Top 4 reasons for early wakes
Early mornings can be brutal! We all know how it feels to get 1 less hour than we actually need. Maybe you get a irritable a little quicker than normal, maybe you drink more caffeine to fuel your body which can leads you down a rabbit whole on anxiety lane, and maybe just maybe you end up on a googling hiatus trying to figure out why your little one is doing this to you morning after morning after morning which has led you to this blog post. Take courage my friend; there is reason and a solution and I can help!
Environment disruption
Environment disruption can be the sun peaking through the curtains, noise from mum or dad getting ready for work, or the birds chirping earlier and earlier as Spring approaches.
How do you fix it?
Keep the environment consistent 7pm-7am. Dark as possible with black out blinds (or cardboard!), white noise at 60 decibels to drown out any outside noise, and
2. The first nap is too early
You are trying to follow awake windows but your baby is waking up at 5, and needs another nap in 2 hours. This is really called an extended morning and your baby is finishing their night time sleep patterns after accumulating some sleep debt causing the mornings to get earlier and earlier.
How do you fix it?
There are a few options we could do here. First of all we want that first nap to be in the 9-10 am nap window where melatonin naturally increases so, your options are: 1. You can push out their nap by 15 minutes a day or, 2. Have a bridging nap which is an assisted nap for 10 minutes and no more (no matter how much it hurts you to wake them up) and aim for the 9 am nap. This will help you get them back on track a little quicker.
3. They are overtired
Over tired and under tired signs can commonly be confused and hard to differentiate. Maybe your 2.5 year old refusing naps but waking super early?
How do we fix this?
This doesn’t mean a later bedtime. I suggest for all of my clients aged 5 and under to have a bedtime, no later than 7 pm. Between 6 and 7 pm Melatonin starts to increase for the night and peaks at 2 am. If the miss this gap, cortisol will be released into their body, which is a stress hormone, and they will get a bit of a second wind and fight sleep even harder.
They may be overtired and reintroducing the nap is the way to go.
Set your boundaries and talk to them about what to expect… And remind them ALLLLL the time.
Set the environment.
Keep it short and set a timer starting at a small amount of time.
Okay so there is one more thing and it is a SENSITIVE subject for some, so bare with me.
4. Early morning stimulation
This could be anything from a sibling waking up for a feed or parents chatting too much trying to talk them into getting back into bed and they are more awake from all the chatting that there is no going back.
HOWEVER, our story went a little like this. Our son would wake up before the rest of the house was ready and we would plop him in front of the TV so we could get an hour more of sleep. First of all, that only works every few days as he would typically want juice and breakfast and us to play with him and us to help him use the potty and so on. Second of all, he started waking up earlier and earlier.
How do we fix this?
Silent returns. Personally, we did a bit of a TV detox for a couple weeks coinciding with the silent returns but that was a personal decision we felt was best for our family as a whole.
When doing silent returns, I am not one for the no hug or no eye contact. I don’t think it’s too stimulating, but keep in mind, every child is different.
Stand outside the door and listen for them to get out of bed. When they do, go in and silently return them to bed. If they need reassurance, give a boring cuddle (no swaying, bouncing, patting, etc.), put them in bed and leave the room again. The first morning of this they will get very upset that they aren't getting the attention they normally do and it will likely be non stop until they decide to go back to sleep or until it's time to wake up for the day. Keep pushing through. It may be a couple days before you see a massive change but I promise, it's coming if you stay consistent.
If you find that early mornings are something you just can’t crack, good news! I can help! Book your free 15 minute phone call below.
