2nd dry night for ds 7.4. Is this it?!

[Whereisegg]

Ds has had very few dry nights in his life, and even fewer of these have been in a row.

At 5 he had his HUGE (surgeon said biggest he'd seen) tonsils and adenoids removed due to sleep apnea.
Dr had mentioned that his brain was so concerned about keeping him breathing, it didn't care if he wee'd but that this would likely resolve itself after surgery.
It did, for 3 nights.

Fast forward a couple of years solid of brick-heavy pants every morning (and occasional wet beds too despite pants), we are on our second morning in a row of bone dry pants.

I don't want to be too outwardly excited at home in front of ds as he can't control it, so I want to be excited here please!

Could this be it, or just a lucky streak?

Ah, she'll calm down on the visits with time.

We use a rather convoluted, "hey, it's fantastic that 'it' happened, which kind of depersonalises it. Almost like a lottery win.

... An alarm + dry nights may be the way forward. Wet stop is about £35 on Amazon.

The alarm is already in my Amazon basket! DD is really determined that she doesn't want the drynites after so long in them, though. Can the alarm fit inside knickers/PJs?

It certainly does go in normal pants, as that is the original intention. When we were using it like this in the summer, however, we found that everyone got too tired, too soon, as the bed changes took a lot longer.

Ah I see, so the idea is that it goes as they begin to wee? So you'd still have a bed and PJ change. We have 3 of those brolly sheets on so bed change isn't too bad if the duvet hasn't been hit! Just ordered v cheap duvet so have back up as impossible to wash and dry a duvet on a work day. Does alarm wake everyone in house? DD is a v heavy sleeper sharing bunk with light sleeping younger (and dry since 3) DS. He has already very kindly allowed swap to top bunk so changing of DD's bedding is easier and so she can get to the loo quicker.

Ds is also a v heavy sleeper, so dh and I took turns on his floor to help with loo trips and getting changed.
Alarm leaflet suggested that the child does it all themselves but seemed a bit cruel to me

We could hear it downstairs, through two closed doors, while DS snoozed on.

He's got a high sleeper, and even with the back-up duvet ready in a cover, it still took too long on nights when it went right down to the mattress protector. Blooming gallons at times, it was.

We felt that getting him to do it all was a step too far, but it is important that they wake up, as that is kind of the point.

Agh, as I'd expected, wet twice last night, and poor DD said she felt 'ashamed' this morning. Reassured her loads but I think she thought that was it after one dry night.

I explained it to ds as a part of his brain was sleeping with him.
That it is this parts job to stay awake to help him not pee, sometimes it would stay awake and sometimes it would fall asleep as it was only 7 (his age), and it's hard to stay up all night at 7.
Buying the alarm, I described it as sort of an alarm clock that would help his brain learn exactly which feeling it needed to wake him up for.

Maybe something like this explanation could reassured your dd?

I really like that, thanks Whereisegg!

As I posted before miiiiiles up thread, if ds got down, seeing the drynites go up to age 15 would help to cheer him up slightly too.
After all, they wouldn't make them up to that age if it was only one or two dc that needed them

Yyy to all of that - and taking care to use language that minimised any idea of choice in what happens at night. The alarm made him feel that he was doing something. We referred to his lovely deep sleep as being mostly wonderful, but with this slight snag.

I am awaiting moans from ds now about the nightly reminder to pee before bed.
I will be telling him that I still do, not because I'm worried I might wet the bed, but that I don't like getting out of bed in the morning, let alone the early hours

It's so hard to know how much is psychological and how much physiological. I'm sure you've discussed this further up the thread so apologies if I'm going over old ground. The nurse said to DD to try some positive language 'I will be dry tonight', 'I will wake up when I need a wee' etc and while I can see the point of this, it does shift it to DD's fault or responsibility. There is no doubt that psychology does play a part - DS who was dry at 3 still has the odd accident and that is always when something else is going on - new school term etc.

We never saw any health professionals specifically regarding ds being wet at night.
I had read on mn that drs don't see it as an issue until 7, so dh and I decided that the first time ds became down about it after his 7th birthday, we would let him know that seeing the dr was an option if he wanted to.
I am saying this so you know that I have had precisely no professional input and that anything I say is purely my opinion from personal experience, and situations shared, mostly here.

So with that in mind, I agree with you that positive thinking is and can be great and a powerful thing, but those particular sentences do seem to personal and could be disastrous for her confidence and self esteem if they don't work.

*too personal

I'm in the same boat as Egg, in not having consulted HCPs. Up thread I talked a bit about the psychology: physiology balance, and my instinct is that a positive mindset won't make it right - but a negative/ pessimistic one means for us that it certainly won't come right (witness July-September posts). In other words, it's not enough on its own, but is an essential ingredient nonetheless. We kind of talked about it with DS in those terms, too.

After a dry night we used to say that we were delighted that it had happened, that we all hoped it would happen again (using "it") but stressing also that it didn't matter if it didn't.

Like Egg, we also couch our go-for-a-wee nagging in terms of our not wanting to get up, rather than his dryness (or not).

Using the Eric website to help him to understand his body in greater depth than his peers helped him to see a silver lining to it all, as he loves facts and knowing what is going on. He's big on bladders now, is DS.

First wet morning in over a month.

Wet stop back on tonight. Gah.

Urgh

Dry this morning

It's going to take us a loooong time to relax.

So, we've had 2 dry nights in about 10 days. Considering they are our first, I'm still feeling happy. And we're down to one wetting a night rather than two. Still feels like there's a long way to go...

Hi all, can I join in? Ds is 7.9 and has never been dry. He wear dry nites and most mornings they are soaked to the point of leaking. He doesn't drink much really yet frequently goes to the toilet during the day. On ds suggestion we went to the gp who refered us to the clinic. They gave lots of good advice, which I already knew to be honest, and asked us to chart what how much he was drinking and how much he was weeing for a few days. Haven't seen how little he drinks, yet how frequent he goes they have started him on the medication, ox..... Something. Has anyone had any success in using this?

Hi, Hippo, Welcome!
We've never used medication, but there was somebody a while up thread who talked about one beginning with D being successful for their child. It sounds like you're doing all the right things re upping what he drinks during the day. Have a read of our journeys, and we're all here to listen and share.

Sydney - that definitely sounds as though she's moving in the right direction, though. Two dry is fantastic, as is cutting down to once in the night.

hi hippo, no experience of meds from me but you're very welcome

Good night lemon?

I can't believe a thread about my ds not wetting for 2 nights has 500 posts!
So happy at the support here