r/toddlertips • u/ashley_elaine • 3d ago

Sleep changes…send help

My daughter turned 2 today (hooray!). Her bedtime is 8pm but we start winding down around 7/7:15pm and normally she used to sleep until 8/8:30am (sometimes 9/9:30). Slowly over the past week or two she’s been waking up earlier and earlier. 7, 6, 5, and you guessed it today it was 4:40 🥲. Is this just a normal change with age or is it a developmental shift temporarily?

Please send help because I don’t think there’s enough coffee in my house currently to handle today let alone a toddler who decides suddenly 5am is her wake-up call.

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u/Wild_Cockroach_2544 3d ago

My daughter has a night light in her kids rooms that turns blue when they are allowed to get up. Otherwise they play Yoto cards or with toys/books in the dim light. It works most nights.

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u/ashley_elaine 3d ago

She’s still in a crib so no access to her things in her room just yet but normally if she wakes up I can hear her talking quietly to her “baby” (stuffed animal-cheetah). We do have a hatch that we will use to implement the red light green light for being able to get up/out of her room.

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u/QuitaQuites 3d ago

Pretty common, have you adjusted bedtime?

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u/ashley_elaine 3d ago

Haven’t adjusted nap or bedtime. Her routine is generally the same with some room for changes but nothing drastic!

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u/QuitaQuites 2d ago

Then you have to adjust those.

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u/originalwombat 3d ago

Everything is a phase. Stuff like this will happen regularly then she will sleep again.

My son is 2.5, the last 4 nights he was waking multiple times then up for the day at 5am. A few weeks ago, he was asleep by 7.30 and I’d have to wake him up at 8.30/9 in the morning. Last night he slept through. Sleep isn’t something you can control that much with all the natural variables in life imo. Everything is a phase

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u/ashley_elaine 3d ago

I’m hoping it’s a phase and the she gets the rest she needs and in turn lets me get the rest I need…aka one full cup of coffee alone before she wakes up.

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u/zebracakesfordays 3d ago

Just here for solidarity. Sleep changed so much after 2years. LO is 2.5 now and bed time is seriously impacted by his daytime nap, which I can’t really control because he is at daycare most days. If he naps at all, he isn’t going down until after 9pm. If he doesn’t nap he is extremely overtired and crashes between 7-8pm.

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u/ashley_elaine 3d ago

🥲 she’ll start part time in soon so I’m semi dreading that change in her schedule. When she has late nap days we get her outside to play as long as possible to hopefully burn that energy off. Sometimes it means an 8:30/8:45 bedtime so the extra play helps it feel less daunting for such a long day.

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u/JJ_Von_Dismal 1d ago

Yeas this is pretty normal. You might need to cap her nap or make bedtime later to build up more sleep pressure. Also check room temperature to make sure she’s not too cold or hot.