We have had a not-long-sleeping, early-rising toddler for about two years. Iver's preferred wake-up time has been between 4:30 and 5 a.m. after going to bed around 8 p.m. Every. Single. Day. (Luckily, he has been sleeping through the night most nights, so there is at least a continuous stretch of sleep).
However, when we went to my parents' house for Christmas just after his third birthday, we were getting him to sleep until 7 or 7:30 a.m. (which, yes, I realize is 4:30 in California); however, he was going to bed around the same time (between 8 and 9 p.m.) on the East Coast. We were so puzzled. How could we replicate this 2-3 hours more sleep PER NIGHT when we returned home? What had we been doing wrong?
We wondered if it was the darkness, and so we removed from his room the stoplight ok-to-wake stoplight alarm clock which I think helped us teach him to sleep through the night at around 19 months (it had been staying red until 5 a.m., which is what we deemed an acceptable wake-up time). We replaced it with a small digital clock, which emits much less light, and it's helped (and he now can read time)!
Now, we are having a toddler who (still naps a couple of hours after lunch and) sleeps from about 8 or 8:30 p.m. until closer to 5:30 a.m. (and has even made it past 6 a.m. a few times, which buys him some extra morning raisins and us a lot of wondering whether he's still alive)!. One day, he told us he woke up in the 5 o'clock hour but stayed in bed until 6 just for the raisins! Although we have to now train our bodies to "sleep in" in rather than awaking early as we've been programmed, we are rejoicing! It's incredible how much difference a later wake-up hour makes in your overall health, well-being, mood, and resiliency. I am shocked, delighted, and of course questioning what magic happened in his brain (and how I can help this happen sooner than three years in our #2). This has been the parenting miracle for 2018!
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