My daughter will be 4 in August. She was first potty trained around her 3rd birthday with a few accidents here and there. She went about 3-4 months with no accidents and no bed wetting. Starting in March, she started having accidents everyday and she was wetting the bed every night. At first, it was hard not showing my disappointment. But I quickly learned that was only making things worse. So I made a "potty chart". If she went the whole day without an accident she got to put a sticker on that day. This worked for about a month, then it just got worse again. I have exhausted every method I can think of to help her stop having accidents, a few things worked for a couple of days. At first she was only having the accidents at daycare (a private in home daycare with babies), so I figured it was just because she was around the babies. But recently she has started having them at home too (she is an only child right now). It may be all of the pressure she is feeling, I'm really not sure. I took her to the doctor in April to have her bladder checked and everything was fine at that time. I may take her again just to be sure. She has said "I can't help it". Has anyone else been through this? Or have any suggestions at all? Thank you in advance!
We have had a couple of changes at home, but this all started before those changes, so I'm not sure how much that would affect her. I remarried in May. But my daughter absolutely loves her new stepdaddy. She actually calls him Daddy, he's been in our lives since she was 1 and a half. Her accidents did start up again while we were on our honeymoon in Jamaica. But they continued even after we returned. And we moved into a new house 3 weeks ago. So all of that might be too much to handle... I've considered that. But what can I do if that is the problem? The only thing I can think of is to wait it out. I know it will get better, but it's hard hiding my stress from her. She will be starting a new daycare next week with kids her age and NO BABIES! I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this will help her move foward, instead of backwards.
To the poster who said her daycare provider put pull ups on her daughter-- mine does too! And it makes me so mad! Just yesterday, she said that my daughter had an accident and things were too hectic and she didn't have time to find her another pair of panties, so she put a pull up on her. (She got the pull up from her cubby that also holds her panties). Since we only have 4 days left at this daycare, I didn't say anything about it.
Children seem to do what others do. She might be seeing some other children having accident at day care. And see the attention they are getting. So she might be thinking she can do it too. It did not happen till she started there right? I hope the best for ya.
Wow, this sounds exactly like my daughter! I do not know what to do about this either. My daughter is an only child as well and she will turn 4 on January 1, 2009. My daughter was doing great as well, but now it seems like whenever I leave her with someone else while I go to work, she has accidents, then the nanny puts a pull-up on her. I think the pull-ups are hindering her potty training myself. I have not tried the potty chart, I may do that. I am getting concerned about my daughter as well, because I feel she should definately be totally potty trained by now. I worry about whether or not this will continue when she needs to go to school in another year or so. The only thing I can think of right now is that my daughter is under stress because she sees me under stress. You see, my husband is Bi-Polar and has been in and out of the mental hospital recently and I think there is a lot of tension in the house and she is sensing this. Has there been any drama, or potentially stressful things going on at your house? Maybe this is what your child is going through.
J.
Our little one will be 4 in November. He has struggled with potty training too. He ran out of pull ups at grandma's house and would not get off the potty because he was afraid of having an accident. That is when we realized he was under stress about the potty training. We just got more relaxed about it all. We quit making a big deal about it and all of the sudden he has started going in the potty almost every time now. There is no magic age that they need to be potty trained by. Just let her go at her own pace.
I know that you have responded above, but I wanted to share my sister's story. Her son about the same age would have multiple accidents for no reason at all. Day and night. It was almost as if he could not control it. Somedays it would not happen but almost every day he would have some issue. She took him to a natural health specialist. She suggested that he may have developed a cows milk allergy. My sister thought it sounded a little hokey, but took him off of milk for about 1 week (all milk products) For that week - no accidents! Then she let him have a glass of milk for breakfast, and within 2hrs he had an accident. She tried it again the next day and the same thing happened. She again took him off the milk and no more accidents. She now uses Goats milk for milk and has since been able to reintroduce cheese and yogart into his diet. This may not be your issue, but it could be worth a shot!
Hope this helps!
T.
It could be something else entirely. Watch her when she pottys in the day time. My daughter was completely potty trained for 4 years and then when she was about 7, she started wetting the bed. Could not figure out why. When she was 9 she was diagnosed with epilepsy. She only had nocturnal seizures. When the seizure was over, her whole body muscles would relax and she would wet the bed. She couldn't help it either. If your daughter has a staring episode and immediately wets after that, it could be something to think about and have checked with a neurologist. Good luck.
M.,
I have to ask, what has happened during that time to stress her out? Or is she playing with a child that wets or isn't trained?
Sometimes this happens when something else is going on. I would talk to the daycare provider and see if she is having some trouble there, since you have already had her checked by the doctor for UTI or bladder problems.
Look at her diet. Is she eating more junk and fatty foods than usual? Urination is one of the ways our bodies get rid of waste. If she is eating more nuggets and fries than usuall, I would back off of the junk food for a while and see if it helps! I know especially during the summer us Mommies are running constantly and need that quick meal. If that doesn't work, then I would threaten her with diapers again.
OK, I read your reply post and that changes a lot! She is going through A LOT of changes right now, I bet it is the stress of everything. Just remind her when she does have an accident that she is a big girl now and she needs to use the big girl potty. If she goes a whole week without an accident, she gets a new pair of panties! (let her choose of course!)
M., my son is 4 and doing the same thing. He has not wet the bed in over a year and was potty trained at 2, now all of the sudden he's we the bed twice in a week and taken care of number 2 twice in his pants. We haven't ever had to deal with this. We were spoiled:-) My husband and I both are thinkikng it's because he's going to start school. We've really been talking about "big boy" stuff and going to school and how exciting it is and he just doesn't want to go. We've been really careful not to criticize the "accidents," but we sat down and discussed it with him the other day and he said he didn't want to be a big boy and go to school. Now, I like the bribbing idea another lady spoke of with the skates. My mother bribbed us all (6 kids) and we turned out fine. I mean, we didn't get anything great, but it made every "reward" we earned fantastic. I totally agree with bribbing.
Good luck and I'll keep checking back for ideas for my son too.
My niece went through the same thing and it turned out that she had some pretty severe bladder/kidney infections and no one even knew it because there was no pain with them. You should take her for a UTI test to rule that out . . .
Believe it or not, my daughter was the same age before I finally got her potty trained. She told me the same thing. To be honest, she just didn't want to stop playing or doing what she was doing to go to the bathroom. The difference between my family and yours was I had an older and younger child at the time. I finally bribed her (I can hear the replies to this one now!). I asked her, "what do you want that only big girls get to have?" She wanted a pair of barbie roller blades. I told her, " Well, big girls do not go potty in their pants, so when you are not doing that anymore and you haven't had an accident for at least 6 months, then you may have the barbie skates. Exactly 6 months later, she got her barbie skates. I don't know anything about your daughter, but it may be worth a shot. It worked for me, don't know if it would work for others.
Have you had her checked medically?
My daughter was potty trained for about a year at that age, and was doing great. No accidents... all of a sudden her urge to go got very bad, and we had accidents every day. I took her to the doctor, and she had a bladder infection. It was causing her to have an urge that she couldn't control.
A round of anitbiotics fixed the issue.
Just a suggestion to think on.
she may have a bladder infection or something physically wrong with her bladder or kidneys. it may also be from a change in the house. is she going to pre-school in the fall? or are you talking about having a second child or anything like that? sometimes little ones feel like the only thing they control is when and where they potty. if she feels like she is loosing control somehow, she may be using this to comfort herself.
