4.5 Year Old Wetting Pants

I would not take this lightly. I would take him to see the pediatrician immediately and have him checked for a UTI, and (this is going to sound strange) a throat swab- both rapid and 72 hr strep culture, and if that doesn't come back positive, I would go to a neurologist.

My daughter had wetting issues similar to this and it turns out that she DID have an infection- strep throat. She did not have a sore throat or any symptoms that you would normally see in a child with strep, but her body was fighting itself instead of the strep, which was causing her brain-stem to swell and she was having weird things happen like wetting, some OCD, behavioral changes, sensory issues, sensitivity to light, tics (eye-blinking, sniffing), etc.

The disorder my daughter has is called PANDAS or PITAND, but there are many infections that can affect the brain and cause symptoms like this. Small seizures called petit-mal seizures can also be ruled out with a neurologist.

Again, it's probably nothing major, but I would want to investigate before it goes any further. If he seems unaware that he is doing it/has done it, that is a HUGE red flag to me.

M.

Make an appt. w/your doc. just to be sure.
I don't want to scare you BUT request a blood glucose reading too. They'll bring him in fasting and do a simple finger prick.

My son was 8 and he started wetting the bed at night 2 or 3 times a week. He had an accident once during the day. He was also really thirsty! I scheduled an appt. to check for a UTI and mentioned the Blood test at my mom's urging. The doc. thought it was silly of me but we took him in fasting and his blood sugar was 310!

Almost 6 years later he lives w/Juvenile Diabetes. It's hard but we managable. Many kids we know were diagnosed with their only symptom being "accidents".

I doubt your son has this problem but better to be safe than sorry!

It doesn't hurt to check with your doctor. In the meantime you can put him on the potty every hour and a half or so. They sell a potty watch to help keep track of time or you can set your timer on the stove. Our son regressed, he was wearing pull ups at night and I switched to underwear all of the time. It took a couple of weeks but he is doing well and has infrequent accidents during the day. You should make him go before bed and right after he wakes up. Good luck.

I haven't had this happen but I would go to his pediatrician to rule out any physical reasons it's happening and they've seen everything before so I'm sure they could give you some advice on how to handle it. Don't stress him out though because I'm sure that will make it worse. At 4.5 I'm imagine he might be able to tell you a little bit about what's going on.
Good luck!

I suspect he's just getting too involved in what he's doing to take the time to pee. My son is 7 and I still feel like a broken record "Go pee." "Did you pee?" "We're leaving, go pee." :-)