4am feed and 5am wake-up!

[lee09]

Hi everyone,

DS is 10 weeks old. It's pretty much standard for him to wake up around 4-4.30am for a feed, then it's impossible to get him down again! If I do manage it, he'll sleep till 5-5.30am and be awake for the day. It's driving me crazy! We're going to move him into his room and put up a blackout blind to see if that helps, but I'm not too hopeful. I've been bringing him into our bed after his feed - sometimes he'll sleep through till 7, but sometimes he squirms and sooks until we get up.

Is this normal and will he grow out of it (soon!)? Will he drop the 4am feed perhaps? I've tried at times to stretch him out till 5ish so we can just get up for the day, but when he's hungry, he's hungry!

Also, he's not a great day sleeper - so what do you think about using blackout blinds for nap times? Good or bad idea?

Thanks!

[boomba]

This too shall pass! My 22mth old still wakes at about 4 ish and will sometimes only sleep till 5 or maybe 6! Just enjoy the extra cuddles. Or maybe bring him into bed with you and let him feed while you sleep?????
I dont think you should use black out blinds, your child needs to be used to sleeping in the daylight I think?

Good luck you are doing a fabulous job x

[FarmGirl]

Hi Lee,

The early mornings are hard aren't they? My son used to do exactly the same thing, and I'm sorry to say I didn't find a solution. I commonly referred to him as my solar powered baby. When the sun was up, so was he.

The only way I could cope with it was to go to bed earlier in the night to try and catch up on sleep. He finally gre out of it around 2 and a half years of age.

I did find the darker room in the day helped him with his day sleeps, but I didn't have blackout curtins, just an extra sheet over the curtains to make it darker. My parents have black out curtains in their room (due to migraines), and if you are thinking of putting these in, you may find you upset the babies day/night cycle. It takes them a while to learn day from night, and blackout curtains really do make a room black.

But as I always tell my friends, if it works for your family, then it is the right thing to do. So give it a go and see if you get the result you are looking for.

Good Luck, and I hope you get some extra zzz's soon.

[Tilda]

My DD2 is 10 weeks too and is up for an early morning feed somewhere between 4.30 and 5. If it's before 5am I can get her back into the cradle for another hour or so before my toddler wakes her up. But if it's after 5am I usually just bring her into bed and let her fall asleep on the boob so I can at least lie down for awhile longer. But I think it's very normal. Adults and babies all have a brief awakening around this time of morning. We just fall asleep again but babies usually realise they're hungry and want a good feed. There's not much you can do except try and help them back to sleep until they no longer need that feed and can learn to fall back asleep on their own. I don't want to scare you but it took my DD1 about 18 months to really sleep through to 6 or 7. As for days sleeps, do you wrap bub? Wrapping can help lenghten out day sleeps. But again, some babies will only catnap and I've stopped thinking there's much you can do about it. My DD1 was a terrible catnapper during the day but DD2 will sleep for hours. And I really haven't done anything differently. They just have different temperaments. So try a few different things but don't torture yourself if they don't work.