Please or to access all these features

Potty training

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

Night time training (nearly six year old)

14 replies

110APiccadilly · 26/10/2026 06:22

DD is nearly six and still in pull ups at night, which are generally wet in the morning. We sometimes have runs of three or four dry nights and I think she's getting it but it never lasts.

Anyone got any tips or is it just a matter of waiting? She'd like to be dry but isn't distressed about it (which is good, to be clear!)

We've tried putting her in pants under the pull-up so it feels wet but that doesn't seem to have made any difference. She has had problems with constipation - basically, we have to be a bit careful with her diet or she starts to have issues, but we don't have to be super strict, just make sure she's getting enough fibre basically. I don't know whether that's a factor though - plenty of times she has definitely not been constipated but still been wet, as now that we know we are careful with her diet!

Her sister (just turned four) has been dry at night for a year, despite having been generally harder to potty train. But no real difference in how we potty trained them - sister just started waking up to wee once she was dry in the day and while I said "well done" and similar (even at 3am, when my true feelings were occasionally somewhat different!) I didn't do anything specific to cause it.

OP posts:
Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
Iocanepowder · 26/10/2026 06:25

Sorry op i have no advice but solidarity as DS just turned 6 and is still in pull ups at night. He is a deep sleeper. I have been trying to stop him drinking much before bed and getting him to do 2 wees before sleep but no change so far.

I have heard of people having to get their kids up at 10pm for a wee.

Greentomatoes21 · 26/10/2026 07:29

Solidarity also! My son will turn 6 this week and is still wet at night - although increasingly the strings of dry nights have been a little longer recently. We tried to remove pull ups about a year ago but this resulted in wet sheets and duvets and an upset child. So we have left him in pull ups as he seems to be less bothered about those than the wet beds. The only thing that has reduced the wet nights is reducing liquid before bed. He eats dinner around 5.30pm and has water with that. After that he generally doesn't have any liquid. Before bed he uses the toilet twice; once before pjs etc and tries again after his story. He was day trained by 2.5 and immediately very reliable in the day. I believe night "training" is not considered possible due to it being connected to the natural production of a hormone. I am assuming his production of this particular hormone in trickling in, rather than the light switch moment it was for my daughter!

110APiccadilly · Today 05:51

Well, the solidarity is definitely nice to have! We keep plodding on, I suppose, and one day it will happen. Have to say pull-ups were on offer the other day and we stocked up and I was hoping for a case of Sod's Law (or is it Murphy's?)

OP posts:
IronEverything · Today 05:53

Is there a medical reason she's still wetting the bed? I think you need to stop the pull ups because you're giving her no need to stop.

110APiccadilly · Today 05:59

IronEverything · Today 05:53

Is there a medical reason she's still wetting the bed? I think you need to stop the pull ups because you're giving her no need to stop.

No known medical reason (I don't think they'll look for one before 8, but I may be wrong). The reason I tried putting her in pants under her pull-ups was so that it did feel wet. And I don't really see what else taking her out of the pull-ups would achieve? Wet over a larger area I suppose but it feels like setting her up to fail to be honest.

She does have other reasons to stop - we have a sticker chart for dry nights and also she does want to be dry but she's clearly sleeping through her wees. It's not laziness, I'm certain of that.

OP posts:
MinnieMountain · Today 06:05

It's waiting for the hormone to kick in. DS became dry at night over the course of a week when he was 6.5.

Bluetreesandbees · Today 06:10

My eldest wasn't dry at night until we sorted the constipation at age 5. Never been wet since. My first thought before reading your update was 'I wonder if they're constipated?' That's very likely to be the reason.

We ended up asking to see a specialist who put my child on different medication. All sorted in a matter of weeks.

My youngest was in pull ups until age 13 but not because of constipation. In the daytime, when they needed to go, they needed to go very quickly. Couldn't hold it for 10 minutes. They just needed more time for their body to be ready.

Bluetreesandbees · Today 06:13

You're right. It won't be laziness.

I would stop the sticker chart as it's not something they are likely to be able to control.

I would keep going with the pull ups with no comment or fuss until the constipation is sorted.

NorwegianForest · Today 06:15

It's a hormonal thing apparently. My three DC were all potty trained in the day at age 2, but night time dryness varied from 2 (happened at the same time for night and day) to age 7. Nothing you can do about it.

110APiccadilly · Today 06:17

@Bluetreesandbees can I ask whether your child was obviously constipated? Because I would say that DD isn't any more (she doesn't seem to be) but I am wondering whether we've missed something.

OP posts:
Simonjt · Today 06:25

IronEverything · Today 05:53

Is there a medical reason she's still wetting the bed? I think you need to stop the pull ups because you're giving her no need to stop.

How will removing the pullups cause her body to produce ADH?

OptimisticallyCynical · Today 06:27

My eldest recently came out of pull ups at age 6.5. Like you, she had never shown reliable dryness at night. I read guidance online and everything seemed to suggest that we had to give up the pull up and try her without. She sleeps in the top bunk of a bunk bed so I wasn’t thrilled about this!

We bought a spare duvet and two reusable bed wetting mats that sits over the mattress sheet - see Amazon, Hygge sheets. This made accidents really easy to deal with as could swap the mat and duvet quickly - no changing sheets in the middle of the night.

We became stricter on liquid intake in the evenings and made her go to the toilet once about half an hour before bed and again just before bed. Encouraging her to drink more during the day is also meant to help.

We saw instant improvement initially with her “only” having an accident about four nights a week (compared with a full pull up every morning!). Then accidents became slowly more and more infrequent. She recently turned 7 and it’s been about a month since she had an accident.

If I am honest with myself we probably should have tried all of the above sooner but with her younger siblings not reliably sleeping through, we didn’t want another reason to have to get up in the night. I am glad we did it though as it felt like she’d be in pull ups forever.

JELr29 · Today 06:33

My daughter was exactly the same this time last year she’s 6 in Feb. She was struggling with constipation and I think it was round the time we sorted it she started to have dry nights. We also were advised by a doctor to completely remove all nappies/pull ups at night time so I bought these
https://amzn.eu/d/0ak1eS8k and I think they also helped with her feeling like a big girl but also protected - not too much of a pain to wash and dry either.

Amazon

Amazon

https://amzn.eu/d/0ak1eS8k?tag=mumsnet&ascsubtag=mnforum-potty-training-5593117-night-time-training-nearly-six-year-old

OptimisticallyCynical · Today 06:33

Useful guidance from ERIC on this too. You’ll get lots of responses telling you to wait for a hormone to kick in but there are other reasons why some children wet the bed.

https://eric.org.uk/childrens-bladders/bedwetting/

New posts on this thread. Refresh page