Sleeping FAQ: 6-9 Months – Early Morning Waking

My baby aged nearly seven months has been happily following your routines for a few months. His daytime sleep is erratic, especially on nursery days, and he is now waking at 5am with a dirty nappy and ready to start the day

My baby aged nearly seven months has been happily following your routine, since Christmas. Since starting nursery 5 weeks ago his daytime sleep has become very erratic. Some days he sleeps for a total of 2.5 hours, others for only 1 hour. On non-nursery days, his daytime sleep is fine, but he always naps in the late afternoon. He used to wake at 5.30 – 6.00am, chatter for 20 minutes and then go back to sleep, but now he cannot do this. He invariably has a dirty nappy, and if I go in and change him he is full of smiles ready to start the day. I also have a 4 year old, and a 5am wake is too early! My baby’s room is fully blacked out.

Feeding details

7.30am: 8ozs formula, 2 dessertspoons Ready Brek.
11.30am: 6 cubes chicken casserole/ fish based recipe, 3 cubes fruit puree mixed with rice, water.
2.30pm: 5ozs formula
4.30pm: 6 cubes vegetables such as potato, leek and pea, 3 cubes of fruit mixed with rice, water.
6.15pm: 8ozs formula

My son naps at 8.50-10am, 12-2.00pm and 5- 5.20pm. He settles at 6.50pm.

Several reasons should be considered as to why your son wakes early every morning. He could be waking through hunger and then pooing once he wakes. Try offering him a milk feed once you have changed him and see if he is able to settle himself back to sleep again. Count this milk towards his morning feed and offer him breakfast when he wakes or by 7.30am. If he did not take a full 8ozs at 5am then offer him the rest after his breakfast cereal.

To prevent your son from waking early through having a dirty nappy stop offering him fruit after his tea. Instead, offer him fruit with his cereal in the morning. Pear, apple or prunes offered with his cereal should help regulate his system and make it more likely that he will poo in the daytime. Have a look at the case study in the CSG which deals with this topic.

Although on the days your son is at nursery it may not be possible to regulate what he eats at teatime, on his home days offer him high carbohydrate meals such as jacket potatoes with grated cheese, lentil and pasta dishes which will help fill him up well. Have a look in the CBW book and The Baby and Toddler Cookbook for ideas and recipes. If you feel that he is still hungry after his savoury course you could offer him a milky pudding rather than fruit and rice, or give him finger food such as a rice cake.

Also on the days your son is at home make sure he is having 2ozs of protein at lunchtime. If his early morning waking improves after his days at home, when you have changed his diet, it would be worth discussing your results with his nursery and see if they are willing to follow your guidelines at mealtimes to ensure he is getting his daily food allowances correctly balanced.

Your son’s late afternoon nap could well be another reason for his early morning waking. Now that he is over six months his sleep needs by day are changing. Trying to keep him to a maximum of 3 hours’ sleep daily should help him sleep longer during the night. Although your son may not sleep so well at his nursery, because of noise and or light, work on his daytime sleep when he is at home.

Getting him back to sleep in the early morning should help him be able to move his morning nap to nearer 9.30am and cut it back to 20-30minutes maximum. To move this nap on without him becoming over tired put him down 5-10 minutes later every two or three days until he is staying up until 9.30am.

The effect of having a later morning nap will be to push your son’s lunchtime nap on to nearer 12.30/1pm. If he continues his pattern of sleeping for two hours at this nap he will be waking at 2.30/3pm. The later time of this nap should help him not need the 20 minutes after 5pm.

Babies of this age can be difficult when tired in the late afternoon but try to find ways to keep him going until his bath and bed time. You may need to bring these forward slightly and settle him into bed by 6.30/6.40pm once he has dropped his late afternoon nap. Once he is regularly sleeping until nearer 7am then very gradually move his bedtime back towards 7pm.

When your son is at home see if he is able to wait until nearer 5pm for his tea. Encourage him to feed himself with finger foods to keep his attention if he shows signs of being tired due to dropping his late afternoon nap. Providing he still takes his 8oz bottle happily at 6.15/6.30pm the slightly later timing of the meal, and its content, should fill your son and make it more likely that he will he will not soil his nappy during the night and will sleep until nearer to 7am.