Sleeping FAQ: 6-9 Months – Early Morning Waking

My daughter of nearly seven months used to sleep 7pm-7am. But now she has begun to wake at 6am chatting loudly. I have followed the CLB routines and read advice on the site about pushing on daytime naps. She settles within five minutes of going down at 7pm.

If I cut the morning nap to less than 40 minutes, my daughter becomes very grumpy until her lunchtime nap, which can then be disturbed. She no longer takes an afternoon nap.

As your baby has given up her afternoon nap, the problem could be caused by overtiredness. Babies of your daughter’s age who fall straight into a deep sleep at 7pm sometimes start to wake early in the morning. The early morning waking then causes them to need more sleep during the day, and a vicious circle soon arises.

We would suggest that you try putting your daughter down in her cot 10-15 minutes earlier than normal. The aim of doing this is that she will come into a light-sleep earlier in the morning, and is more likely to settle herself back to sleep, which is less likely to happen when a baby wakes at 6am.

When your daughter wakes, allow her 15-20 minutes to see if she will resettle herself back to sleep. If she doesn’t, it is important at this stage that you help her to get back to sleep, even if it means feeding her.

It is important to realise that what you are aiming for at this stage is to get her to go back to sleep, whatever it takes. Leaving her to fuss on and off for longer than 20 minutes is, in the long-term, more likely to create an ongoing problem with early waking.

It may take a couple of weeks, or longer, to “re-set” your daughter’s body clock, but once she is used to getting back to sleep quickly between 5am and 6am, and sleeping soundly to 7am, you can then begin to adjust her daytime naps without risking her becoming overtired – the most likely cause of her early morning waking.

Once she resettles back to sleep until nearer to 7am, it is important that you very quickly push her morning nap on to nearer 9.30am, and reduce it to 20-30 minutes, This will allow you to push her lunchtime nap on to 12.30/12.45pm. A later lunchtime nap will then enable you to push her bedtime back to 7pm.  Once she goes back to sleeping from 7pm to nearer 7am, it is very important that you watch the total amount of daytime sleep she has. We would recommend that it is no more than 2 hours 30 minutes.

Although we are fairly sure that the early morning waking is due to over-tiredness, you should not rule out the possibility that it could be caused by hunger. Given that you daughter happily takes an 8oz bottle of formula at 2.30pm and then 3oz of water at 4pm, it could be that she is not taking enough solids at lunch. You do not say whether the two tbsp of protein at lunchtime is pure protein or a mixture of protein and vegetables. If it is a protein/vegetable mix, it could be that you need to increase the amount of protein she is having. Check out the recipes in the Weaning book, which will give you advice on the amounts needed for a baby of your daughter’s age  Do bear in mind that all babies are different and your daughter may need slightly more than the book recommends.