4yo wetting himself. :(

[Egon2473]

Hey mums/dads....First post so be gentle... :)

Dad of three, 2,4 & 22 (don't ask!) and recently our 4yo boy has started wetting himself with alarming regularity. He can get up in the night for a wee so we know that he can feel the urge to go but it's getting silly now.
We tried the carrot and stick methods but to no avail. :(
I'm hoping it's not a bullying thing at school and have asked his teachers and ta's to keep one eye open (I understand they're flat out with 25 over active reception class kids!!) but nothing to report.

My long suffering wife is really frustrated and I'm running out of ideas.
Anyone have any idea's?

Yours "waiting for the washing machine to finish again"
Ian.

Oh its frustrating isn't it? When it you think it was sorted! My 4yo boy had a phase of this (wee and a bit of poo sometimes ) a few months ago. He's not a school yet, but happy at nursery, had good control normally - it seemed to be linked to an inability to tear himself away in time from whatever play he was up to. We used regular reminders that he really didn't want to have to go back into nappies 'like a baby and not a grown up boy', along with prompts to try at regular intervals, persuading him to stop his activity and not let him start again until he'd tried for a wee (he gets very wriggly when needing to go so easy to spot!), and high fives when there were (almost) clean pants at the end of the day. Not sure if that helps, but the problem did resolve eventually - maybe two or three months.

Thanks for the reply, it's massively frustrating, isn't it?
Might try the nappy thing as no other coersion seems to be working.
Regular reminders , like you say are needed, he just seems to be preoccupied enough to forget.

Two out of three of mine would happily trot out of school with a plastic bag of wet bottoms slung over one arm. Not bothered in the slightest.
One just dried out over the summer holiday between yr r and yr 1, the other one took considerably longer. He just wasn't bothered.

The third one was dry day and night from 2.

Don't make it a big deal. There is soooooo much going in yr r. They perhaps need to remind him to toilet time a couple of times in the day, rather than waiting for him to realise himself...?

Other ideas - is he drinking enough? Sometimes they don't bother at school. Or the converse - is he visiting the water fountain a billion times? Both can cause issue with bladder control...

Check for UTI? Not always discomfort, so worth a quick Gp visit if it is an unusual behavioral change.

My ds1 is 4.5 and we have the occasional wet bag coming out of preschool where he just forgot about the loo until it was too late

Make sure he can get his trousers down quickly - one accident we had was when he couldn't unbutton a pair in a hurry or just pull them down tight mummy making him wear too small clothes

Regular loo trips, when he gets up, before you go out anywhere, then whenever convenient out. Always before meals and before bath and before bed. Basically drill it in to be a habit.

No hot water bottles - this was my fault over Christmas, we had a run of wet nights before I clicked that the hot water bottle under his bum was to blame.

And then just ride it out. Sorry, but there with you!