never do anything other than the laying him down, patting his belly and nite nite. You want him to self soothe back to sleep. A different trick each time will just have him convinced that when he cries you'll go in and bend over backwards to get him to sleep.

He'll get the hang of it within a week, and you'll all be back to sleeping.

Good luck to you and yours,
F. B.

My boys always had disturbed sleep schedules during big milestones--ie. crawling, walking, vocab burst etc. My assumption is that your little guy is working through something like that as well. You didn't really say what his nap schedule is like, it might be he's working from a 2 --> 1 nap a day, and or it could be he's not napping enough.

What was his schedule like before he started waking early? Honestly, whenever my boys did the waking early thing, it was because they were over tired and/or teething. Generally, tho' it was because they didn't nap well that day. I moved their bedtime back 1-2 hrs and then they would sleep an additional two hours. I always can expect foot steps at 5:30am when we had a late night before....

At this age most children need anywhere from 12-14 hrs of total sleep. My oldest literally would take a 3.5 hr nap and then sleep 12 hours at night. My youngest will only take 1.5hr nap and barely sleep 11 hours at night. So it could be your little guy is on the lower threshold for the number hours of sleep he needs, but anything below the 12hr mark, I would guess its more of the overtired not sleeping issue.

Good Luck--sorry its such an exhausting phase....I'm there with you, but its the we're done with napping, but Mommy is pregnant and needs her nap. Isn't going too smoothly.

He sounds like he's had his full 8 hours of sleep by 4am, if he goes to bed at 8pm or earlier.

Just put him down an hour later for starter.

Also, could he be hungry and just want some warm milk and he would sleep again?

And why would you need to watch him through the video monitor and not just go back to sleep youself? It's not ignoring him for you to return to bed, if he is safely in his crib.

Another alternative, will he fall back asleep after a diaper change and you tuck him in bed with you?

Kids need more than 8 hours of sleep. At one year old I think it is something like 12-14 hours of sleep for the day -- including naps and night-time sleep. So your bedtime isn't necessarily the problem. (My kids go to bed and are sleeping by 8:30 every night. The 6 yo sleeps until 6:30, the 3 yo sleeps until 7:30) But he may need to consolidate to one nap earlier in the day, or he may need more "activity" during the day to wear him out.
If consolidating naps doesn't work, you might try a slightly later bedtime or a slightly earlier one (I know... it's counterintuitive to put a kid to bed earlier to get them to sleep later, but it worked for my kids.)
Good luck!! IMO - Sleep deprivation is one of the worst parts of motherhood.

He's hungry. You may not think so if he eats his normal amount and seems fine all day, but trust me. For three straight days (takes time for body to register it) increase his eating by CONSTANTLY offering food. Not just right before bed, but ALL DAY. After three days of more eating. he'll sleep soundly all night. A full baby won't wake unless a medical issue or teething is going on, and even then they'll self sooth if they're full enough. He's probably having a growth spurt. My one year old was still waking twice per night when I learned this. My aunt (mother of 10 who got all her to sleep thru by 3 months old) told me. Three days later, my daughter never woke again at night and it worked like a charm on my next two too.

My son did this when he was around 2.5. I cut his naps and he slept longer at night. I would suggest cutting his naps if you can.