We need some help to try and counteract Jacob's latest sleeping problem - 5 am wake ups.

He won't go to sleep on his own at night either - he will cry and cry and scream the house down if we leave the room, so we are spending an hour (or more) settling him for sleep each and every night which is taking it out of us (believe me, we have tried everything in the book). Then, if he wakes up at all during the night, he won't be resettled for maybe 1 - 2 hours (sometimes longer). It doesn't matter if you get into his bed, or move him into ours, the same thing happens. He will just stay awake. Again, you can't leave him in his room because he will cry and scream if you do (hence why we get into bed with him or bring him in with us so we can attempt to sleep - mind you, we never do!).

Even with this kind of waking during the night, he will then wake at 5 am. If he sleeps through the night, he will wake at 5 am. He will NOT be resettled for sleep regardless of where he is - he is wide awake and seriously cranky if he is left alone.

So, at best, he is getting 8 - 8.5 hours of sleep per night and this is happening regularly ATM (maybe one or two nights where he sleeps longer). I know that for some babies/children, this is enough, but it isn't for Jacob. He gets extremely irritable from the resulting tiredness. To be happy and contented, Jacob needs around 10 hours sleep overnight, plus a day time sleep of at least one hour. The dramatic change in his behaviour on the days where he has this amount of sleep is amazing - he is much happier (as are we!).

DH and I are on average, having around 4 - 5 hours sleep as a result, if we are lucky.

Any suggestions? We're both at the end of our rag.....

I'm wondering if he is a bit stressed. I have a number of health concerns ATM (I won't go into details here) so am thinking he is picking up on that? He has otherwise adapted extremely well to Ruby's arrival (very loving and caring with her) so I'm not sure it's related to that.