When do we need to worry re. night-time pull ups?

[cat811]

DS is 5, and has literally had 2 nights ever where his pull-ups have been dry. The rest of the time they are soaking wet in the morning, and he has even started leaking through them at night recently.

We have gone through phases of trying without them - he is really keen - but despite having no drinks after 5, going to the loo at bedtime, and us waking him up when we go to beds (have tried spells of doing this, and also not) it doesn't work. He's often soaking even by the time we wake him to go. Or if he isn't, and manages to go then, he still goes again later during the night and wets the bed.
He has no access to a drink at night.

At what point do we start to worry? He is a very heavy sleeper, and never even wakes up when he wets the bed - we only know about it once he wakes up in the morning - he would happily asleep soaking wet all night!

Is there even anything we can do? Don't want to take him to a doctor and make him feel likes there's an 'issue' with him, as he's not massively aware of it being a problem at the minute - we try to treat it lightly and gloss over it - though he clearly doesn't really want to wear them, and also doesn't like waking up wet.
He has no issues during the day, and toilet-trained relatively easily at 2.5/3.

Andyadvice/reassurance from anyone out there? Thanks :)

*Any, not Andy!

Only thing I would say is: don't ever start to worry. Sounds like he is one of the unlucky few (one of my DC was too) who won't be dry until much later on in his life. So don't make an issue of it. You are already doing what you can do, with the restricted drinks in the evening, and lifting him before you go to sleep.

You could try desmopressin - didn't work for DS and doesn't for lots of boys. Or you could just teach him how to manage it. Don't go down the route of alarms etc as it makes them so self conscious. There's a hormone the body produces that keeps us dry at night and some boys just don't produce it until they are much much older, so no amount of hypno or alarms etc can change that biological fact.

Just let him be who he is and teach him to manage his problem. So long as his hygiene and confidence are good, and he has strategies for coping with sleepovers and camps etc that's the main thing. He'll outgrow it eventually.

If he's soaking through at night he's producing a lot of wee, so it's clear he isn't producing the hormone to stop this yet. At 5 this is normal. Medically concern only kicks in age 7+.

Please reassure your DS there's nothing he can do and his body will figure it out when it's ready. Stick with the pj pants and wait.

Lots of good info on the ERIC website.

Thank you for the reassurances - will not worry yet then!

I totally agree, dont worry. My eldest, now 31, was reading chapter books, knew his times tables, was having piano lessons before he was dry at night! He was dry by 2.5 daytime, about 8 before reliably dry at night. Another of my boys was dry at day and night at 2 and another was dry at night before day, so no "normal" age really. Hope you mind is put at rest.

I agree that there is no need to be concerned at this point. My dd was like your son and she was dry at late around 5 - or that was when we stopped taking her for a wee before going to bed ourselves and she stayed dry all night. There are plenty of people who say 'lifting' isn't helpful but given the choice between that and wet and miserable children I think lifting is fine. Given that hasn't worked for you I would simply use pull ups until they are dry in the morning. Don't withhold drinks though. He needs to drink when he's thirsty. The issue is hormonal not as simple as water in, urine out

No need to worry. I too had boys at both ends of the "dryness" spectrum.
DS2 dry by day at 2.5 and night before 3.
DS1 wasn't reliably dry at night until about 7 and still had daytime accidents past that.
It's beyond his control and he will get there in the end. If you did a survey of his class at school you would find plenty more still wet at 5.

Hmm, have to say i wasn't convinced by the ERIC website. Lots of ads on there and suggestions for all sorts of things to buy and get caught up in trying to prevent it. (Unless the site has massively updated in recent years.) He can't help it. He'll grow out of it when he can.

Another post to say please don't worry, my DS was dry during the day at 24 months but still wearing pull ups until 6.5 yrs. I was concerned but nothing we tried worked then over the space of 2 weeks he naturally became dry. At almost 8 he will very occasionally wet the bed when super tired. I would bet he'll do it in his own time without a strategy.