2-Year-old Waking up Too Early

I heard a really good idea on the Today show a while ago. They suggested when you have a child that gets up too early to have a morning light that lets them know when it is morning and ok to get up. They said to use a nightlight that is on a timer and when that light goes on the child can get up for the day, if the light is off it is not time to get up and they need to stay in their bed even if they are not sleeping. I think that a 2 yr old understands enough to follow the logic of that. Hope that helps a little.

We do the night light thing in reverse. We have a fairly bright night light on a timer, and tell her that when it is on it is time to stay in bed. She is the same age as your daughter, and we started doing it around Christmas time. She grasped the concept immediately. She still wakes up early most days, but will usually stay in bed and babble until it clicks off -- then it's "light off! light!" time to get up.

I can relate, both of my children were early birds. They were both up and ready to go before 6am. My daughter who is 16 months just started waking up at 5, so I'm batteling this with you too! What I'm trying today is putting up a dark towel in the window to block the light. Possibly this will help her rest a little longer. What usually helped my son sleep was going for a really long walk before bed, then he tended to sleep longer in the mornings and never woke up during the night. The fresh air really helps. If your daughter is a light sleeper, try using a fan to sooth her from thinking everyone else is awake or that she is missing something! Good luck, please keep me updated! I'm eager to see the other responces from moms!

Hi, K.! The only thing that worked for me when my 2 year old started the same thing was to lose the nap. Once she stopped napping, those 2 nap hours got tacked on to her nighttime sleep and now at the age of 4, she goes to sleep at 7 and gets up at 6 (which is when we all get up anyway, thus the early bedtime). If I let her stay up later, she still wakes up at 6, but she's really cranky. I think kids are somehow in tune with the sun, because all 3 of my kids awaken at the first rays. It looks pitch black to me, but then I look closely and sure enough, the horizon is slightly pink. Anyway, good luck with the whole sleeping thing, it never ends. When you get one thing figured out, they start a whole new thing (like coming to your bed every night once they're 4 or refusing to go to sleep and playing with action figures under the covers when they're 9). I guess they're getting their awake time now so that when they're teenagers they can make up for all their lost sleep!

I like the night light timer idea! Maybe try limiting her daytime nap to one hour and see if she'll sleep a little longer at night. Good luck!

Hi K.,
How about exercise? I know when my kids don't get enought exercise, especially outdoor play, they both have trouble sleeping. I sometimes take them to McDonald's playland if we can't play outside. If you just stick to the apple and yogurt snack there, it's a lot healthier than an Happy Meal.
Good Luck!
P.

My daughter goes in cycles (she's 2 1/2 and very active). We noticed early on that it seemed to cycle with her growth spurts. She spends several weeks sleeping in and eating well, then flips a switch. She'll start waking up at night or VERY early in the morning and picks at her food. If your daughter's mood seems okay during the day, she may just be cutting down on her sleep needs. Watch to see if there is something that consistantly interests her at that time in the morning. A favorite TV show, is she especially hungry? It may be prompting her to wake up earlier than you'd like. When my daughter wakes up too early because she's ready to play, I tell her that she has to play quietly in her bed until it's bright outside. Sometimes she falls back to sleep and other times she doesn't. It helps a lot when I tell her she doesn't have to sleep anymore, but she does have to be quiet. It gives them the control to make the choice and seems to help.

Does she have some type of way to self soothe? Our son is almost 2 and we are getting ready to ween him from his pacifier, which he just has at night, but he has a favorite stuffed animal. We have also found he is afraid of the dark and a night lite really helped. Good luck!