Please help me deal with 420am wakeups!

[lemontree]

DS is 16 mths (today!)  We co-sleep.  He has never been a great sleeper and at Xmas started getting molars and has had such a hard time with them.  On the nights when he is in so much pain I have given motrin.  Mostly though, he just needs me pressed against him and he nurses like a wild man, basically chewing on my nipples for hours

....I'm tired.  We are all tired. `This morning I went to clean up a spill and instead of getting a rag I grabbed the sugar bowl! (??)

Yesterday and today he woke up at 420.  Why? Why?  Why???!! I tried to treat it like a night time wake up, but when he wakes up and starts babbling and standing and signing in the night it has been known to take 2-3 hours to get him back to sleep.  So I try for one hour to nurse, cuddle, rub his back, ignore him as he rolls and stands and pokes me...both days it has failed so I put him in the crib in our room with a few toys at 530ish and then we start our day at 545! 

He went to bed at 630 one night and 7 last night.

He napped both days from 10am-1pm which is his norm.

He doesn't nap in his crib, or in our bed...he likes to sit in his bouncy chair and sleep there during the day. 

My question: what can I do to help him sleep later?   There have only been a handful of times in his life when he has fallen back asleep without nursing, and nursing doesnt work at 430 am when his body seems to wanna gogogo....but he needs more sleep.  I don't know if I'm making a mistake by getting up at 530 instead of continuing to struggle to get him to sleep?  Like, is this just a wonky phase or am I setting up a bad dynamic?

If I ask ANYONE IRL they will tell me that it's my fault because I never "taught him to fall asleep" by CIO - since he would scream, I mean scream! any time I would put him down "drowsy but awake"  My friend told me, "just tell him its still night night time and leave him in his crib.  He will go back to sleep eventually.  My daughter goes right back to sleep w/o a tear!" (they CIO a while ago...)

....100% of my mama friends have "sleep trained" which makes me feel so alone in this problem, so hopefully someone on MDC will be able to help me sort this out.

[ctrygirlatheart]

Uggh.. I feel your pain.  Everyone I talk to seems to be a CIO believer but I just don't have it in me to listen to my kid scream and cry.  And she isn't one that would cry for 5 mins and then go to sleep, trust me!  It is hard especially when you are so tired.  I am not sure what your schedule is but when he wakes up early have you tried to put him back to bed after an hour of being awake?  Sometimes when my daughter is sick and gets up early we do and hour or so of quieter things then she is ready for bed again.  Or maybe early nap?  You could also try a dream feed at 4am before he is stirring to see if that extra milk might entice him to sleep a little longer.  Teething babies make for tired mommas huh?  Try to take care of yourself and grab a nap yourself on occassion if you can.

We are working on 2yr molars too and we have had some really rough nights. I keep telling myself that these are the last ones.

[physmom]

Blackout curtains and white noise machines were my best friends when DD was that age!  Honestly, with teething we just had to ride it out.  DD refused to take liquid medicine (thankfully she is two so she can now take chewable tylenol, which has helpd a lot!) but at that time she suffered through it.  One other suggestion... can you have him chew on a bag of frozen peas or something before bed?  That always made DD really happy.  Oh, and we never did CIO but we did nightwean recently (DD is two and it was rough for two days but now she just wakes up once per night which I can totally deal with).  We survived, it wasn't easy but we lived to tell the tale.

[irishmaji]

Maybe wake  him up early from his daytime nap, instead of 3 hours turn it into a 2 hour nap so that he's more tired at night?  I have a similar issue in that my son likes to get up by 4:45-5am, however, he only takes a one hour nap during the day, so I don't think I can really shorten that up much, he's never needed a lot of sleep since he was born, but I think if your son is taking a 3 hour nap during the day and waking up early, he might just need less sleep during the day?

[lemontree]

Thanks.  Well, today he woke up at 5:30 which is a step in the right direction!  Guess we just need to "ride it out"

[MrsBone]

Just know this is a phase..he's probably going through something developmentally right now and doesn't need as much sleep. I rememer having nights(and still do) with DS at that age...2, 3 nights in a row of early waking, and coming on here for advice, then all of a sudden realizing, oh hey, he hasn't woken up early in a few days! Just know, once this one ends, there will be another phase he goes through where he doesn't sleep. Of course just recently I finally discovered that DS (2) wasn't ready to give up naps and after 2 weeks of trying, bedtime was a nightmare because he was so overtired, he'd fight it. When I finally gave in and let him take a nap and stay up til 9:30 or so, he's been much happier and well adjusted..you may have to adjust his sleep schedule(shortening the 3 hour nap, putting him to bed a little later perhaps?

[hildare]

did i write the original post?  no?  this is us, too. 

i have noticed, if this helps, my dd (15 mos) is having some waffling around dropping naps.  she isn't willing to do 2 anymore, but doesn't seem really happy with just one.  i think this has a little something to do with it, there are some sleep cycle changes happening, at least in our neck of the woods.

also, those horrible awful teeth.  i just bought an amber teething necklace out of desparation.  let's see if it works.

dd also seems to have a cold today, all those factors. 

my initial comment to dh after the first wake up and play day at 4:00 (you got twenty minutes more sleep- see, it's not so bad!) was that, in addition to the sleep changes, our dd seems to be going through a developmental language stage.  she's been extremely verbal right before the crazy wakey started.  i told dh that i bet this is about to be a language leap.  she went through brief wake-up-at-4 stages with other developmental things like crawling and walking, so that was what occurred to me at the time.  does any of that sound like you guys?

at any rate, it's not like you're going to all of a sudden right now decide to try CIO.  can you picture THAT?  lol

and, seriously, would it really do any good to wrestle in the bed for a few hours?  i think you're fine with getting up.  you might check out the NCSS just to see what sleep needs are for this age, and maybe adjust naps and bedtimes till you get it better (and unless i'm on to something with the developmental theory).