Needing Advice on Nightime Bed Wetting

4 years old....if she was not wetting the bed before..think about what has changed in her life? Have there been any major changes? If not..forget the pull-ups. Put her in underwear, and when she wets the bed have her help you change the sheets, put them in the washer etc. She will get tired of having to help and will get up and go to the bathroom. If there hasn't been changes this could just be laziness. I doubt there is a medical reason for the bed wetting since she was successful at it before.

She might be having a growth spurt. When my oldest was having one, he would sleep more, and more soundly. Honestly, he wasn't completely dry at night until 6th grade. That's a pretty extreme case, but I tell you to let you know you're well within the normal range. Staying dry at night is not something that a kid can control; you just have to let them mature. In the meantime:

-limit drinks after dinner.
-make sure she goes potty right before bed. Maybe even try waking her to go potty again right before YOU go to bed.
-double up on her bottom sheet, with a rubberized liner between them. That way when she does have an accident, you can just pull off the wet sheets (have a basket in her room for them!) and dry ones are already there. She can even do that herself, which will mean at least she won't have to feel bad about waking you in the middle of the night.

Hang in there, she'll be dry before she goes to college!

It's probably a phase - her body growing.

Make sure the bed-time routine is SOLID...no changes, exactly the same every night.

Our oldest who's now 5 - we had to modify her routine a little to include going potty twice over the course of about 2 hours before bedtime. AND cut off drinks in that time period too. We'd remind her that if she wakes up and needs to go potty that she needs to get up and go potty. She'd say, "I use YOUR potty" I told her she can use whatever potty she wants as long as she used one.

If/when she wets the bed, don't make it out to be a big deal because chances are she already feels bad about it. I remember once our oldest had had a very busy day and was really tired. She woke up at one point, having wet her bed, and came in to use the potty. After that she went and tried to use wipes to clean off her bed, then told me her pajamas were wet. I asked what happened (and had already suspected), she started to get upset because she thought I'd be mad at her. Once I said, "Well, we need to change your sheets..." she said, "You're not mad?" I told her I wasn't happy, but I wasn't mad, it wasn't a big deal - it was an accident. She hasn't had an accident since.

For what it's worth....

My son had some problems with bedwetting until he was 8. We cut off his dairy in the evening and he stopped wetting the bed. It was the weirdest thing, but I found it online and gave it a try, and it worked!

Good Luck!

Do you have a cut off time for last drink of the night? Kids' bodies go through huge growth spurts, and sometimes it can affect their bladder function. I always cut off drinks an hour before bedtime. I don't have to anymore, but mine are 5 and 6. I had the rule up until about a year ago for my five year old.

Could be a variety of things like changing seasons (from spring into summer), could also be stress or a change in her environment. She may also have a urinary tract infection. Normally when girls have uti, it hurts but sometimes it doesn't. Anyway, to eliminate a physical problem, I would take her to her pediatrician.

Our pediatrition told us to wait until our boy was six and then did an ultrasound to make sure nothing was wrong physically. Then he recommended an alarm that helps teach the child to wake up when they have to go to the bathroom. It worked well, even though we were skeptical at first (the first week we were up multiple times during the night).

Hi M.,

Seems like someone posted about a couple other things it might be related to, such as nutrition, or dietary changes. Also I seem to remember that another mom said her daughter got help from a chiropractor--something about her pelvis pushing forward onto her bladder. Can you look up the archives on this site? I think there is a way to search by topic.

sometimes it is just a maturation process; but it must be frustarating for all concerned since she did so well for two months. Sorry I can't be more help. Good luck!

K. Z.