Night-weaning means early waking? Transitioning to own bed, etc.

[cristeen]

Beginning of September, I started night-weaning my almost 2 yo (now 2). It went relatively smoothly (took 2 weeks), in that he will now go back to sleep without a bottle for his first 1-2 wakings.  But around 4:30/5:00, he's decided it's time to get up so that he can have a bottle.  He'll usually be fairly quiet in bed until 6:30, but he's most definitely awake.  This is not enough sleep for him, and I can't figure out how to get him to go back to sleep.  It's definitely not enough sleep for me.  He goes to bed at 8:00 (although I've tried 7 and 7:30 recently and he wakes at the same time), usually pretty easily, and takes a nap around 1:00 for up to 3 hours, although the last week or so it's been more like 1 hour, if I'm lucky.  How can I get him to go back to sleep in the wee hours?  Preferably without a bottle - he's not drinking so much of it that he needs it, it's a comfort thing.

The other issue is that I've been working on transitioning him to his own bed (alone) for a while now.  He and I have been co-sleeping in his room for over a year, and I'd really like to get back into my bedroom with my DH.  He does fine for the beginning of the night, but when he wakes up the first time (usually between 1 and 3), he won't let me sneak away again.  Either he wakes up when I move, or he wakes up within an hour.  If I stay, he'll sleep pretty solidly until 5-ish. 

To compound all of that, I went to flip the (Queen) mattress yesterday morning and discovered extensive water damage to the mattress and the wood floor under it.  So the mattress is gone and I had to rush out yesterday and buy him his own (toddler) mattress for him to sleep in last night, so there isn't even anywhere for me to sleep anymore.  He went to sleep fairly easily, I went in at 2:30 to put him back down, and I hadn't gotten back to sleep again before he was awake again.  That time he wouldn't let me sneak away, but he still woke up for good about 5-ish (I couldn't read the clock from the floor). 

Hopefully that makes sense.  Obviously I didn't get much sleep last night, so I'm not sure how coherent I am.  Ask if you need clarification of any points, please.  I'd really just like some solid suggestions of things to try, because I need more sleep, and so does he. 

[phaedra13]

When we nightweaned our son at around 15 months (when I became pregnant) he started waking earlier, too. So I don't know if that's related. But I did a lot of reading on toddler sleep patterns and what I learned was that he really WAS sleeping about as long as we could expect at night. It seems like I read that an 18 month old needs about 11.5 hours of sleep a day. So if he was taking a 1.5 hour nap, that left about 10 hours at night. He was going to bed at about 7:30 and waking around 5:30. Yep, that was it. Still is. It SUCKS REALLY BAD. But I think early toddler waking times are pretty normal, at least according to my friends. All the toddlers I know who go to bed before 8:30 or 9pm wake before 7am. I think it might just go with the territory of being a toddler (at least if you're still taking a nap).