How to Shift an Early Bed/Early Wake Cycle
When parents contact me telling me that their baby is having an early morning wake up, I always ask for data and more information! Having an early morning wake up is a very subjective term! What early morning may mean to one family, can be very different to another family.
What is an early morning wake up?
An early morning wake up is when a child wakes earlier than 6am for the day without falling back asleep, and before they have had an adequate amount of night sleep!
When is NOT an early morning wake up?
If it is past 6am
Your little one has more than 10.5 hours of sleep
Your little one wakes up and falls back to sleep
Your little one wakes within 30 minutes of designated wake up time
they're hitting their average sleep needs between day and night sleep
The first step to eliminate an early morning wake up is to ensure that there isn’t anything causing it!
There are four main reasons that can cause an early morning:
Overtired
Undertired
Dependent on a sleep association
Sleep environment
You can read more about this on my blog post on all about early wakings.
Once you have eliminated those other factors, you may realize your baby is stuck in an early wake-up/early bedtime cycle, therefore, your baby needs a schedule shift!
How to Know if You are in an Early Wake-Up / Early Bedtime Cycle?
Is your child’s bedtime consistently early (around 6pm)?
Is your child sleeping over 10.5 hours at night?
Is your child getting the appropriate amount of day sleep but their naps are early in the day?
If you know me, you know I am a BIG FAN of an early bedtime! However, an early bedtime of 6pm has it’s place. You can use an early bedtime for off schedule days and/or during nap transitions, a 6pm bedtime is not for every single night (unless it’s working and isn’t resulting in an issue— that’s always the KEY!)
So if your little one is constantly sleeping from 6pm-5:30am, that's 11.5 hours of sleep and not technically an early waking-- it's just shifted earlier because of when they're going to bed.
This early waking will then shift your first nap to happen earlier which perpetuates the cycle of going to bed early, waking early, and repeating that over and over!
How to fix the cycle:
You would start with shifting your little one’s out of crib time later and consider stretching some awake times if necessary. The wake times in the middle of the day are usually the easiest ones to stretch/ones they’re least sensitive to.
Depending on your baby, you can make this shift gradually by shifting about 15-20 minutes each day until you get to a designated wake time of 6:30am/7:00am.
For example, if your little one’s out of crib time is 5:30am, you can shift it to 5:45am for a day or two and then to 6:00am and so on. With this morning shift, it will naturally shift your whole schedule to later naps and bedtime!
What if your early waking is REALLY early and they’re just not getting the hang of things? Here are some things you can try:
Hold them in the dark until the desired wake up time to reset their circadian rhythm
Utilize your sleep training method until desired out of crib time
Try the wake to sleep method
This *may* work in 3-5 days with dedicated focus but it will not teach them any sort of independent sleep skills.
You may need to combine this with another method or strategy that addresses issues like timing at bedtime, increasing connection during the day, etc.
How to utilize the wake to sleep method:
The goal is for the child to semi-wake up prior to their habitual wake up time. This can encourage them to start a new sleep cycle without waking up completely and bridges that gap over the habitual waking.
The Baby Whisperer suggests for nights:
Implement this one hour or so before their habitual waking at night
Gently rouse baby by moving them, stroking them, bugging them enough to see some light movement (obviously there is the risk that you completely wake them)
If nothing happens, try again in a few minutes
Work on one waking at a time (the earliest waking of the night and working later; i.e. if they say, “my child wakes at 10:05pm EVERY SINGLE NIGHT!!” then you’d have them start the wake to sleep method at 9:05pm to see if they can sleep past 10pm).
If you’re still struggling with early wakings and just can’t figure it out with your independent sleeper, check out the schedules package!
