I want a sleep in…….

the curse of the early rising child!

When babies are born, sleep and sleeping through the night – is something that dominates thoughts and conversations.  Nothing in harder about becoming a parent than the intense sleep deprivation that comes with it……..then that magical day happens – they sleep for the whole night! Then they do it again and again!

I am sure for a lot of people this signals the end of another phase in their child’s life and they go back to blissful nights of uninterrupted sleep until the sun comes up?!?!

Me? That hasn’t been my experience………Master 4 – the terrible and troubled sleeper, still wakes through the night, although the time to resettle him is much less these day……..then there is Master 2. He still has a good nap during the day and is a very settled and solid sleeper at night……BUT he is an early rising child……very early!!!!!

When he first started sleeping through the night, he would wake at 4.30am………and after originally feeding every two hours during the night, sleeping to 4.30am was a welcome relief – even if it meant I was up for the day!

As he grew older, he started sleeping later, waking at 6am and sometimes 6.30am.  For that small window of time, life seemed blissful. But it wasn’t to last!

A few months ago, Master 2 started waking at 5am! And I don’t mean he would wake up for something and go back to sleep – I mean he was up for the day, and there was nothing we could do to convince him otherwise!  We took him back to his bed, sat with him, rocked him, let him come in to our bed – but he just keep looking for a playmate!  It was all we could do to stop him waking his older brother. And sometimes he managed to do that to!

In the end we accepted the inevitable and just let him be…….he was content enough to play or watch some television until it was time for the rest of the household to get up.  Given his mischievous nature, our house is solidly childproofed, but that doesn’t mean we have not woken up to a few surprises!

One morning I found two containers of milk in the pantry!  Another time I found a box of Weetbix torn to shreds and a trail of crumbs from one end of the house to the other!

Oh I remember the days before children……….when 7am seemed an early time to get up.  Now I would be delighted with a 7am sleep in!  And now as the sun starts to rise earlier, I am resigned to the fact that 5am is the time that we start our day!  At least in the summer months when the sun is up earlier, it doesn’t seem so cruel.

I am now at a place of acceptance……and don’t think I will be getting that sleep in any time soon – if only I could be productive at 5am!

Do you have an early rising child in your house?  What have they gotten up to in the wee hours of the morning whilst unsupervised?  Share your stories with me below I’d love to hear them.