How long to be dry at night?

[partyorganiser]

DD is 4 and was out of nappies at 2yr 6mths fairly easily. We left her in nappies at night and have just never got round to trying without until now. We've never consistently had dry ones in the mornings but dd asked if she could go without as most of her friends don't wear nappies at night. We've given it a go for the last 2 weeks but the only times she's been dry is if I've woken her to go to the loo 1-2/night. If I haven't then she wees in bed but that doesn't necessarily wake her either - I usu find her wet. Gone back to pull ups tonight and she was happy to do that.

Is it best to wait until her nappies are dry or leave her without? I'm not sure how to help her become more aware of her bladder at night. We try to stop excessive amounts of drinking at the end of the day although I think this is partly responsible.

Are kids capable of concentrating their wee at this age?

Thanks for your help

[MunchMummy]

My DD1 potty trained at 2.2 months easily. However we didn't bother with night time training at the time. At 2.9 I decided it was spring and enough was enough. Still THE soggiest nappies in the morning. Mixed results. She never weed in the night but always first thing in the morning. In a week it was half and half in the morning. I was about to give up until I was told to put a potty in her room.
Not that she needed it, but to give her the confidence that it was there should she need it (bathroom only next door to her bedroom door anyway).
And since that day 1.5 years ago we've never had a wet bed since.

After 2 weeks we got rid of the potty and that was that. I've heard other people put the nappy under the pillow - its just a reassurance thing.

Good luck - I'm now potty training DD2 and am not looking forward to the nights.

[fruitful]

Some are capable, some aren't. Dd was 2.3 and ds1 was 4.10. Dd announced that she wasn't wearing nappies any more and that was that. With ds1 we had a few unsuccessful attempts and gave up. Then he suddenly had 3 dry nights in a row so we stopped the nappies. We still get the odd wet bed if he is particularly tired or drinks lots in the evening (he is 5.8 now).

10% of children are still in night nappies when they start school.

[BlueEyeshadow]

I've been wondering about this too. DS1 is 3.8. At the beginning of the summer he was waking quite often in the night for a wee and expressed interest in not wearing pull-ups. We didn't try without though, because we were going to be away and in other people's houses a lot and I just couldn't face it. Now he doesn't wake and the pull-ups aren't dry in the morning. Have we missed the window of opportunity?!

[partyorganiser]

Thanks all. Spoke to a friend whose dd did the same thing and she just went back to pullups until they were dry in the mornings - she said it just suddenly clicked one week. Will leave it for a while xxx

[PlasticinePolly]

We used pull ups and encouraged her to try and keep these dry.

We also put a potty in her room and showed her what she should do if she needed a wee in the night / morning.

Once she was consistently dry we stopped using pull-ups. She's had the odd accident since but is on the whole dry at night.

We also had a reward system - but these are useless if your child isn't ready yet and should only be used if you are sure your child is ready and just needs a bit of extra motivation.

[partyorganiser]

Thanks - might try putting a potty in the room and see what happens (will still use pull-ups).