can a 3.5yo be 'trained' to have dry nights?

[Neeerly3]

I have 3.5yo twins, one is dry at night the other is not. He wears pull ups and wakes up soaked most mornings. Sometimes we position winky incorrectly and are woken at 12/1am by child wanting wet bed and pj's changing, so it's not like he's getting to morning and just being lazy and peeing in pullups before he gets up. Occasionally he poo's in the pull ups in the morning too insisting it was an 'accident mummy!'

He has never been chastised for wetting or pooing, just "oh well never mind, lets try harder tomorrow eh?"

My question is, can you train little ones to be dry at night and if so how? We didn't have to do anything for the other twin he was just waking up with dry pull ups so we took em off. I'm not in a panis really, would just like to have stopped buying pull ups by the time I am buying nappies again next feb.....

Thanks all

panis??? panic obviously!

No.

You could try waking him at 11pm and putting him on the loo - this may result in fewer wet beds - but you can't train him to feel the signal to wake.

thought as much - how old will he have to be for me to think there might be a problem? (keep being told "all mine were dry day and night by now" by well meaning relatives and "just take the pull ups off, he will never learn otherwise" - how will he learn while he is asleep, pants on or off!)

there is a siuggestion that "lifting" can elongate the length of time it takes to get dry at night - because you are artificially controlling the situation. My b/f' Ds is 4.3 and still wets at night. I thnk if they get much older you might want to speak to a GP - does he sleep very very soundly?

Do pull ups let you "feel" the moisture? If no (never used them) then you could invest in a good incontince bed mat - or two, easier to wash one mat and pair of pj/s cheaper too, and it might get the brain to sense wetness mroe quickly? Does he maybe associate pull ups woith nappies - and unconscioously, that is what you do in nappies.

just batting some ideas around

my ds is the same age and still wet 2 out 5 nights or so. I'm just waiting till the dry nappies become more regular. no hurry imo

dd is 3.2, nearly, and I started last week without pull ups (or sleep pants as we called them)

I have one mattress protector so have been gettng Pampers Bed mats to use also. Last night was our worst night, twice she was soaked

Think I might need to invest in some more washable mattress protectors as don't like disposables.

We have had a couple of nights that were pretty good and some nights she gets up soon after going to bed to use the potty, right beside the bed. And some nights she's obviously got up not long before getting up time and there's some early morning dark pee. Some nights she has wet the bed but it has dried in and she's not noticed....

I'm trying not to let her drink too much before bed time, but she drinks a lot during the day, which I'm happy about as I don't drink enough fluids.

will be following this thread with interest!

He sleeps really DEEPLY which i think is the issue. He gets up declares loudly that he's dry, removes his "big boy pants" and they are sodden, so i have to gently tell him that no he's not dry, but it doesn't matter he will be soon.

Thing is before xmas we went big boy pant free for about 2 weeks and was up every night at least 2/3 times (the other twin was still wetting at that stage too, just never at the same time as his bro), so i was getting through sheets like they were going out of fashion and we were all shattered - subsequently the days were horrendous too as they were both too tired.

Now DT2 is dry, i guess it proves to me, that they just do it when they are ready....more patience required i think as if we go pant free so he experiences the wet feeling will just wake him up more frequently, but AFTER he has weed, so not sure it's teaching him anything. You can't teach a child to wake when they need a wee i guess.

they do it when they are ready, you can't train it.
Anything before age 5 is totally normal
age 5-7 is still common though then the GP will recommend you start lifting, restricting fluids post 4pm etc.

DD1 was 4 when i realised she was weeing in her Easy-Up before she went to sleep and again in the morning... i moved her to pull-ups with a reward if the graphics were still visible in the morning (i.e. not wet) and she only wet them once. But she wasn't weeing asleep, i don't know when she stopped though.

DD2 stopped weeing in her nappy when i day-time potty trained her at 2.8. She refused to have nappies on at night and that was that. She does get up once or twice to have a wee though and wants assistance and that is a PITA!

so to answer OP, i think you have to wait. He is still young and if you know he isn't weeing awake then i would leave it and not make any mention of it at all for now.

thanks amidaiwish, i will do that i think....

DD was dry at night at nearly 5. I was waiting until her morning nappy was dry until I read on here that it wasn't necessarily a sign that they were dry.

We had given it a go without nappies a few months earlier and it was a disaster, but this time it just happened - no lifting, restricting drinks or anything. She was just ready - and until the night we tried it her nappies had been sodden in the mornings.

so trial and error surfermum? Give it a whirl and see how he goes?

That's what I did and was pleasantly surprised the second time!