I will preface this by saying that we are seeing a sleep medicine specialist and a child psychologist.
My son (age 4, will be 5 in August) has always been a bad sleeper but it has gotten SIGNIFICANTLY worse in the last few months. He regularly wakes for the day at 3:30-4am, and he is EXHAUSTED. He refuses to nap and go back to sleep, just screams and cries. NOTHING. WORKS. As you might imagine, his behavior is horrific because he's so tired. He is super aggressive with his little brother, ignores everything we say to the point of danger. He's not like this when he's well rested (which is unfortunately almost never).
He is dealing with some anxiety we're trying to address and we think he may have ADHD. It's like he wakes up and he is so amped up he can't settle himself back to sleep.
(another note - he did have sleep apnea and he's had his tonsils and adenoids removed already.)
Anyone else dealing with this? Of course it's hell for me getting no sleep, but developmentally it's so bad for him. I'm super worried.