dd age almost 5 wetting herself GRRRRRRRR only at home

[chocolatemummy]

She has always wet herself not all the time but fairly often at home, nursery, chldminder etc and tried everything. She started school over a month ago and I was worried about her getting picked on so sought professional help. HV came and suggested not make a big fuss when she does it,just quietly clean her, give clean clothes so she can dress herself. So as not to affect her self esteem etc or give attention to it. since starting school she has wet herself once at school thats it but at home she is worse than ever and its so frustrating, sat she wet herself three times! she has just come home from school, dry all day and within half an hour at home she has wet herself.

no advice but dd is doig the same, she's almost 4 and keeps herself perfectly dry at playschool but as soon as she's home she refuses to go to the toilet.

rewards don't seem to work, neither do star charts, praise, ignoring, anything really.

and she's getting worse not better

exactly, I have tried reward charts, I have to put her into pull ups at night which she hates but I keep telling her that if she doesnt stop wetting herself she'll have to go back inot pull up during the day too. Its so frustrating isnt it. WE went to the park yesterday and within about 20 minutes she had a wet patch and we had to go which she went mad about but she MUST know what she is doing because how does she manage at school all day five day a week?

that's what gets me, she clearly doesn't have a medical problem or a developmental delay as she can do it 5 days a week at playschool but she just won't do it for me. even though she knows she loses out if she wets herself she'll still say she doesn't need to go and then wet herself 2 mins later.

i mean if reminding her makes her stubborn but she's too lazy to go on her own what am i supposed to do?

i know she can hold it for ages as there have been a couple of times in shops where there was no toilet handy that she's held it for up to half an hour til we found somewhere so she clearly doesn't have a urge incontinance problem either.

[sigh]

My dd is like yours, Choc

She has just started Reception too

She doesn't fully wet herself, but leaves it a bit too late so knickers get wet

She's been good lately but has had 3 or 4 occasions where she has come home from school and needed to change underwear

Posters on MN told me this was normal

IME, the ONLY ONLY ONLY thing that gets dd back on track again is to ignore it, play it down and not make an issue of it. It's frustrating, I know (and I am guilty of nagging her about it sometimes) but at the end of the day it doesn't really matter... they have just started school and are not going to be doing this forever (dd is really reliable now most of the time)

HTH

Ladies, I feel your pain. DD exactly the same when DS came along (up to 6 "accidents" a day at home, none at nursery, all inevitably on my watch) and it took over 7 months to sort out but we got there in the end.

We revoked all treats - no TV, biscuits, sweets or any other luxuries. These were earned by staying dry, with lots of praise for good behaviour and totally ignoring any accidents. Even to the point of just not changing her if the accidents were very small, or telling her she had to go an change herself when they were bigger. We sent her to the toilet every hour, went with her, lots of praise and small reward (couple of jellybeans or similar) for staying dry, bigger reward for half days (bit of TV) bigger again for whole day (craft or similar). If she asked for any of the above during the day "only if you stay dry" was the response, or "No because you've wet your knickers" (not "accidents" because they inevitably weren't, too well planned, and accidents are genuine and entirely reasonable in some situations and we didn't want her to worry about those). If it happened when we were out she still had to change herself and miss out on the fun everyone else was having while she did so. Pull ups were not an option as they are "for babies". We did get some Bright Bots pants which look like knickers but have plastic lining to stop small accidents though so at least in minimised the washing in the short term.

We tried all sort of things previous to this and nothing worked and I was finding it incredibly hard and very upsetting as I took it that she was unhappy with me. It took at least 2 months with the above technique but slowly it fixed it. We'd have a couple of good days then back to 6 accidents again, but I just stuck to the system. It does mean a lot of going into toilets to look at her knickers, which is less than ideal, but all the praise heaped made her want to achieve it more regularly. Even now 6 months on she still says "ask me if I've had any accidents today mummy" when she comes out of nursery and proudly tells the DH/DGP's she's been dry.

we have been here too! i got so fed up with it.

there is hope!! my dd now 6 has pretty much stopped. I am not sure what changed but i know i did stop going on about it

when she was 5 i always took her after school as she was holding on all day - so perhaps make that your new routine? saves you one change at least and might take some of the stress out of it

persistence, ignoring it etc, I have heard itr all before but mayeb I am just not sticking to it long enough or seriously enough. I was so fed up with her on saturday, three times one after another, ALL THAT WASHING! it doesnt seem to bother her at all and as she gets older it smells,

My dd doesn't care AT ALL if she wets herself

But in a way I am pleased about this. It would be awful if she developed a sensitivity or hang-ups about it

Also, if not bothered ignoring an even better strategy as otherwise you just do your own head in by going on about it all the time. And they STILL don't care!

IME kids this age too young to ridicule over wet pants. In a year or two, maybe, but for now I think its ok on that front

When I mentioned to dd's teacher and asked if she could remind her occasionally to go to the loo, she reassured me dd was not the only child in Reception doing this

Chocolatemummy. Sorry I hope my post didn't sound smug and I'm sure you have tried everything I've suggested with knobs on. As I said I was terribly upset by the whole thing and took it all very personally. I am ashamed of how cross and angry I got with DD, though luckily she never saw that.

DH made me think in the end - she was only doing it to me because she loves me most in the world and she missed spending time with me when DS was born. Your DD may love school, but it doesn't mean she doesn't miss you. I was so frustrated with advice from family, friends (even MN !) but it really took a change of approach mentally from me before I could change her. I can see now that all those wet knickers and trousers really didn't matter as I have a washing machine - I wasn't having to beat them against rocks every day! I stopped ironing her trousers because I knew they'd be in the wash again within 24 hours. I even bought some cheap leggings from H&M and kept her in those. Anything to make things easier on me and reduce the tension the situation caused. At their age they certainly don't have any comprehension of the wider impacts of their behaviour so I realised it was hardly fair of me to get cross at her for that. Once I'd calmed down, I found I could genuinely ignore the wetting and stay calm much more easily. Which in turn led to me enjoying my time with her more, instead of just waiting for and dreading the next incident, and she in turn started wetting less often.

I hope that doesn't sound trite and patronising. I seriously thought I was going to end up with PND again it was making me that depressed, so I do understand how totally frustrating, annoying and utterly horrible the situation can be.

I was so glad to read this thread. DS has just turned 4 and he is exactly the same. He'll be fine for days at a time and then goes through a period when he just can't be bothered to go to the toilet. Any suggestion from me that he might need to visit the toilet (when he is obviously desperate) is met with a flat refusal to go. He is generally better when we are out or when he is at nursery. I don't mind the occasional accident, I know that's completely normal, but DS was trained at 2.9 so this has been going on for over a year. I know the best strategy is to ignore and praise when he has stayed dry, but it is just so hard when it is so obvious he needs to go.

The thing I keep trying to remember is that he WILL improve and that with every 'bad' day is a 'good' day. We also have a new strategy this week: spiderman pants!!! I'm just really grateful that it only seems to be wees that he has an issue with - he always goes to the loo for a poo and is even beginning to try wiping himself