I think I have gone mad (continence)

[starfishmummy]

Have just changed DS. He has a new type of pad for the dayime, a stick on sort which seems to be going well.

He is 12. He will use a bottle/the loo/commode at designated times of the day (get up, change time at school, bed time). He will sometimes ask for the toilet (for wee and poo). Mostly he tells us he needs changing when he is soaked.

He has just asked not to wear a pad. I have agreed but told him to sit on the floor on the cheap rug.

He can wee for England (I have seen half a litre in his bottle) as he has a high fluid requirement/intake.

I have taken leave of my senses!

ooh hope it goes well...and that the rug is washable!

Fingers crossed it's because he's ready to toilet train

sit on your mat then, son

Kylie sheets...

Bloody useless things, just an extra thing to wash if the bed gets wet. Nowt wrong with clean dry sheets, you're going to have to change the damned things anyway!

Hi ccplditz we have those for in bed from the continence service. Moot point at the moment it's one a night but they have rounded down the packs so only 0.8 per night and none spare.

How it went.......

No wee cos i kept asking him but we did have major poo issues.
He has always pooed a lot. Possible down to his tube feed. Its not that he's leaking round a blockage just lots always. He said he didn't know he'd done it and if i spot him in typical doing a poo 'pose' he denies it so i guess he's still not ready.

are you aware that there is a sheet laundry service . SW set it up for us as my 36 year old is incontinent, NHS supply sheets and they are uplifted and replaced every week cuts down on some laundry although still have PJs,

myra

Hi Myra - we know there is one; and once one of the community nurses mentioned trying to get ds on to it but we hit a brick wall. The Social Services Children's disability team denied all knowledge of it in spite of me saying there is one on the councils website! We don't have a SW so maybe that is why. At the moment we get bed protectors as well as pads via the continence team - they go on top of his sheet so usually save it from the worst if he has a big "leak"! It's not every night (thank goodness)and if there is a small damp bit on the bed I'll just throw a couple of dry bedprotectors over it until the morning!

oh, lots of sympathy from here. I hope it's a sign he want to start taking responsibility himself. That's a good start even if he's not quite able to do it yet.

DS decided he didn't want to wear nappies in bed way before he was able to get up and wee in a bucket himself.

I was exhausted by the amount of laundry, and in the end only washed the sheets for big leaks, not all the little ones; horrid I know, but sanity is important too.

I had some brilliant suggestions from a friend on a special needs parenting course:

1. hang on in there for the long term; it may take months, but if the child wants to go without nappies/ pads. then that has to be a good sign
2. put a waterproof sheet over the top as well as underneath so the duvet doesn't get soaked
3. make up the bed with the water proof sheet OVER the top of the normal one, so if it gets soaked in the night you can strip it off and the bed is made up underneath ( you can get waterproof sheets with towelling tops from ikea or john lewis.

when things were really bad I used to put three waterproof sheets on top of each other and at least I got three nights without having to remake the whole bed in the middle of the night.

And eventually he got the hang of it. Yes!!!

good luck

Some handy tips there, thanks lorikeet.

I have to admit ds's sheets don't always get changed as often as they should......but I hhadn't thought of stacking multiple sheets!

I used to use washable waterproof over the sheet pads but he went through a phase of having so many night time changes we started buying disposable covers from Attends. THe NHS do provide them now (but theirs are not as good) because they have finally agreed that there are no napppies/pads that will cope with the output from his overnight feed.