So stressed about urine accidents.

[Whoareyoumyfriend]

DS1 is 5.5 years and nearly finished with his first year at school.

Today at a family party he had damp pants and shorts 5 times over the day. I sent him each time I noticed he was damp but he shows very little initiative.

School want him dry by year one because they have no additional adult in the afternoon.

Half a term to go and I'm so worried about it 😫

My eldest was never clean and dry til after their seventh birthday and even then, there's intermittent minor accidents/ pants catching.

In their case, it's in part due to diet and hydration being inadequate (faulty genes and hypermobility, stomach issues run in the family) and due to very inattentive adhd.

You can get Dry Like Me pads for in pants, which helps just a little. But don't let the school bully you over it. It clearly sounds like it's not you, it's him. But not in a mean way iyswim.

Mine needed years of movicol, diet change, and a lot of support from staff to use the toilet and to stay sat on it long enough to actually have a wee.

Thank you all. This all really helps.

I do think its a developmental/metal issue rather than being naughty. We are pretty convinced he's autistic as he just doesn't see the world in the same way as others seem too. I just can't work out if it's behavioural- as in he doesn't see the point of being dry, or inability to physically be dry. He's dry at night so does have bladder control. I think it's just lack of awareness.

His teacher said kindly that she believes he's lazy and would rather continue his activities. But in my view there is no jiggling and no willy holding so he isn't trying to hold his urine.

His urine does naturally smell strong anyway so the washing is a nightmare

When you say you’ve sought medical help, do you mean GP and paediatric urologist? That’s what you need, not the school nurse.

My son had similar and was successfully medicated.

The school did a referral to the hv team (school nurse) and the gp was going to do the same but saw the referral had already been done 😥although we have already been discharged because apparently we are doing everything we can be doing

I think you need to go back to GP and request a referral to the specialist continence nurse. I found her incredibly helpful. It is completely different to the school nurse service.

So we've managed three dry days. Yey!!!

Today is the third day and he said to.me "but mummy. Why do I have to be dry?"

My daughter started with this at 5. She is now under a urologist and diagnosed with overactive bladder. She is trialing meds that will help it at the moment. No luck so far but we have hope. The urologist said he sees 900 children a year with this.

Just to add, if you contact your school nurse, they can get you in touch with the local continence nurse who can assess him properly and do further scans/refer to urologist if required.

Does he wet at night when asleep?

It's a long shot but if he isn't recognising the physical sensation of a full bladder could one of these (used outside of school) help ? www.bedwettingalarm.co.uk/

I know its not exactly the same, but my son had a very persistent night wetting issue until he was nearly 10. The Rodger alarm pants fixed it permanently within a few weeks.

No real advice but I'm in a very similar situation and just wanted to say I hear you.

My boy is 5yo and has several accidents a day. I've self referred to the County continence team but it's been a year and counting. We've seen GPs, health visitors, school nurse, community nurse to no avail. We've tried timers, reward charts, money, treats, but nothing works. My GP has also submitted a referral to the continence team, as has my school's SENCO, but other than an acknowledgement letter, no appointment yet. We've had two years of this and I'm fed up of the washing, and my son is starting to realise that he's not like the other children, making him more anxious.

It sounds like you are making some positive progress though, well done. Have you tried something new or is it just starting to improve by itself?

I feel like possibly he's slowly getting there. I'm pretty convinced he's physically capable. It's just maybe a mental block with him. I'm going to try to do some research about him about what happens when we flush the loo and where it goes