He's 5 and wears Good-Night Undies each night. These are expensive but necessary. (All the fabric ones you wash are awful; a wet, soggy mess each morning, and they take FOREVER to dry in the dryer).
BUT the Good-Nights (and all other brands) leak through a bit. So then it's an extra $30/month to put a disposable Good-Night pad on the bed (these are new and they are self-stick. I LOVE them. So it's like $50 a month for this one child!
So is this the best option? I know better than to think I'll do laundry each day. Before the disposable Good-Night pads he basically had pee pee sheets each day, or usually a waterproof pad (the washable kind), that got peed on. I can't keep up with laundry. I know that.
Maybe 7 pads that you wash, one for each night? And just work them into the laundry when I can?
The disposable ones are easy and now he's never sleeping on sheets with dried pee...but it just seems so costly. But again we're trying to just survive with babies, toddlers and pre-K kids...so I know what I can handle. A lot of laundry daily isn't one of them.
I know there are worse things than pee in a bed. But part of me feels guilty and asks why can't he at least sleep in a pee-free bed...that a good mom wouldn't let her kid do that. Some in my family would strip sheets if only water spilled, ha! And I'm so beyond worrying about pee. I draw the line at fecal matter. Now THAT I would wash and be very, very sanitary and tough with, don't worry.
I use a waterproof crib pad, more like fabric than plastic.....and wash when needed (they do not leak every night).
Maybe try getting the bigger sized goodnights to see if they hold more.
I didn't realize it was that much for the pads, I've just seen them advertised. You might want to look into the pads they sell for incontinent adults, we used them for my Dad when he did home hospice and duct taped them to the top of bottom sheet, the nursing aide taught us that, and they may cost less than the Good Night pads.
Because the bed-wetting can go on for years as S.H. said, I think I would invest the $$$ and buy a week's worth of flannel backed waterproof pads, the crib size ones that cover a good part of the bed, place them on top of his sheet before bedtime, and work them into the wash once or twice a week with the laundry. They can be used down the road for the babies and toddlers and save you money in the long run.
My 6 year old has this problem too. The Goodnights work fine for him and rarely leak. I have a waterproof matress pad under the sheets and if leaks were a problem then I would put a smaller one over the bottom sheet. You could try waking him up to go to the bathroom 1.5 to 2 hours after he falls asleep (before you go to bed). That works for some kids. We did this all the time for bedwetters at summer camp.
I know you said you tried the washable trainers but have you tried a combination of the goodnights and a reusable cover? I think a fleece diaper cover would work well for your problem. Fleece is super-absorbent and it's really easy maintenance, so you can throw it in with your regular laundry. I don't know how big your son is, but I would search on Etsy for fleece diaper covers (they look just like underwear) and if you can't get one big enough you could contact the seller and get some custom made. At ~$10 each even if you got enough for a week you'd make up the savings on the pads in 2 months and you can reuse them with your other children if necessary.
I would also try putting him on the potty right before you go to bed to minimize the volume that he might wet during the night. We do this with our 3 year old son and he never wakes up and he almost never wets the bed.
You can buy plastic sheets, that go under the bed sheets, or over them.. doesn't really matter. It protects the mattress and the sheets, and all you have to do is wipe it off if the child has an accident.
Maybe try not putting your 5 year in any night-time diapers, just leave him one night (when you have nothing planned in the morning) and see what happens, tell him very nicely that he needs to try to wake up if he feels like he has to pee, then if he doesn't for that one night, he has to sleep in wet jammies (no one likes that), maybe that would help him to learn not to wet the bed.
If you go to Kmart they sell plastic mattress overs for mattress cheap second my son was 7going on 8before his bladder grew enough to hold out all night n to this day if he falls asleep n doesn't pee before bed he will have an accident so I hear ur frustration but don't blame him nor punish him it's not his fault god gave him a small bladder
There is a nose spray (Desmopressin or DDAVP) for bed wetters. I believe it is an over the counter medicine so just call or ask a pharmacist about it. It might be more cost efficient and solve your laundry conundrum all at once. I recommended this to a lot of parents when I was a teacher and had elementary-age kids that suffered from this problem. Google it to find out more about it. Good luck!
HTH,
A.
Any child who has night time incontinence should be checked for blood sugar issues, and possible diabetes. By the way, the parameters of the blood sugar charts are much more lenient than they should be.
Also kids who have milk based products bedfore bed are more likely to pee the bed. Milk has a calcium ratio of 8, to 1 part magnesium. This can cause hypercalcemia which contributes to bed wetting and blood sugar issues. higher magnesium controls hypercalcemia and also blood sugar.
high sodium is another cause of excessive night time urination. People with high sodium tend to have lowered magnesium levels and also lowered potassium levels.
Try to get more potassium foods into the diet like bananas, potatoes, and you can give magnesium glycinate supplements.Reduce dairy intake.
Geez, it sounds like he needs to go to the bathroom before he goes to bed so he won't pee out of his pull up.
We have 2 in pull ups and just this month went to the goodnights. The huggies overnights have worked so well but our Walmart does not carry them in the size 4-5 anymore. The goodnights do not work as well as the huggies but they do contain 99% of the urine.
I cannot imagine what you are going through. Our little guy is soaked when he gets up in the morning and goes straight to the shower. He is never so soaked he is drippy like what you are posting about.
Our's drinks tons of water too. He drank almost all my sonic cup of water just a bit ago, he'll wake up with at most a moist waistband and perhaps his jammie top will be damp on the tail.
I don't know what to tell you, I know that when I was deciding to not do pull ups I got a print out of my past electric bill and gas bill for the year and watched to see how much it went up for me to do so much laundry.
It was shocking, the $50 you are spending on goodnight stuff is less than the cost it could be to wash stuff every day, sheets, other bed linens like blankets and pillows, laundry detergents, fabric softener, dryer sheets, the utility bills increase, etc....it was going to cost me nearly $100 more per month plus you know what? My time is worth something. I am not a hired servant in my own home to do nothing more than laundry over and over.
I guess the pads are the one thing I would eliminate if I had washable ones. You can wash them then hang them over a line in the garage if you need to and they would be dry by the next day. I put some of my dryer stuff over a wood rack and I always put it over a heat or a/c vent so that air flow helps it dry quicker.
There are things you can do to cut this bill some. I can't tell you that I would let them pee in the bed and not clean it the next day. I think urine smells nasty and hate when my house stinks of it.
Good luck with your little guy.
You can purchase a case of 100 chux’s for $24 or buy a reusable one for like $16. You put them over the sheets and it saves you from having to wash everyday if you buy the disposable ones. This is what we used when I did skilled nursing. My suggestion would be to let him sleep in a t-shirt (less laundry) and evaluate your routine to see if there are opportunities in your schedule to wake him to go. I don’t like cutting off my child’s drinks because my son has kidney issues but I’ve liked some of the other suggestions and think it wont hurt to try it. Good Luck
Could you just get the 2' x 3' size waterproof pads and layer the sheet/pad/sheet/pad?
I know what you're saying but please don't let him sleep in pee sheets. And it will smell. He may smell as well.
He's a bedwetter. Just go buy fitted sheets (5-7 of them) and a half dozen water proof pads. I think you can even by it on a bolt at Joanne & cut to size.
