Hellobee Boards

@cake2017: yeah the BMs were probably a fluke. My son got up at 4:30am for a few months when he was that age, then gradually now he will sleep til 5:30 (latest ). I get up at 4:30 so that was probably half the problem! Sometimes their clock just gets earlier. I would think you could push bedtime around 7. For us, changing bedtime never made a minute of difference- 7, 7:30 or 8:30 the kid gets up at 5:30. Ugh

I personally wouldn’t push bedtime at all. It could be a fluke or a regression of some sort. 2 days does not a bad habit make

As for how to handle, we have a time that is our set “morning wakeup” time. It’s 7am. So anything before 7am is treated as a night waking. Like Even 6:45am.
No interaction. Lights off. Boring. Back to bed.

We did this with our nearly 4yo and now we have a 5.5mo. He does sometime wake early (5:30/6am) and we just simply don’t go in till 7 unless he’s hysterical (we’ve sleep trained so I’m ok with going in if truly hysterical). He does have early morning poops sometimes and if that happens and he’s hysterical we will just treat like night waking. Nighthlight change diaper, don’t talk, no eye contact, straight back in crib.
Also, I asked my Ped about this with my first when he started sttn. What do we do about night or early AM poops? She said before bed when you do night diaper do an insanely thick coating of A&D or Aquaphor or whatever you use. Like thick. That way if they do poop they are protected and it worked so well for us. We have an early morning pooper and usually he can go back to sleep and we’ve only had rash when we got lazy with the A&D.
If he is the type that absolutely will not go back to sleep after a poop, I would go in and change like a boring robot and put him back until your designated time. He may protest at first but if he’s alrewdy sleep trained I bet it won’t be bad or he’ll fall asleep.
And if not, he could do a super early nap before daycare drop off! If he wakes at 5am and never falls back asleep I would get at 6/6:30, feed and put right back down like 7qm. Let him nap till 8am then your DH has the time he needs to get ready.

ETA: being consistent with your day start time just reinforces routine and his internal clock. As soon as you start giving in and getting him for the day at the early wake time, you reinforce “yes it’s time to get up!”
If you treat anything before as night waking, then you make the designated time a big production. Lights on, cheerful words, songs, GOOD MORNING! So he gets it.

Anyway this is how I would handle it It’s worked well for us.

@cake2017: following this! I can completely commiserate with this, not so much the BM but the waking early

I have to feed LO2 at that time but I feel like there’s no way in hell he would go back to sleep in his cot then, the only time he will sleep is back in our bed...which means I’m trapped in bed until I’m ready to start the day for all of us! LO1 is a later sleeper but now gets woken up by LO2 who is up & ready to party anywhere from 6am! I know it’s not hideously early but I would much prefer being the first awake!

@cake2017: I don't think 15 or 30 mins will mess up his nap. How are things now?

We also treat anything before 7 as a night waking, so at 4:30 I would change him if he’s pooped and then put him back down until whatever time you deem to be the start of the day.