There are many reasons why your 9-month-old or older baby wakes up early in the morning around 5-6 a.m. and doesn’t want to go back to sleep. If early awakening does not work for your family and you would like to try extending your morning awakening time, we need to identify the possible causes of early awakening and address each issue.
Common issues that need to be addressed are:
* Too much light entering the bedroom in the morning.
* Household / environmental noises
* Baby is not warm enough for early morning temperatures.
* The reward of an early breakfast
* Wake up for a milk drink
* Habits and routines already established as a younger baby, from an early start of the day
* The moment of the first day of sleep.
* Your baby’s bedtime at night.
* Genetics! Your baby is made up of two parents
So once you decide what the possible causes are, you can start playing around with some solutions. Always give each attempt at least a week to have an effect on your baby’s biological clock and be patient.
* It is easy to adjust the amount of light entering the bedroom with the right window shades from anyone looking. Anything that is useful will work, it doesn’t have to be professional or expensive to be effective, just block out the light. Think of an old duvet cover, a dark sheet, large towels, a picnic blanket, a fabric lined with blocks.
* Sometimes we can train the family to be calm in the house early in the morning, but sometimes external factors affect the awakening of your baby. Try playing soft bedtime music, such as ‘Music for Dreaming’, repeated throughout the night to cover up some of the noises and make your baby stop listening to music in a few months.
* Over 9 months Babies are very mobile in the crib and should be dressed for the night, assuming they are rolling in the crib and will not be under warm blankets all night. Think about how you would feel sleeping in what you have dressed your baby, if you were sleeping on top of your blankets without a partner. Excess blankets become a risk for SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) if your baby moves and crawls or rolls around the crib.
* If your baby over 9 months is currently enjoying breast milk in the morning or has breakfast as soon as he wakes up, this is a nice reward for waking up. If you’re happy to offer these foods, early mornings are a consequence, unless you fall asleep again after the meal. If you think that the baby does not need these foods for nutrition and is simply waking them up as a habit, you can stop them if the baby is over 9 months and eats solid solids during the day. This is a personal decision.
* Sometimes mom and dad need the baby to get up early for work hours during the week, but want to encourage him to sleep on the weekends. Unfortunately, the baby does not understand the difference between a workday and a weekend, so I recommend that you treat every day as a Sunday and encourage him to sleep until the last minute and organize breakfast for the baby on the spot. babysitting or babysitting.
* If you reward your baby for waking up early in the morning with a sleep shortly after breakfast, you are encouraging him to wake up early.
* If you put your baby to bed too early at night, he will reach his sleep quota earlier in the night and will not be able to sleep until his reasonable time to wake up in the morning.
* The last and obvious reason is that if you or your partner are early risers, the baby may look like the early riser and will always thank you with their presence when they wake up. After all, the baby is genetically related!
Tip: If your baby’s routine is working for your baby and your family, don’t change a thing! If the routine needs fine tuning, first look for potential contributing factors, then confidently put a consistent plan in place and monitor your results to see what works.
(C) Copyright-Natalie Ebrill. All rights reserved throughout the world.