My daughter turned 3 this past Nov. and has been potty trained now since Jan 07. She recently started having accidents all the time. I don't think that she is doing it on purpose, but she won't tell me she did it either. I notice her pants are wet and ask her if she wet potty in her pants and she will tell me yes. I am wondering if maybe she has a infection or if she is just going through a phase. Has anyone else had this problem with their child??? Any suggestions would help.
I wasn't going to respond until I seen that you have a home daycare, did you get any new kids recently maybe a baby or toddler? Kids regress if they see mommy is giving another baby attention, even if they are used to it and never did it before. It is probably a faze and I wouldn't worry about it.
This is very common. It can stem from several things. Children get so much attention while they are getting potty trained sometimes their motivation to use the potty dissipates when the praise and rewards go away. Also, parents typically do a lot of the monitoring and help the child know when it's time to go potty. Your child may still be relying on you to make sure she goes to the potty on time. My daughter was doing this and we had a good talk about how she is the only who knows when she needs to use the potty and it is her responsibility to make sure she goes in time. I made it clear that nobody else could do this for her. Once she realized what she needed to do she stopped having accidents.
It is also possible that it is a bladder infection. If it is an infection you do not want to wait so definitely get her checked out by her doctor to ensure that isn't the case.
Dear K.,
I had a daughter that was doing the same thing and had a serious urinary tract infection. I would check that out first. Then look and see when she is wetting her pants. Some children get so involved with what they are doing that they don't want to stop and use the bathroom. Whatever the reason, make sure that you don't make her feel bad about it because she will want to hide it from you when she has accidents. They do grow up and get over it. No one puts on their resumes or college applications when they were potty trained!
Hi,
My daughter did the same thing. She was potty trained for a very long time and started to pee her pants. Her body is growing faster than her bladder and her bladder can't keep up. I started to put pull-ups on her at night so I wouldn't have to clean the bed at night and just kept reminding her to go to the bathroom every hour or so during the day. She started peeing her pants in about Nov-ish and stopped at the end of January. So hang in there. If she keeps peeing her pants, I would ask a doc.
Good luck!
B. P.
When she has an accident, is she playing hard or concentrating hard on something? Does she cry or act like it hurts when she goes to the bathroom? I would go back to gently reminding her every so often (especially when she's busy) that it's time to try going to the bathroom, and actually take her in there. At that age it can still be difficult for a child to feel the urge (or pay attention to that urge) to go to the bathroom. Try not to show frustration, and try not to push too hard. She'll get there. Usually, not always, w/an infection there will be redness, pain or a burning sensation when urinating, maybe a fever. Call the pediatrician if you see anything that makes you think an infection is possible.
K.,
Any changes in her life? New house? Change in the family situation? Going to a new preschool? Check that out. Many times children regress when there are changes.
Also, when she wets her pants, simply take them off, help her clean up and put on dry ones. Don't make a big deal about it. If she is not telling you, she is embarrassed. If nothing has changed, see how it goes for a couple of weeks. If nothing is better consult her doctor.
It is normal for children to have "accidents" sometimes up into 3rd or 4th grade.
L. :)
I would make sure there isn't anything wrong medically. My daughter, at three, didn't like to take the time to stop what she was doing and use the bathroom. Reminding her often helped, plus we wouldn't get in the car to drive anywhere or go outside and play until she had used the bathroom. When we were at a store or at someone's house I showed her where the restroom/bathroom was (still do this in fact) since she is shy and doesnt' like to interuppt adults and ask about things. We also used a chart...smiley faces every day she went without an accident. then after 7 days we would do something special. good luck. A little persistance goes a long way.
I haven't personally had this issue with my own children, however, my sister has with my neice. In her situation, she was holding and then throughout the day she would have accidents. She got so used to holding that the sinsation of having to go, was almost non-exsistant. I don't know if this is the case for you, but might be something to watch for.
As a child, I ended up having several allergies and migraine headaches (as early as 3 and sooner).
My parents took me to an allergist in Grand Forks. They found out I had several allergies from grain dust (daughter of a dairy farmer) to milk, eggs, wheat, and sugar. I had to have shots 2-3X/week.
As soon as this was found out my allergies, bed wetting, migraines, ear infections, etc. all got better!
I am now a 31 year old that has "out grown" the allergies I had as a child and my migraines ceased after college....hmmm, stress related as well?
I have a three year old daughter that will soon be four. She did go through that faze too. I don't know for sure what it was. My guesses are that I started watching other kids, or because it wasn't too long before she was potty trained and that she got too caught up in what she was doing and lost interest in the potty. I have lots of guesses but physicly she was fine and healthy acording to our doctor. We just started to re-reinforcing that she needs to go and then she started doing better again.
Hi K..
I also have a 3 year old daughter who has been wearing panties since she was 18months old. Recently, she started having accidents too. It's usually nothing to worry about. Around this age, children become more active in their play and as they concentrate on other things, the less they respond to the cues that remind them they need to go, often until it's too late. Just try to remind her that she can always come back to what she's doing AFTER she goes to the potty. Also, even though she is trained, if she is having accidents, you might want to give her hourly reminders, like you probably did when you were training her. The problem should correct itself soon. But if the accidents begin to go from occasional to all the time or if she has pain during urination, you might wanna consult your pediatrician.
Hope that helps! Good luck! :-)
This is just a thought, have you considered a food intolerance or allergy ?
Have there been any new foods recently ? My son has accidents when he eats
foods that have added color. It's not every time, but it happened enough that I noticed
a pattern. I"m sure it could be a combination of things, but I just thought I would pass that idea along.
My daughter did the same thing at age 2 and she had a bladder infection. Have a doctor check your daughter.
K.,
The same thing happened to my daughter when she was around 3. In fact I put her in timeout for it. Then I started to think maybe it was an infection so I made a dr. appt and got a urine sample from home.(I figured it would be easier than trying at the drs. office) She did have an infection they gave her an antibiotic and actually did an ultrasound for extra percaution. The antibiotic took care of the infection the ultrasound was good and she is now almost 6 and never had another one. Boy, did I feel like the mother of the year for the timeout.
J.
Hi K.,
Both of my children went through this. My pediatrician first suggested that we have them tested for a bladder infrection, which neither of them had. At that point, I was given the advice to tread very carefully and NOT make the child feel any shame, but to try to find out if the child was under any new stress or having difficulties. I found with my son that it occured after we had moved to a new home. With my daughter, however, I could find no stressors that were apparent to me. I used Pull-ups and gave her as much encouragement as I could, trying to be very loving and understanding...particularly since I understood that I had NO control over it. I could not MAKE her not have accidents. I will be honest...it took a few months with each child until they were not having any accidents. My pediatrician assured me this was totally normal and in some ways a developmental issue...like their way of dealing with changes going on inside of them. IN talking with other mothers, I have found several that have had similar experiences. Hang in there and good luck.
