Help...night time training 4.5 year old

[Tinks15]

DD is 4.5 years, she’s been dry in the day for 2 years now. However, she still wears pull ups to bed & most mornings has completely wet them through.
I feel like I should be doing something about this? Should I be training or encouraging her in some way?
I’ve heard that you can’t ‘train’ them for night time wetting & they will stop this naturally.

[NannyR]

You can encourage her to get into the habit of going to the loo straight before bed and as soon as she wakes, but otherwise you can't really train for night dryness. She will start waking up with dry pull ups eventually.

[GlitterSparkle85]

Not sure if it will work for you we in process of doing this too -do find that no drinks an hour before bed helped Wee before bed and depending on how shes been throughout the day we "wake her" in the night around 10pm or 11pm what ever suits your bedtime pick her up and take her to the loo. Shes normally half asleep and after going she falls straight back to sleep so far it seems to be working and shes woken up a few times herself to go to the loo and back again. Just made it clear to her before hand what was happening eg you've only got 2 pull-ups left before NO more pull-ups and explain what will happen. Hope this helps as everyone is different X

[NannyR]

If you decide to go along the route of waking them to use the toilet late at night, it's important that they are fully awake and aware. If they are half asleep it can reinforce the sensation of weeing whilst asleep, which is what you are trying to avoid.

[Tinks15]

Thanks all, i think the first thing we need to do is stop the drinks an hour before bed, she usually has a glass of milk about 20 mins before she goes up - obviously that’s not helping! I shall see if that makes any difference then go from there.
Is there an age they should be dry at night?

[Mary8076]

No, there's not a specific age when they should be dry at night, but doctors wouldn't consider it a problem at all until at least 8yo. Often it is just a totally natural thing in their growth, for someone it continues until puberty or even until 16yo! If there aren't constipation, diabetes, sleeping apnea or other causes (and you should be aware of them by the correlated signs besides bedwetting), there's nothing you can do to stop it. Just don't manage it as a real issue and reassure her she is not the only one.
A wet alarm works for someone but doctors never recommended it to me before 8yo, too bad for the kid's sleep, the same about waking them at night to go to the bathroom, never worked. About pull-ups leaking our solution was using a disposable mattress pad or just switching to regular diapers (the classic one with side tabs, if the one for babies are too small there are ones for adults in extra-small size too, look on amazon) eventually adding a booster pad inside that to add absorbency.

[bluebluezoo]

Nope, nothing you can do to “train” it.

Good advice above- especially with lifting, you need to wake them up or it simply trains them to wee in their sleep.

One thing I did find useful was encouraging liquids. As much as they will drink. It stretches the bladder and they learn that subconscious “full” feeling which is one of the biofeedback mechanisms they need to wake up at night.

The other thing they need is the hormone that shuts down urine production at night. That happens when it happens, and until they start producing it there’s nothing you can do to help. Limiting drinks before bed isn’t particularly useful without that hormone.

[ColdRainAgain]

Only other thing to try is double voiding - so, upstairs, toilet, bath, teeth, story, toilet, sleep.

[greeneyedlulu]

My midwife friend told me its a hormonal thing that naturally kicks in when they are ready and that you should expect some wet nights up to around 7/8

[somanyquestions19]

My dd is 5 years old and up until 2 weeks ago still wore pull ups for bed. She still has a lot of accidents in the day and I was putting off even attempting to go dry at night until the days were sorted but I reached a point where I thought right I'm just going to see what happens.

Her nappies were leaking every night as well so we went cold turkey.

I wake her to go to the toilet at 11pm and then 3am and touch wood we've only had one wet bed which was actually my fault as I didn't take her to the toilet.

I'm amazed to be honest. I don't let her drink from about 6pm and am going to try stretching the middle of the night toilet trips out so there's only one a night. She's a really heavy sleeper and I really don't think she'd wake up to use the toilet herself but we will see.