My daughter is 18 months old and has always been an early riser. Does anyone have any tips on getting her to sleep later? She goes to sleep at night between 7:30 and 8:00 PM and wakes up between 5:30 and 6:00 AM. Keeping her up later has no affect on the time she wakes up. Sometimes she wakes up because she's gone to the bathroom, but not always. Help!
Put her down 15 to 20 minutes earlier. I know it sounds strange, but it worked wonders with my son, 17 months. We're putting him down between 7 and 7:30 now, he usuaaly gets up around 7 a.m.
Good luck!
sounds counter intuitive, but try putting her to bed a little earlier.. maybe 7pm. with mine, it seemed to help, it's that whole idea of more sleep equals better, longer sleep. also, try feeding her breakfast a little later when she wakes up. her body clock may be hungry, so by feeding her a little later after she wakes, she may not feel hungrier til later and sleep longer.
good luck
E.
Christa, typically toddlers are early to bed and early to rise, though there are a few exceptions. You have already found out that keeping her up only makes her cranky and that she will wake up when her internal clock tells her that it's time to wake up.
I have always felt uncomfortable trying to change a child's internal controllers. They have to change soon enough when they go to school, but fiddling around with what is her nature is a concern. Unless you absolutely MUST sleep in, just ride it out. You will want her to get ue earlier when she's a teen and it takes a bomb to get her out of bed, lol.
It sounds like her schedule is pretty normal, assuming you can get her to sleep til 6:00am. If you can do that, I wouldn't really be messing with things. That is pretty good.
She is probably just one of those kids that gets up early or she may just be excited to hang out with you and getting up earlier and earlier to do so.
Have you considered setting an alarm for a time you want her to get up(something soothing in case she is still sleeping like lullaby music on a dvd clock radio)? You can start it whenever she gets up most often (5:30), then slowly increase the wake time a little later and later on the clock.If she associates you coming to get her with the music then she will learn to wait until it goes off.She will listen for it as a cue to get up, but you HAVE to go in there when it goes off. She must learn to trust you.
When you do daylight savings and those sorts of things it is an easy adjustment. I had a friend that did that. My doctor actually recommended this for me when my son was having similar trouble.
how long are her naps? maybe shorten those and she'll be more tired at night.
Room darkening shades and a noise machine (one that makes ocean sounds works well for us.)
We had this problem with my daughter who is now 4. She would be up between 4 and 5 each morning, and looking back I am surprised we actually got up with her. When I was heavily pregnant with #2 and she was 2 1/2, i couldn't take it anymore. For about 2 mornings I would turn off the monitor and would not get her until 6. She then started sleeping until 6 or 7 each morning, which was heavan. Now we are starting to have this problem with our 15 mo old now that he is giving up his morning nap. My advice, move the bed time up a bit, make sure there isn't some physical reason like a wet diaper that is waking her up, and then slowly ignore her until you get to the wake up time that you want. Good luck!
Hi Christa-
I don't know if this'll help- but we hang a fleece blanket over the twin's window & block the light at the top of the rod.
This usually gets us until 10 of 7 on the weekends...
They too go down for the night at about 8pm- but since during the week we wake up at 5:30, they already are sleeping in.
Good luck!
Carri
I found out quite by accident once that if I gave my daughter a bottle an hour or 2 before she woke up, but while she was still sleeping, she would sleep @ least 1-2 hours later than normal!
You could try that & see if it works for you.
Good luck!
Welcome to motherhood! :) My daughter is almost 2, and she has always gotten up early. Actually, if you can get her to sleep until 6am that is great! My daughter gets up some mornings at 5. She goes to bed between 7-7:30 and is up by 7. 7 is a good day! It doesnt happen often!
My only suggestion is to "black out" her room, and have a fan or something with white noise. Make sure the morning sunlight doesn't come in at all- and there is something to block out outside noises. Wear her out before bed as well, making sure there is an evening activity that takes a lot of energy. All of these suggestions, plus putting her down for bed around 9pm are what I do, and my kids sleep until 7:30-8am.
All that being said, some kids are just early birds and there's not much you can do. Good luck!
Christa,
I had the same problem with my daughter. I hate mornings and she still is an early riser even at 7 years old. I had to learn to comprimise, and so did she. I found talking with her and explaining my needs and listening to hers worked very well. I explained that I needed to sleep until a certain time and if she didn't need that extra sleep that it was ok for her to play in her bedroom/play room until I woke up, but she was not allowed in the living room or kitchen (until she was much older) I planned with her what things she could do in the morning to keep her occupied until I woke up - no my daughter does not have a TV in her room and never will. to this day, my daughter has never woken me up from sleep since I started talking to her about my needs. Realizing your child is 18 months old, I think you can do this. Remember to get down to her level as an equal, don't talk in baby talk, take her seriously no matter what her needs might be, and trust me she will in a couple of weeks start to do things independantly of you.. this will be pretty scary for you until you learn to trust your childs independce.
I also like Amber's Idea about the alarm clock.. I never did that, wish I did, it' might have worked sooner and I would have gotten some much needed sleep. LOL.
Anyway, I hope this helps at least a little.
E. C
hello,
my two older ones (5 & 3) are the same way... now as babies they were great sleepers. we bought room darkening curtains from lowes, along with the blinds, and that has helped SOME, they still are up alittle after 7am, but it's a start. hope that helps
M.
a dark room and white noise for starters. that way if its the daylight or cars going by waking her that may help. or leave a sippy cup of water in her bed and a book and stuffed animal and see if she will play quietly for an hour or maybe even go back to sleep. that is what we do. i am not ready to start my day at 6am. if youre really desperate and you get up to use the bathroom in the wee hours of the morning you could try to change her diaper while she is sleeping. if she is waking cuz she is wet that might help her sleep a little longer. we use diaper doublers cuz my son pees alot. that might help her feel a little dryer and stay asleep. my son is 16mo and still wakes for a bottle around 4/5a.m. now. he gets changed and will sleep then til 7am. when he does wake he plays for a while then i get up. good luck.
Hi Christa - I had (and still have) an early riser like you. Even as a tiny one, she went to bed (knew it was bedtime, I didn't have to cajole), between 8:30 and 9:00 pm. In the morning, I'd give her breakfast, put her in the "jolly jumper" and let her go. If I needed to nap, I'd nap during her exercise time and put on soft and or
classical music as she was in the jumper. She really didn't need me during that time - so my nap was a gift. After about 30 -45 minutes, she was ready to get out, needed a bottle or milk in a cup, and I'd put her down for an early nap around 10. However , I wasn't a working mom at that point, so her naptime became my catchup time.
Like the birds and all animals, we have what's called a circadian clock - her body knows it's own time, but one gift you have been given is your evenings after her bedtime. You and your husband may want to turn in as early as she does to create more sleep time for yourselves. The real challenge comes when a second baby is born, which - when that happened - we adjusted to very slowly.
You could try all kinds of things, but if her body wakes up early and goes to sleep early, know that it will be her biological clock telling her when to wake.
Today my daughter is 37 years old and she STILL goes to bed between 9:30 and 10, and wakes up with the sun.
Good luck! At least she'll get up without complaining when it's time for school, and she's smiling.
P.
Two quick suggestions: if your daughter wakes up happy, try letting her play in her crib rather than you getting her up. They will coo/play for 30 - 60 minutes and fall right back to sleep (continuation of night sleep). Also, I've read and personally experienced that sleep begets sleep. So try putting her to bed even earlier (6:30 or 7:00). I know that sounds really early, but you might see that she'll sleep an extra hour in the morning that way.
A great resource for sleep is: Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, by Marc Weissbluth, M.D. The first few chapters are really long and explain his philosophy on sleep. (Important but you can skim and still get the gist.) Then he breaks things down by age group - which tends to be the sections that I refer to often.
