6 year old boy bedwetter

[SimpleSimonSaysU2]

Any advice? He wears bedtime nappy pants but they still leak every night.

I can't cope with washing his bedding all the time!

Camping was the same, wee everywhere.

Any advice? He wears pull ups and has a waterproof sleeping bag but it is still leaking everywhere. 😭

@SimpleSimonSaysU2 - hi, I don't have experience of this personally, however, my 6yo niece and 8yo nephew both had issues with dry nights and they had an alarm that woke them in the night when they started to go. Might be worth talking to your gp xx

Do you know what time he’s wetting? Is he drinking plenty throughout the day but nothing after 5/6 depending on what time he goes to bed. Does he open his bowels often? I know being constipated can push on the bladder
My 12 year old ds has been dry for almost 2 years now- the difference it makes is amazing- I really sympathise. Nothing really worked for him. He’d either sleep through the alarm or take it off. He used the melts but they didn’t make much difference. In the end it was a stern talking to and the threat of charging him for the washing. He’d force himself awake when the alarm would go off and was soon dry.
My 10 year old has gone through a phase of wetting. Just couldn’t work out why until we got called into school. Persistent, low level bullying which he’d react to and land in trouble himself. Couldn’t believe the difference once it was identified- not had a wet night since.

Do you limit drinks to a few sips 2 hours before bedtime? Plus don't give squash or things with sweetened like Hot chocolate as it can cause be diuretic ( causing them to wee more)!

Also I'd try to not make him wee unless he decides to in the daytime. So if your going on a short trip out don't ask him to wee before you leave. The idea is to improve bladder capacity and to get him used to feeling full and will help with night time. Very hard as as adults we do the just in case wee before going out.

Might be an idea to check on when they are weeing in the dry nights. If it's on waking, then causing a leak then this could be resolved by discussing that when you wake up you need to get straight out of bed and use the toilet. That the dry nights aren't for weeing in in purpose ( this could be the case.) Obviously if it's happening at midnight and they don't wake, you could try them without to see if being cold wet wakes them. It's a tough one, because changing a bed in the night sucks either way.

We were given a couple washable bed mats by a friend for DD- my friend said they were called Kylies. They were great- easy to chuck in the wash.

At 6 it is very normal to still be wet at night. Have a look at the ERIC website .
Two of my DC were still wet every night at 6 , one was fine with the dry nites with very few leaks and the other wore 'disposable' nappies. Are there different makes you can try?

I have the same with DS who is 8 in April.

We have tried everything and though we have had some success, he's still wetting at least twice a week and I've had to bite the bullet and buy more drynites pants today.
I can't keep up with the washing, his bedroom smells of wee and I'm paranoid of him being teased at school.

Following with hope and interest x

It is really tough, but at the age of 6 I don't think it is even a matter of concern to the medical profession. My twins were still not dry at night until 10+

From the age of around 8 they were being seen at the enuresis clinic. The first requirement is to ditch the pull-ups which I'm sure you can imagine was fun with two of them, two lots of wet bedding to deal with every morning. As others have said, lots to drink during the day, avoiding drinks after 6pm, no squash. We also had to measure wee output for a time. They both had bladder ultrasounds which found no abnormalities. We tried the drug treatment which didn't really help. One became spontaneously dry at around 10.25, for the other one we progressed to trying an alarm which he hated, I think he was finally dry just before 11.

One thing that did help - brolly sheets. They are tumble dryable and although expensive to buy, they saved an awful lot of washing.

I must say I don't like to think of it as bed wetting - to me that always sounds like a regression of a child who is normally dry at night. In our case, they never had been dry at night despite cracking daytime potty training very easily at about 2.75yrs.

Good luck.

Which pull ups are you using? Perhaps look at changing the brand. Aldi size 6 are good for older children, and make sure the frills around the edges are pulled out.

That's the issue big- if you are not discovering a wet bed in the morning then it might suggest the wetting is happening as they wake. There is very much this approach nighttime dryness being hormonal, but I do think some gentle work has to be put in. In a pull up they won't be feeling so wet against the skin, so why wake? My DS wets about once a fortnight, usually after drinking loads before bed , but a cough has been making things worse. I consider him trained as the wetting wakes him, but it's a learning curve.

• until the morning

I know this is no consolation, but lots of children are not dry at night at 6. Parents don’t necessarily talk about it a lot, so it can feel as if you are the only family struggling.

My daughter has just gone dry at night at age 8. We didn’t even try her without night time pull ups. She has been wearing Aldi size 6 for last 2 years, no leaks, but is slightly built. We have entirely avoided the constant washing off sheets.

Over the last year there has been the odd dry night, so for the first time I started to mention, that her body was getting ready to “go dry” and that eventually she would sleep without the pull ups. Just in a casual type way, no pressure. I also said that if she ever wanted to try a night without the pull ups, she should let me know, and just left it at that.

A couple of times she mentioned she might want to try without them, but then changed her mind at bed time, she was clearly a bit nervous.

Then 2 weeks before her 8th birthday she had dry pull ups every day. She started telling me, she was having dry pull ups and seemed quite excited. I responded fairly low key, “great, you are getting older, body changing etc”. Then the night before she turned 8, she announced she was ditching the pull ups. I was more nervous than her, mostly because I didn’t want her to be upset on the morning of her birthday.

But I also wanted to respect her decision.

Well, she was dry that night and for 20 out of the last 21 nights. She has had one accident which she insisted was caused by sweating too much! It wasn’t sweat! I let it slide, didn’t matter. Just said, “even people who can cycle fall off their bike occasionally”, it’s all part of learning.

My godson was 10, almost 11 before being dry at night, so I knew this was not untoward.

I know it’s a bit of a pain as they get older, but there is a very wide age range during which children become dry at night.

I too never viewed it as bed wetting. My child’s body wasn’t ready for night time continence.

If I had tried to somehow help her become continent before her body was able to be, the last 2 years would have been much less happy and relaxed for us all.

I also appreciate that every child is different and some may require further investigation/support from healthcare professionals.

Just my own anecdotal experience and should be read as such.