Bedwetting in 7yo dd

[northender]

dd has never been dry at night and as I'd been told there was nothing to be done until she was 7+, we waited. Then, prompted by a thread on here, we started increasing her fluid intake, last drink one hour or more before bed and toiletting twice before bed. 2 weeks ago we stopped the nappies. The first 3 nights she was soaked in the mornings, then had 4 mornings of being dry or almost (fantastic as she has not had a single dry night before). Since then she has been wet every night.
She's being so grown up about it but obviously wants things to improve. I wanted to do all these things before going to the GP, should we go to GP now or give her more time?

Any tips or advice gratefully received

No advice but my DD turned 7 last November and I'm in the same position. Will hang around with you and wait for advice if thats ok?!

Loads of great advice in ERIC.

I have a family of bedwetters, and I have taken a completely opposite approach.

I do nothing. I keep them in night nappies. We check on them before we go to bed ourselves, and if we find that their nappy is frequently dry at that time, we start lifting them and taking them to the toilet every night. Once their nappies have been consistently dry in the morning for several weeks, we leave off the nappy but continue lifting them. Dc1 started taking self to the toilet in the night after a year or so. After a few months of lifting, dc2 stopped being able to wee when lifted but stayed dry and rarely gets up to wee in the night. Dc3 is 5, still in nappies and rarely dry when we go up to bed.

Dc1 and 2 were 7-8 when they showed signs of readiness to be dry at night.

I come from a family of bed-wetters, and remember the stress of being 'trained'. I swore I would never put my own dc through that. If they're not ready then they're not ready and thank god for good nappies.

I'm in the same boat. My DD (5.5) frequently wets the bed once or twice a night even though I take her for a wee when I go to bed. She also often does wee's in her pants during the day.

I've been looking on the ERIC website and am gonna try bladder training with her. Have already increased what she's drinking. There's some great advice on there - including layer the bed clothes - waterproof layer + towel/bedmat + sheet, then repeat so that during the night is s/he's wet, you can just rip off the wet stuff and dont' have to worry about making the bed up until the morning. Mine are in bunk beds and it's the oldest one on the top who's wetting herself, and it's such a pain to change the bed in the middle of the night.

No advice as similar position. DS is 6.8 and has never been dry at night. It runs in the family. I had always understood do nothing before 7 as it could be hormonal and I thought lifting was a bad idea as it encourages the child to wee during the night when what you are aim for is them not going at all. I have just made an appointment to see the School Nurse to get her thoughts before we undertake any treatment. DS drinks loads and has amazing control during the day. Fortunately (I think!) he isn't too concerned. And he wears nappies every night so he isn't actually wetting the bed iyswim.
Have looked at the ERIC website before and it is very good. If you do see the GP would you update the thread?! I'll do the same once I have spoken with the School Nurse.

I'd put her back in the nappies and ask the GP for a referral to the enuresis clinic. It might well take a few months for the appointment to come through, so may as well get things started.

My dd was still wet until much older than 7. The enuresis clinic advised not to lift and to do the things you have been doing (more fluids, not before bed, two toilet trips etc). They can loan you an alarm for the bed which might be worth a try.

Try to reassure her that it will get better eventually :) at her age there will be other children in the class who have the same problem (10% of 5 year olds and 5% of 10 year olds have accidents at night).

Thanks for all the replies. It helps knowing you're not on your own. Prettycandles it's also good to hear the other side of things however dd really wants to give it a go now and so I feel we're supporting her. She is always dry when we go to bed and I don't know what time she's wetting as she doesn't wake. The ERIC site is great, I've printed some info off for dd. Talking to her tonight, she doesn't want to go back into nappies at the moment so we'll keep going and I've booked a GP appt for 2 weeks time. Fingers crossed for her and the others. Will keep you updated.

If she really wants to night-train, and isn't feeling under pressure to do so, then it would not be right to deny her that opportunity.

Why not try lifting her when you go to bed? Waking dry would give her such a boost.

Will follow this thread with interest as my DS(8.5) is still wetting the bed, not every night, probably a couple of times a week. We kept him in pull-ups until about 6 months ago, after a couple of previous attempts at removing them, but he had been wet every night then.

We do lift him at around 11pm. I know that's against the advice, but it's sort of working for us. Sometime he's already wet by then, sometimes he wets after that. I think he is more likely to wee before 11pm if dinner (and therefore last drink) has been later than usual. He's not a heavy sleeper, so I think he must lack the hormone needed to wake up when his baldder is full. As far as I know, he has never woken up to go to the toilet. I haven't taken him to the GP - I don't want him to get stressed about it or be given synthetic hormones to take.

OP if your dd is motivated at the moment I would persevere but let her know she has the option to go back to pull-ups whenever she wants to.

I simply had to reply to you all as I went through all this a year or so with my DS1 (now 9). He was consistently wet at night, so we never got off the night nappies (what a godsend). But here on MN someone recommended some "alarm pants" as they became known in our family. If you google Roger Wireless Bedwetting Alarm or similar you will find them. Basically they are pants that your child wears in bed that are linked (wirelessly) to a monitor. You set the monitor (preferred volume and alarm type!), plug it in (or use batteries) and go to bed. At the first drop of moisture, the alarm goes off and wakes up the child (and you if it is loud enough). Child then wakes up and realise it needs to pee. I was very sceptical but we had the problem sorted in 2 weeks, no joke. A bit pricey but worth every penny, I promise.

I'm also a huge fan of the alarm system - we had youngest dry within 3 weeks using this. He wanted to stop wetting (his brother was a bed-wetter, too) and he wanted to be dry like his older brother. If she's keen to try, the alarms are worth it. Although, my only advice would be to start the alarm training during half term - my little one found that getting up twice or three times a night when the alarm went off made him very tired, and he had some trouble managing his behaviour the next day.

Hi
Just found this thread. My ds is 9 and still bedwets. He has never been dry at night. We have tried limiting night time drinks,making him go before bedtime,trying to get him up-all to no avail.

We use the pyjama pants but sometimes if he wakes up in the night and they are wet he will take them off,go back to sleep and promptly pee the bed again!

I was also a bedwetter but I think I was dry before this age. Am pondering taking him to doctors but have unhelpful doctors and dont want to get a face from them.

Any further advice?

I also found the alarm system helpful, we went from wet every night to dry in 6 weeks, with my 9yr old. It was a lot of work, and the alarm never woke him, only me!
I am about to see the school nurse about an alarm for his younger brother(6) as we have tried everything else.I am very concsious of keeping my frustration at the huge washing pile to myself.
I was interested to hear they don't have to be 7yrs old to be referred now.

Thanks so much for all your replies, it's really encouraging. Just talking to others who've experienced what you're going through helps, doesn't it? Haven't got much time tonight so will update properly later in the week.

I spoke with the school nurse who was helpful but also unconcerned. Nothing obvious for us to do but we are going to increase his daytime fluids and then restrict him to one small drink with his supper. Also toilet/story/toilet before bed. Then in a few months we are going to try without night nappies for a few weeks and see how he goes. She will refer to enuresis clinic if we wish. So we have a plan and I have spoken to DS so he understands.

I agree it is good to hear of other's experience. Esp success stories! I'm going to keep my eye on this thread and i will post if we have any success.

Ds1 is now 8.6 and up until very recently wet the bed. We were forced to do something as he had a school residential trip.

9 months before the trip we went to the docs, as my son was not producing the hormone vasopressin which limits the amount of urine produced at night he was prescribed Desmopressin.

He went on the maximum dose, it worked. We stopped the meds and he wet the bed again confirming that his body was just not ready to be dry at night.

We resumed the meds for the trip (staff were fab about it all) and we use the meds when we stay in hotels as per docs instructions.

He now wets the bed about once every 2 months. Ds2 has never wet the bed. I wet the bed as a child so the chances of my children being bed wetters was high.

We just rolled with it all mainly because Ds1 was fine about it all. Had he been upset we probably would have done something sooner and used the alarm system. I didn't like him being on the meds but it was needed. ERIC is a fantastic website.

My ds was 7 in July and had never been dry at night. I went to the gp and got a referral to an enuresis clinic. We started attending in October and were given an alarm that senses wetness, I saw an improvement in 2 weeks - he was getting up when the alarm went off and going to the toilet. Since 11th of this month he has not been wearing the alarm and has not wet at all, either getting up or holding til morning.
My advice would be get referred ASAP, good luck

Thought I'd update this thread with really positive news! After some great help from this thread and involving dd we decided to try an alarm ourselves(the same one suggested by CEDP). The plan was to try it for 6 weeks and if no progress we agreed she should go to the GP.

So she has taken it very seriously and is meticulous about her drinking re volume and timing and the toiletting before bed.

We've been doing the alarm for 3+ weeks now and she has been dry several times and 3 nights on the trot now. The difference is amazing and I feel sure we'll get there quite soon with her. I can't recommend the alarm system highly enough.

Hope things are going well for others on the thread

Hi everyone,iam new to this. We fosterd our nephew when
He was 6yr old,hes now 17. Just like you guys weve had this problem all the way through,and he still continues to wet the bed. We tried everything from lifting,reduceing fluid in take,alarms,medication,but to no evail,it still continues. We love him,dont make an issue abowt it,but we are now under the incontience departnemt,and see a specialist nurse every 8wks. We
Was referd by our doctor. Due to this,purley for his protection purposes I had to resort back to putting him back in nappies,which we get off the nhs. We get 12wks supply at a time. We get supplied tena slip super, which are the same as pampers etc,but just bigger,so basically,all this stigma abowt older children in nappies,if they require them,so be it, its just not babies and jounger children who require them,its a wide range of ages. My nephew will be soon attending 32wks of pherapy for emotional and phycological problems to see if that will help. I hope this helps,and dont feel ashamed abowt useing nappies still. They are there for help and protection purposes only.

I'd just like to add from a child's perspective (a very long time ago!). I don't think I was dry at night until I was about 8, but my lovely mum was really calm about it and I did get there eventually .

I did everything I was told by the enurisis team for a few months and nothing worked and I had ten tons of washing each day. So I just out her back in pullups and waited and a month ago her pullups were dry in the morning and she was done. But then they said she didn't have the hormone issue she just needed to stretch her bladder. Don't know if they were right but I never managed to get her to drink as much as they wanted so don't think anything we did changed things. The whole idea that you should just take away their pullups so they feel it happening is a lot of crap for many kids IMO. They are asleep so they can't realise what is going on. If they sleep deeply like my DD they will not even wake up when they do it.

Oh and my DD is 7.5

Hi everyone again. As you know from my previous post. Ive only just noticed in last few days. When my nephew wakes,as usual his nappy is wet,but he doesnt take it off till after breakfast,but ive noticed purley from the bulge getting bigger through his pjs,iam sure he still wees in his nappy whilst having breakfast. Ive askd him,but says he doesnt. Anybody else going through this,your advice would be gratefull.