What would you do if your 10yo kept wetting himself?

[MincePieFlavouredVoidka]

I have put off posting this but I am running out of ideas.

DS is 10 and in year 6. He has AS traits but no formal diagnosis. We are still under a Paed and CAMHS.

DS doesnt like going to the toilet at school, so he holds it in all day. Since he started back in September he has wet himself on the way home at least once a week. I think he starts to relax once he leaves school and then cant hold it in any longer.

He gets so upset and embarrassed about it. He doesnt want me to speak to his teacher about it, and all the Paed could offer was tablets to stop urine output. When we sat and talked about it he said he gets worried that the door will be locked when he gets home and that he wont get to the toilet in time. I gave him his own key to try and get round that worry but that hasnt helped.

He walks home by himself - it isnt far and its on a straight road. I dont know what else to do. Should I go and speak to his tecaher even though he is adamant he doesnt want me to?

camhs for anxiety issues?

ds1 is the same (10 in 3 weeks), although won't admit he is phobic about using public toilets. the paed sees three issues
1- continence
2- an 'issue' (as yet unnamed but various suggestions inc as/asd/add/odd/pda etc etc)
3 - anxiety, phobic behaviour

we are doing desensitisation trg wrt public loos (dh of course has to take him as he's too old to come into the ladies) so it happens only on weekends. so far it is imporving slowly -ds has used the toilets at ikea twice. wee only. there's no way at this point he will pooh in public.

ds is currently undergoing full psycho-ed eval by child psychologist as well (various sessions, due to finish 20 Dec) so hopefully we'll have some concrete solutions at that point. (or at least how to move forward)

ds1 also soils due to the phobic issue. he came back from cub camp with an entire bag full of soiled clothing, despite the leaders being fully aware. i do understand though - there is no way that any of them could have persuaded him to use the toilet. ds1 didn't go to the next cub camp as a result.

i'd not be happy with your paed though. ours is far more pro-active about finding a solution.

should aslo have said about the 3 issues - it's a sort of chicken and egg venn diagram, so we're doing the rounds of all of them to see where a solution might lie for the continence.

Is there any chance he would use the teachers toilets after school finishes? Would the school allow that? He could put a sticker on the main toilet entrance door so teachers would know not to go in. That leaves him in control and maybe Willing to urinate?

Could he go home to wee at lunchtime? It can't be good to hold it all day ( I remember trying to do that myself and got horrid dehydration issues).

My DS3 (Asperger's) had/has issues around school toilet use, because they are filthy. He would frequently complain (loudly, to the teacher/HT) that they needed cleaned as there was urine and fecal matter on the seats, floor and walls. You can imagine how popular I was with his school (we got calls to complain about his complaints, which were valid IMO!). He would still use them rather than wet himself tho'. When he transferred to high school, he had access to the special needs unit/behaviour unit and was given permission to use their loos - cleaner as only a few people use them.

Could your DS use a "special" loo?
Could he take wipes with him to clean the seat or would that freak him out?

with ds1 it's nothing to do with cleanliness of facilities. he just doesn't like peeing if anyone is likely to hear him.

flush and pee at the same time, then no one would hear him?

we've suggested that, too. it's not a rational thing, def tipped over into a phobia. so if we get him into the washroom, he'll wait to see if anyone is going to come in, instead of making the most of it empty. or flushing.

i think we might try practising that at home though it def doesn't work in public at the mo, but maybe if he did it at home to 'test' the waters, so to speak?!

OP's DS:
Is it really impossible to work on getting over his anxiety about weeing at school? That would be the ideal solution, no?

Madwoman can he not use the Disabled loo (single person at most schools, I think?)

Actually I don't think it's that unusual for kids to dislike using school toilets. No privacy and others messing about. Often they are very smelly.

I also think it doesn't necessarily merit medical intervention. My DS1 was about 10 when he stopped having accidents. He was slow to be dry day or night and certainly had daily wet pants up to about 8 years then it gradually improved. No SN just slow bladder control.

I'd back off and don't fuss or criticise but make sure he knows you are on his side and it's no big deal.

he won't even ask to use the loo at all. not even here. we have to suggest it to him when he is literally hanging off the seat with his face contorted in agony. and he still sometimes says 'i don't need to go' when every fibre of his body is screaming that he does.

he is getting better, though. slowly. and more often than not if we are at home he will go if we remind him. and very very occasionally he will go without prompting.

squirrels, ordinarily i would agree with you. but after six years of dealing with soiled pants and seeing (and smelling) my almost 10yo with damp and soiled patches on his trousers, and hearing dd1's report of an entire school bus of children shouting 'someone's shit themselves' for a two and half hour bus journey, (and then seeing him walk off the bus obviously covered in his own urine and faeces) and having to throw away most of the items in his cub camp bag as they had been all thrown in together with the faeces because he refused to use the toilet at all for a 48 hour period (he has to pooh in the morning and the evening or he explodes), anyone that's got any ideas how to get him dry and clean will be listened to. most med profs are a bit useless tbh. but his new paed seems to be having a bit of success.

i totally understand the 'not a big deal' theory, but it's so hard to implement when a busload of kids are shouting 'you stink!' and he would still rather put himself through that again than use the toilet.

Sorry madwoman, I didn't mean to trivialise your son's problems. Clearly there is something much more than the odd pair of wet pants there. I wish I could offer some constructive ideas but it sounds as though you have tried everything.

oh, it's ok. if i had a pound for every doc that told me it wasn't a big deal and i must ignore it... we had one doc that told me to send him to boarding school, as he would stop doing it there. given that cub camp didn't work, or school or youth club trips, i wasn't entirely convinced... the same doc also told me to make him wash his own pants. and also tried hypnosis. (ds1 was entirely incontinent for the next three days - the worst i have ever seen him, so we're not going down that route again!) so we've ended up trying most things. this doc is the first one that's been addressing it as anxiety/ phobic behaviour instead of a straightforward developmental delay though, which is i think the distinction...

he'll get there.

Would it be more comfortable/ less embarrassing for him to wear incontinence pants? It could help get more help at school as well, and be more accepted by the other children if it is a medical issue.

Seen as a medical issue I mean, iyswim.