In thinking she may have more control over this than she lets on?

[TheRealPerson]

Before I start, some of you will know who I am and I apologise for another post on my DSD but I was hoping for some insight into a problem she has. I'm not trolling, just looking for some advice. (I am still leaving my DP but can't just ignore what happens here until I leave).

Bacially as I have posted before, she has a problem with wetting the bed. She's 13 and has always wet the bed. Usually every night, sometimes less often but always more than twice a week.

She has been involved with doctors and the hospital who cannot find anything wrong with her.

I think I have sorted out the hygiene thing (she never used to get a shower and would go to school smelling of urine) which has changed dramatically but still she wets the bed almost everynight.

What I don't understand is, when she went on a school residential trip for a week, she didn't seem concerned at all about wetting the bed which I found odd and low and behold - she was magically dry all week.

As soon as she comes back, she wets the bed almost every night again.

Whenever she sleeps at a friends house or if a friend stays here, she's always dry and has never had an accident.

If she sleeps at a relatives house, she is always dry.

Out of curiosity once, I suggested to DP that he gives her an incentive to stay dry and so he decided to give her a chocolate bar for each night that she was dry. Needless to say, as soon as this incentive started, she was dry almost every night. When he got "Bored" of treating her everynight and stopped, she started wetting the bed again.

What really got me is that last week, DP was rushed into hospital and had to be kept in for a week. DSD was dry EVERY night that he was away (a full week) and as soon as he comes back, she starts wetting the bed again.

DP is furiously sensitive about the whole thing and won't have it said that she could be doing this on purpose. I feel bad considering the fact that she COULD have more control over it but surely if you have a genuine bladder problem, it wouldn't be such a convienient one?? The cynic in me thinks she's doing for attention or at least some of it. (She is constantly thinking up attention seeking illnesses and actually gets excited at the prospect of going to hospital with her dad).

AIBU for even thinking this? if not, what should I do because DP just won't accept any discussion of it.

Please don't accuse me of trolling, I've admitted who I am, but it doesn't make the problems from before go away. Thanks.

OP - you might think this is not your problem because you are out of there - however, if you don't help this poor girl, who will?

TBH I am a bit surprised that in the case of "no medical reason" found for the bedwetting, no one official has thought/investigated the possibility of abuse (friend of mine was checked out after her DD fell awkwardly on a piece of play equipment and hurt her bits requiring a trip to A&E - shes a teacher and KNEW they would think it a suspicious injury, and they did)

After reading this alarm bells are ringing with me too.

bloody hell, poor kid. she's living in such a dysfunctional family. I don't know what to say. She is 13 but inside she is a little girl.

She may be just totally mixed up about her role in the family, the wetting is a way of allowingherslef to be a baby, so she gets attention. I don't think, she's doing it intentionally, there is hell of alot going on in her head she won't even be aware of.
It's to do with coping, with displacement etc...

so what are you going to do. also i don't know your sitch but if you are going she is prob hurting and angry inside?

She didn't have an eating disorder. She tried to have an eating disorder.

It's difficult to explain. She likes her food (was overweight when I first moved in here as her dad allowed her to eat chocolate all night and they had constant take-aways etc) but she WANTED to have an eating disorder. I know how ridiculous and cruel that sounds but at the time she had a friend with anorexia and I think she saw it as a great way of causing a bit of worry/panick/attention from her dad. She starved herself for a day (in sight of us anyway, but I know she had food in her room) and now constantly refers to the fact that she "Must" have an eating disorder and she once went all day with no food.

This is what I mean about wierd behaviour. When I was 13, I would have KNOWN that anorexia didn't equal one day of not eating.

She'll also say stuff like "everything thinks I speak posh - I do - you know why? I went to London when I was a baby so it must be because of that" but she's being deadly serious when she says these things and to me, a 13 year old does not think in such silly, black and white terms.

Another one was "do you think some of my words sound a little scottish? well they do and that's because I have scottish family members so really I'm half scottish". At 13, I would not have said something so silly in fear of being laughed at. She cannot think this way really, surely??

But back to the main issue, I am going to contact a friend who works with the social services and get his advice. I basically just wanted clarification on here that I was no thinking out of context about the strange bed wetting. Thanks.

I agree with Eleanor .

OP because you're so close to this you probably can't see it the same as an outsider, all of those things in your last post make her sound, at best, quite disturbed and odd.

Those things make it sound like she is trying to work out who she is - she's trying to define herself. All 13yo do that to some extent, though she seems a bit unsophisticated in the way she is going about it. It's probably linked in to her lack of self-esteem - she isn't comfortable being "her" so she has to find ways of being someone, by using things she can identify and label about herself.

Please sort some help for this child before you go, because I think you are the only normal person close to her,by the sound of it.
Teachers/friend's parents may all be assuming all is ok because you, someone who comes across as normal, are there with her.

Would echo what some others have said. A teenage girl wetting the bed and it being linked to her father...alarm bells ringing. Alarms bells for what? Could be a number of things, but definitely signals that this little girl is emotionally disturbed in some quite severe way.

I really try hard not to judge situations quickly from a thread - I know nothing of your family or life, really - but your DP and his family situation sound very unhealthy. Are SS involved?

perhaps she's desperate for attention and very fragile?

the bedwetting could be attention seeking behaviour
her family set up sounds grim

please be gentle with her and try not to judge her by adult standards

my ssis was very immature and naive and went through a terrible betwetting phase but it was all because she didn't want to grow out of whatever protection she felt offered by childhood

reward her if it gives the attention she requires at the minute
don't make an issue of things unnecessarily

Tell social services and get the hell out!

Why are you splitting with her father?

The poor girl sounds very troubled and you need to talk to Social Services IMO.

A number of reasons Violet. He's controlling, petty and childish. Acts wierd all the time, the issues with the DSD - it's just everything but more than anything I just want to be free to raise my boys alone without all this freakshow going on around them.

The poor poor girl. If that is how he behaves all the time you need to speak to SS and try and save this girl before its too late. You might be her only lifeline.

TheRealPerson would you be willing to make a detailed report to social services / school after you have left?

Sounds horrendous for everyone concerned. Have to agree with colditz though - huge alarm bells ringing for me too in your situation.

Please talk to social services or call the NSPC for advice.

As to whether she believes the things she says. I was abused and I know I appeared extremely immature in many ways in the things I said and I how I behaved.

You know this situation is not right - even if it is not sexual abuse it sounds to me as if this child needs help. Who will help her if you don't?

I'm just adding my voice to the consensus here; everything you describe about this girl rings very loud alarm bells.

Please do something about it; once you have left the family, who else is going to raise the alarm?

I'm with Chrysanthemum - stop discussing it here and procrastinating and get her some help.

Whatever you think about her personality or what she says is irrelevant - she's a child, you need to be the adult and call the NSPCC.

it's actually more worrying if she has "control" over the bedwetting - as rather than an unpleasant, but manageable continence problem it suggests that your SDD is somewhat psychologically distressed. Normal attention seeking teens wouldn't deliberately wet/soil, it's a sign of emotional troubles.

I know you said 2/3 weeks ago that you'd made the decision to leave this man and I'm glad, but I really hate the way you talk about your DSD as though she were some annoying little freak.

She's a child, your boyfriend is the freak! She is a child - fgs help her! You are the grown-up and as adults we all have a responsibility to protect children.

When are you leaving? Do you have concrete arrangements?

I think social services need to be involved here as a matter of urgency. I think people have been saying this for a while.