My 3 3/4 year old doesnt nap anymore but requires 12 hours of sleep or else she's a nightmare the next day. I had another baby 9 months ago and, for the past few months, he has woken up at 6am and sometimes earlier. I've tried putting him to bed earlier/later, but he still wakes up ____@____.com problem is, this wakes up my older daughter and she does not fall back asleep...she is up for the day. She used to sleep from 7:30 - 7:30 but now she wakes up when he wakes up and everyday, by 3pm-ish, she is a complete nightmare. She refuses to nap (when she does nap she goes to bed even later at night and still wakes up early so it's actually worse the next day) and I have tried EVERYTHING to get her to sleep later (shifting bedtimes, sound machines, punishing, rewarding later wake up times, etc.) Nothing is working and I'm at a complete loss. Anyone been through this?
Thanks SO MUCH everyone for the responses. I think they *are* early risers because despite all the suggestions below (blackout shades, quiet time in the AM, noise machines...I've done it ALL) my daughter still wakes up as soon as the baby does. I think she just doesnt want to miss out on anything so if he's up, she wants to be up. I'm going to keep the earlier bedtime for her (6pm works best because she get the full 12 hours!) but since that can be really difficult for me to get them fed, bathed and in bed by then, I think I'm going to have to force the naps on days when I know it just can't happen. So tough...thanks again for all the support!
This is tough and exhausting! My only two suggestions are 1 - put her to bed earlier..? And maybe get some activities she can do in her room in the AM and not wake the baby (special coloring books, markers etc).
We started giving an extra feeding at bedtime, and put up thermal curtains in the baby's room. This helped him sleep longer, but we also taught our older children to play quietly in their beds w/ books and toys until we came to get them. Usually, they would fall back asleep for a little while, but when they didn't they played quietly. Good luck!
Your in luck we set our clocks ahead this Saturday so at least she'll be getting up at 7am my children have been doing the same thing because the sun sets earlier not next week. Do you have a room darkener? Good luck.
What is the sleeping situation - where are the kids located in relation to each other? If they are in the same room and he's waking her up, then you may have to relocate him to your room or find some other option. You may have to get creative, or sacrifice some space in your room for this one.
I don't understand punishing her for not being able to go back to sleep when someone else is waking her up. Some people just wake up all the way when they wake up in the morning.
Maybe instead of trying to get her to sleep longer, you can (GASP! I'm gonna take some heat for this one...) let her watch TV in her room until it's time to 'wake up'. You could put a clock over the TV so she knows when she can come out. You could even use educational shows. :P
Yep, that is pretty normal. Since he wakes up at 6am, can you set your alarm for a little before so you can get him up and feed him before he starts yelling?
Unfortunately, your son may just be an early riser. Both of my kids are usually up around 6 and it's been that way forever. Now that my son is 5 we do get days where he will sleep in a bit more. Since sleep is one thing we can't control it can be especially frustrating. When my son was 3 1/2 nap became a bit of an issue. We made the rule that he had to lay quietly for an hour. Many, but not all the time he feel asleep. When he fell asleep we let him sleep about an hour or an hour and a half to get the "grumpies" out, it made things more manageable, but he still went to bed ok. And it was a somewhat short lived problem, eventually he was back to napping fine. In fact we worked on phasing out his nap at 4 1/2 to prep for school. If nap time isn't an option maybe her room needs some changes. My SIL changed some things for her daughter when her second was born that seemed to help retrain her daughter's habits that started with the new baby. She bought black out curtains. This made the room stay darker for longer. She also got the sound machine you talked about, but she put one in both rooms, so that it would block out he sounds on both sides. She bought a clock that glows red when you need to stay in bed and green when you can get up (my stronger willed children would probably ignore it, but her daughter paid close attention to it). She also closed the door to both bedrooms after the kids fell asleep, because it blocked more of the noises. NOw she has the opposite problem. Her daughter will sleep to 8 or 8:30, but getting her up earlier is a bit of a nightmare, so she is starting to worry about her schedule when school starts next year. Gl!
I have the Good Night Light for my almost 5 year old son that we've used since he was around 3. It's a night light that you set the times for when you want it to be a blue moon (night) and turn to a yellow sun (day). You can start setting it to turn to a sun pretty early so your daughter has faith in it, and gradually change it by whatever you think (5 minutes later every couple of days/week?) until you're closer to the time you'd like her to get up. If you're sure she won't go back to sleep after waking, but want her to stay in her room, you could give her a bin of "big girl" things that only she's big enough to do until the sun comes on ;) Good luck!
