We are fed up. Gunner wakes up at 5:00 a.m. What do you even do with a baby at five in the morning?!?! I am not a good mommy at 5:00 in the morning. I can do 6:00, but I cannot to 5:00. I can't even think about being a decent mommy until six. Last week, I decided to concentrate on teaching him that the day doesn't start until at least 6:00. But in order for me to get a few minutes of extra sleep, I have been nursing him in the morning. So, when he wakes up (always screaming!), I take him into bed with me, nurse him, and make him cuddle me until at least 6:00. The result is that he sometimes snoozes until around 6:30, but usually he and I just end up fighting and I end up getting up in a bad mood. And I have had it up to Here (my neck, my eyeballs, highest reach...take your pick) with starting our day this way.
I read that some babies wake up early when they expect breakfast right away, so we should delay feeding them until a "normal" breakfast time. So, we don't sit him down for cereal until 7:00. Does this mean that that I need to delay (or just cut out) that early morning nursing/cuddle, too?
Also, I hear everywhere that we need to push back his bedtime about 10 minutes each night so that he gets used to a slightly later bedtime, which might then convince him to sleep a little later in the morning. I am hesitant to do this for two reasons. 1) He seems to always wake up at generally the same time in the morning, no matter what time we put him to bed. 2) He is so tired in the evening after being awake since FIVE, that it's all we can do to keep him up until bedtime. And generally, it's a miracle if he's still alive at bedtime since he is so tired and cranky that we can hardly stand him!!!
I have talked to several moms who say that they nurse their babies around 5:00 in the morning, and then put them back to bed. It works for them, but I don't think Gunner would ever go back to bed. Especially since bedtime is between 6:30-7:00 at night, and by 5 a.m., he has already been asleep for 10 1/2 to 11 hours!
So, what do we do with him? Does anyone else have early risers? What have you done that works for your family? And how do you cope with them?
7 comments:
I suggest you let him read the paper first, even if he drools on the comics.
I'm so sorry! My early riser has never been that early on a regular basis. Also, there's absolutely nothing I could do with Charlotte to make her sleep in later. She just wakes up when she wakes up. Her bedtime didn't change when she woke up so I figured what's the point of torturing myself longer in the evening? If it helps she did eventually start sleeping in later all on her own.
Probably not a popular opinion here, but it might be easier to train yourself to be an earlier riser than training your little guy to be a later riser. And some of it may be the change in the time--Gunnar still thinks it is 6 a.m. even though we fell back an hour and the clocks say 5 a.m. But just wait until they're teen-agers and they want to sleep in until 10 or 11--you'll probably get frustrated with that, too. I know it sure drives me crazy!
Ooh! I can't wait unitl mine are teenagers and want to sleep in that late on the weekends and I come into their room singing songs and opening windows and being noisy. Then when they wake up all grumpy I can look surprised and say, "I let you sleep in until 9!" Now I know why my mother did that to me.
Ha ha, Maggie! My dad's thing was to sing "Good Morning To You" (tune of Happy Birthday), very loud, chipper, and slightly off key. Yes, I now know exactly why he did that!
When you said that he's tired in the evening because he's been awake since five, does that mean that he doesn't take naps? If that is the case, maybe you could work on that and then he could stay up a bit later and then sleep longer. I have some more ideas, but I'll email you. Good luck!
He does nap, although he is resistant and doesn't usually get all the daytime sleep that he needs.
Post a Comment