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Potty training

Is your child ready for potty training at nursery? Here's the place for all your toilet training questions.

Night time wee training

9 replies

Whenwilliteverend · 11/01/2022 13:44

Hello, name change as been discussing in real life. Hoping someone with greater wisdom might be able to help! DD is 4 and a half. Started daytime wee training at the start of the first lockdown, so just shy of 3. Was a bit of a disaster, we kept at it and despite several set backs and regressions we have fairly much cracked it. Things were great in the summer but she started school in September and understandably there was another regression. School have been great and they've told us that when challenged she's said "it doesn't matter if I wet myself". Which led them onto asking if we had trained at night, we hadn't even started contemplating that. They think she could be getting mixed messages by having the night time nappies.

In the daytime she knows she's wet herself but will never tell us, acts evasive if questioned. She's not bothered or uncomfortable if wet. She will go do a wee if we ask most of the time, and go herself too if in the mood. Poos have always been fine thankfully.

So in early October we ditched the nighttime nappies and went cold turkey - soaked every night. Started waking her several times to do a wee, much better, no accidents 2/3 of the time. Kept at that until December, daytime is great again, but no progress with night (wet if we don't get her up). Got in touch with health visitor to see if we should continue or give up and try again in a few months. She said (via text as that's what they're doing) that we must not give up, keep at it. Told us off for waking DD up, says she must wake herself when she feels wet. This has never ever happened, she sleeps like a log. This is the root of the problem really. She's never had a dry nappy/pants if not woken and made wee. She's never gone to the loo/potty herself at night. Arrgghh!

Got some of those thick training pants that hold some in, but they and the entire bedding are soaked every morning. Anything that can be covered by a protector already is.

Over Christmas we did go back to nappies as we were travelling and couldn't have that mess every night. Daytime remained ok. We pretended that the nappies were a special type of holiday training knickers that didn't hold wee in to try avoid confusion.

So anyway here we are, I want to give up and try again in a few months but my husband thinks we should go back to waking her in the night a few times. neither of which the health visitor agreed with. If you've read this far thank you so much! Any advice or even solidarity welcome. I never thought that coming up to 2 years we would still be here..

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GrendelsGrandma · 11/01/2022 13:52

That sounds crazy, DD is 5 and still in nappies overnight and she potty trained just after 2. It's a hormonal change that happens in their brains to make them able to night train. You can't make them do it. Doctors aren't worried until much later - I think 7 or 9?

I'd stick her back in nappies overnight quite unashamedly, being tired from multiple night wakings will make it harder for her to stay dry in the day.

For daytimes if she doesn't care about being wet - after a while we made sorting an accident much more onerous for DD than going to the loo. So she'd have to stop playing at once and we'd get her to help clean up. Message being that it's very boring when she has an accident and much quicker if she just goes to the loo. If she wee'd around a toy then it would have to be taken away to be washed etc.

It sounds like you've had bad advice and been stressed about it, I'd focus on staying dry in the day and relax more if you can!

Whenwilliteverend · 11/01/2022 13:59

@GrendelsGrandma

That sounds crazy, DD is 5 and still in nappies overnight and she potty trained just after 2. It's a hormonal change that happens in their brains to make them able to night train. You can't make them do it. Doctors aren't worried until much later - I think 7 or 9?

I'd stick her back in nappies overnight quite unashamedly, being tired from multiple night wakings will make it harder for her to stay dry in the day.

For daytimes if she doesn't care about being wet - after a while we made sorting an accident much more onerous for DD than going to the loo. So she'd have to stop playing at once and we'd get her to help clean up. Message being that it's very boring when she has an accident and much quicker if she just goes to the loo. If she wee'd around a toy then it would have to be taken away to be washed etc.

It sounds like you've had bad advice and been stressed about it, I'd focus on staying dry in the day and relax more if you can!

Thank you so much for replying, you speak a lot of sense. Yes I thought it was meant to be a developmental thing that you couldn't rush!

Good point about being tired in the day. We are up anyway with a small baby (gah we get to do all this again Grin ) but she wouldn't be.

Sounds like a great plan to make a big deal of accident clean up, really good thinking.

Have been trying not to get too stressed, more p*ed off with the amount of washing every day!

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Metalhead · 13/01/2022 19:26

I agree with the previous poster, it seems crazy to either wake her every night or have a soaking bed, she’s clearly not ready to ditch the nighttime nappies. DD2 was only dry at night about 2 months before her 6th birthday; she’d had a couple of dry months during the year beforehand but then “relapsed” and we thought she’d never get there, but she did eventually.

GrendelsGrandma · 14/01/2022 15:58

Glad it helped @whenwilliteverend

MissyB1 · 14/01/2022 16:03

There’s no such thing as night time training I’m afraid. Their bodies will decide when they are capable. It’s very different to daytime, they can’t control what happens when they are asleep.

Sally872 · 14/01/2022 16:04

I had the exact same question about 9-12 months ago and the advice was you can't night train. I thought I could/should but listened and the wise mumsnetters were right.

I read the Eric website, stopped drinks an hour before bed, used desmopressin when he turned 6 then just before Christmas we tried him off the tablets and he was dry all night. If desmo hadn't worked my next thought was bed alarm. But I didn't start anything until 6. At your dds age I would just wait.

SliceOfCakeCupOfTea · 14/01/2022 16:07

DS is 5 and potty trained him at 2 and bedtime trained at 3. Did reward charts and everything.

I never knew about the hormone thing. We had a load of pressure from school to make sure all kids were not having accidents during COVID..

Indecisivelurcher · 14/01/2022 16:09

Agree with Pp's, being dry at night is controlled by a hormone. I don't think it's considered an issue until age 7.

If you continue to have issues in the day there's a charity that my sil spoke to about her dc, I think they're called Eric. They gave her some good advice.

bedington · 14/01/2022 16:15

Some kids will not be fully dry at night until much older...you can try all you want to train but it is a waste of time. And there is no shame in it.

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