11 year old still bedwetting anyone ells in the same boat

[Alanna88]

Ds1 is 11.5 and has never really been dry at night. Not sure what to do. I have tried waking him but he still ends up wet. I had an alarm but he would just sleep threw it. He wares huggies drynites nappies and they are full each morning. His two siblings age 8 and 5 still ware night nappies so he doesn't feel too bad about it, but he does find sleepovers a mission to get threw with his nappy. One thing I have noticed is on the weekends they are more wet than normal, and they seem warm. This is possibly because he lies in and has his morning wee in his pull up. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks x

My SIL is a McTimoney chiropractor and has had success in the past with teenage bedwetters. Misalignment in the spine can block the signals from the bladder to the brain. Check out the McTimoney website for one in your area, some specialise in children (I normally look at the chiropractor's GCC number, this will tell you how long they have been qualified, anyone under 1000 has been qualified for 20 years or so, as the numbers are given out sequentially). Might be worth a try.

Mine is the same age and we have tried everything, but the best has been going to our GP and being referred for us was like opening a door with a breath of fresh air. We went to GP and he was brilliant, please tell your child he is not the only one and our GP explained this to our child and said there were lots and lots of children with this problem, some at the age of 19!

ERIC is really helpful, but the first thing is to exclude any underlying problems, then the treatment or incentives can begin. We had nearly cracked it but she went to secondary school and that altered things and of course you have the anxiety around girlfriends and stress it brings. When she is with us she is brilliant, but when its been a bad day and stressful for her at school then we ask her to take half desmopressin or if she has been to a friends and drank a little more than normal. we watch her constantly which can be exhausting and we do get it wrong so occ the wetting happens.

Avoid caffeine after 6pm this includes cola, and hot chocolate, also we have found if we eat tea before 5.30-6pm things are better so her body has time to digest before she goes to bed at 8pmish.

Having the medication has given her a new lease of life and she goes to sleep overs and enjoys life to the full which is lovely to see.

We still have wet nights and its stressful but I make her sort her bed and put it in the washer and if shes here the drier etc yes , its hard but hopefully she gets to hate doing it and will help her stop wetting.
Thankfully she is well and there is no medical reason for it but sadly that means its all down to her and its horrible watching her get upset because she has wet, so we love her and reassure her and try to get her to see that she can conquer this and things will get better and try to keep her positive. it is difficult and distressing for all of us but the meds do help and that gives us a break when the stress at school causes problems.

With my number 3 child we tried absolutely everything. Everything. He'd been dry for a year at night aged 2/3 but started wetting again at 3 and a half. We saw loads of medical experts, tried drugs etc. but nothing worked. Finally, at 13 he's simply stopped. In his own time. It's been 3 months, so I'm optimistic. The pull-ups I'd buy for him were age 8-15 so I felt that, while unusual, it wasn't abnormal to be wetting at 12. No advice really, just wanted to say that there is hope. X

Shema, I'm really pleased to hear your DS stopped spontaneously. There is hope for us yet!

And yeah, we're using those 8-15 pull ups, from Amazon where they are cheaper, thank goodness (awaiting delivery as it happens). But I hate to tell you, there are adult versions too because some people never grow out of it.

One of the wires on our TENS machine broke which gave DS mild electrical shock so I need to replace it. Now not using it, I have noticed pull-ups are wetter, so maybe that did make a difference. Although this mornings wasn't very wet at all, but i think that's down to DS not drinking enough yesterday.

I am just resigned to it, and DS is OK, not embarrassed or ashamed. Just fed up.

Here's a good stat for you - 6 million adults in the UK suffer with some form of incontinence! No idea how many kids wet the bed but I'm certain you aren't alone.

Not quite in the same boat as you but we are working through it. DD is 6 years and pees right through drynites. Doc says she will grow out of it, but when we were reading we found out that like Tuhlulah says, some kids never really grow out of it.

ERIC is definitely the place to start if you haven't been there yet. Tons of useful information about bed wetting etc

I found a blog post about getting bigger nappies, which helps her loads because although she wears them (which she wasn't too keen on to begin with), she doesn't have a wet bed in the morning! (or in the middle of the night).

This doesn't really help your 11 yo I guess because you didn't say anything about leaking, but it seems to me that most of the stress of bed wetting is the disrupted sleep and wet sheets rather than anything else. An "adult strength" product might help him feel a bit more confident if nothing else.

We are just going to wait it out till she stops on her own, but anyone having dramas with leaking pull-ups should take a look, we were so happy to find anything that helped: www.everynappy.co.uk/blog/size-7-nappies-for-bigger-or-older-children-bigger-nappies-compared

For sleepovers they also have a washable pull-up, they look like normal kids pants but waterproof. I got a pair and they really do look like girls knickers (they have boys pants too) but we didn't try them out in case they didn't work. I think it would be worse if we sent her to stay over somewhere with her "normal" pants, and they leaked! We'll need to do some testing at home first. Largest size is 10-11 years, www.everynappy.co.uk/childrens-incontinence-products/kylie-washable-incontinence-pants-for-children

Good luck, hope that helps!

Hello Alanna, how did you get on with ds1? Do you have any tips for my bed-wetting 11 y/o ds who has been invited on a sleepover on Saturday?
He completely fills Drynites Pyjama Pants every morning. I don’t know what to do.
Thanks in advance.

Following this thread. Dd is currently being seen at enuresis clinic after gp prescribed desmesprossin and it didn’t work. Now prescribed with 5 mg of oxybutin on top of desmesprosin and seemed to work to begin with but now stopped working again. I was told if 5mg didn’t work to go to 10 mg of oxybutin but have not done so yet as worried about amount of drugs we are giving her already (although there are no side effects to). Has anyone else’s dc been on 10 mg of oxybutin and 240 mg of desmesprossin?