Bed wetting 5yo

[BadRoly]

Dc4 (5) has never had a dry night. I am not overly concerned about this having searched and read several times that this is very common, especially in boys.

But I'm struggling with the practicalities and this morning has tipped me into asking for advice.

He is a tall 5yo (compared to classmates) and I've got him in size 6 nappies. He asked for pull ups and we've tried some but he is leaking out.

I think he is getting uncomfortable in a wet nappy as he has taken to pulling them off in the middle of the night for the last couple of weeks. He then wets his bed. Dh was home all last week so was disturbed and changed the bed each night.

Last night dc4 did this and then got into my bed as he had been doing. Except dh went away again last night so I didn't realise until this morning when dc4 wet my bed.

So my questions are:
Should I be looking at bigger nappies/different nappies/dry nites?
How can I 'break' the nappy removal habit?
Is there anything I should be doing to help him (I don't at the moment) be dry?
What's the best way of getting small boy wee out of a memory foam mattress?!

My 4.8yo girl isn't dry at night either. I'm not worried. As I understand it there is nothing you/your child can do until their body produces a particular hormone in sufficient quantities to wake them when thy need a wee. We use dry nites and they sometimes overflow. It's a pain - we had night after night of changing her bed in the really hot weather as she was drinking so much. But I guess it's just one of those things...

I have a long thread about this on this page, have you tried different brands of pull ups?
I found them all pretty much the same and so would just buy whatever was on offer.

I think you need a decent mattress protector, I'm sure if you have a look on the housekeeping pages there will be some tips to save the mattress!

Have you read the ERIC website? Lots of tips on there including more drinks during the day, nothing dark or with caffeine though, double voiding before bed, not lifting them.

My ds is 7. 8 now and has a dry couple of months under his belt after we bought an alarm.

Good luck

Hi, all the kids have good mattress protectors on their beds and dc4 has 2 so that we just take the top layer off at night iyswim?

Unfortunately we don't have a waterproof mattress protector on our bed as I have chronic urticaria and use a pure cotton mattress protector to try and help with that.

Like I say, I'm not overly concerned about him being wet at night as he is still young. But I don't know what to do about him taking his wet nappy off. I think part of it is trying to be a 'big boy' but we don't tell him off or tease him about wearing a nappy. We don't actually comment about it at all.

Likewise I don't lift him (we never have with any of them), he drinks lots of water/milk, very rarely squash (I don't buy it).

I will look up double voiding though, we ask him to have a wee after he's brushed his teeth - presumably double voiding would be doing it twice in quick succession, eg before and after teeth brushing?

I think he is currently wetting twice - once in the middle of the night which wakes him so he removes his nappy and again 7ish (which is when he wet my bed this morning). So I need a practical way of managing that middle of the night nappy removal.

How about giving him a potty in his room for when he wakes and encouraging him to take the wet nappy off then and pair of thick traditional style trainer pants to put on when he takes his nappy off? We found with one of ours who was doing a similar trick that whilst they would be no use at all for a whole night they would just hold a second accident in the morning when he seemed to be more easily woken as he was weeing. We managed to find some quite thick waterproof nylon covered Terry pants when we were on holiday in the States and I believe that you can get what are called "bedwetter pants" here - though no doubt you would re-name them .

That might be worth a try. He could probably even put a pull up on himself.

So I've read your thread Whereisegg. Wow! How's your ds doing now?

I'm torn between having a go at being proactive and just leaving things be for a while. Ds is only just 5. His 3 older siblings were all dry day and night by this age so it's all unknown territory. I too get the 'helpful' comments about babying him and it's called toilet training for a reason.

I almost feel like I'm ignoring advice on here. But I'm not, I am reading and taking most if it in. I need to make a decision about what I'm going to do and how I'm going to get dh and the dc on side!

He's still dry, although it's only a few days since I last posted a count!

We decided to leave it until 7 to see a dr as that is the earliest they refer here, and we would only go if ds brought it up, he had those first couple of dry nights before and now here we are!

You can try all the upping drinks, double voiding etc, and what about a school nurse?

Ah, I didn't look at dates towards the end, just saw the counts! He must be pleased.

We must have a school nurse but I've never had anything to do with him/her. I have spoken with school (his teacher) because he was late with day time toilet training and still has accidents.

He is very immature in some respects - his speech is very babyish (tone rather than vocabulary) and he is still very toddlerish in how he plays alongside other children but not with them.

I don't know if this all somehow ties in together, if he is just a late developer. Most of the time I am laid back about it all but then I have a little neurotic panic that I am failing him as a mother by not 'doing something'.

Honestly, this parenting lark, it's bloody hard work

It is! Once you start looking, you realise that lots of dc are still wet at night at 6/7/8 and beyond, but as nobody talks about it you feel isolated and very much that it's something you're doing/not doing

What about a onesie to stop the nappy removal. A button one would probably be more likely to stop it.

My DS took a while to get dry at night. I used to layer up the bed with 2 lots of waterproof sheets and 2 lots of normal sheets which made the night time bed sheet changing better.

When it came to my Dd still being in pull-ups at 5, I thought we'd give it a go but she was wet every night and sometimes didn't wake up. I know 5 is not old at all but both my kids are really deep sleepers and I felt it'd probably be another couple of years of pull-ups before she'd be dry by herself. After a few nights of changing beds at night and all the washing I decided to buy a bedwetting alarm. It was expensive and I figured we'd be spending a lot of money on pull-ups & washing. Best decision ever! She has been completely dry ever since. I've lent it to friends too and currently using it on 8 year old DS who is having a period of bedwetting I think due to illness. Can get them on ebay too.

The pants we got in the States were called Potty Scotty - and despite the name they worked. I've just fished a pir out of out extensive nappy cupboard to find the name in case it helped and realised that they are probably microfibre rather than conventional Terry and I had remembered them as thicker than they are - but they worked, were adjustable and, yes, he could put them on and pull them up himself.