Bedwetting for 9 Year Old

I would buy the pull ups and wait a few months see if he is dry. Does he have any medical issues? Some childcare's bodies have parts that grow at different rates so he could have a real physical condition. Help him see that and good luck to you guys!
J.

I will apologize ahead of time for my lengthy answer, but I have many years of experience with this topic! I am the mother of 4 boys, and my 2 oldest sons, now ages 12 and 10, were both bed wetters up until 9+ years of age. They both wore pull-ups to bed from the time they were potty trained @ 2 years of age. I've heard people say that a child isn't potty trained until they make it through the night w/o wetting. Obviously, I disagree. My 1st son decided he wanted to try and stop using pull ups after he turned 9. We made a plan and woke him up every couple of hours during the night to take him to the bathroom. After about 2 weeks he was trained. He was waking himself up to go to the bathroom. When his younger brother turned 8, he decided he wanted to do the same thing, however, we tried waking him up every couple of hours and he would already be wet, or get up and pee and still be wet by the next waking. This went on for 6 months before I was going nutso from lack of sleep! I decided to take him to the doctor knowing full well that he was going to tell me that his bedwetting is "familiar" because my husband was a bed wetter until the age of 12. I knew my boys had a higher chance of being bedwetters because of this, and like I suspected, he said I needed to relax and just get him some pull-ups. Problem was I was putting him in pull-ups, waking him up throughout the night, and he was STILL wetting the bed, having leaked through his pull-up. I tell you all this because the one thing my doctor did that really changed this situation was give me a pamphlet for "The Potty Pager". I read the information, lulled it over in my mind for a couple of days, doubting very highly that this little $75 piece of hardware would really work for my son who seemed to have a super-human sized bladder coupled with the ability to sleep through flash floods happening in his bed, but I decided it was worth a shot when I realized how much we had spent on pull-ups!! And to my pleasant surprise, the thing worked!! The best part is that it didn't make any loud noises waking up his brothers (3 of my 4 boys share a room by choice!) but worked exactly how it said it would, helping to train my son to wake up in the night when he needed to go pee. I would say he used it for 2 weeks before he didn't need to use it any more. It was AWESOME! I know it sounds costly, but as a doubtful mom who spent a small fortune on pull-ups for 2 of her boys, it was well worth the investment. I highly recommend looking into getting one for your son. I know you will be glad you did! Here's the webpage: http://www.pottypager.com/ Good luck!!

If you haven't already, limit his intake leading up to bed time and nothing an hour before. It should help.

Then, if you can, take him to the bathroom before you go to bed.

hi
my son wet the bed until he was about 7... We'd do bathroom checks before bed, limit fluid .. etc.. but he would still do it..
so.... we put him in pullups.. and did the whole plastic covering for the mattress... eventually, it did stop..
I did read that some kids simply have smaller bladders than do others, hence the reason some cannot hold urine for as long.. it's not unusual or anything weird, it's just how people are built..
therefore, could be you son has a smaller bladder.. something worth reading up on.. of course, that said, it would also mean that perhaps it's best to stay away from specific foods at night that might cause one to urinate more.. sodas... etc..

My son just recently stopped. I bought the Good Nights for him. We did go to the doctor and the doc asked if he goes to the bathroom a lot when he is awake. If that is not the issue--not for us--then it is not his bladder and medication would not correct it. We also tried all the tips we had heard, including getting up in the middle of the night, not drinking liquids at least an hour and then 2 hours before bed, no milk after dinner, watching if a food triggered it. We even tried seeing if there is a change in how much sleep he gets. With that one, there was a slight difference but not a stop to the wetting. It is not unusual for a boy to wet until he hits 10 or even 12 years old.

Have you tried stopping liquids after dinner and going and emptying the bladder right before bed?? That worked for my son. He goes to bed at 8pm, so he gets no fluids after 6:30pm and he stopper wetting the bed. There could be something going on to cause this as well such as overactive bladder. You should mention this to his pediatrician and get him checked out for that. I have a niece that has that problem. If there was a big transition or he is getting bullied at school or something like that is going on, some kids can revert back on potty training as well. Cover all your bases and talk to him first and see if anything is going on that scares him in any way. Then go to the doctor and get him checked though. There are a lot of things that can cause this to happen.

D. P.

My 8.5 year old wets the bed. We haven't tried the alarms but our pedi recommended against them because he is such a sound sleeper we would have to get up with him which would defeat the purpose of the alarm.

We've been getting chiropractic care and it's helping. Ds used to wet the bed 1-3 times a night, every night. We started chiro care 3 weeks ago and so far have had one stretch of 5 dry nights and several stretches of 1-2 dry nights - he's dry more than he's wet. We're not done with the treatments yet, so we're still hopeful it will resolve completely for him. Chiro care for bedwetting is only indicated & appropriate if one specific vertebra is impacted - if he feels pain there. If there are problems higher or lower on the spine chiro won't help for bedwetting - so make sure you go to someone who has treated kids successfully for bedwetting before.

And yes, get the pull ups, it will make all your lives easier.

If he is still wetting the bed at 9 years old, there has to be a reason for it. Either its physical, psychological, or its laziness. Get to the bottom of the reason before you try and treat the problem. Has he seen a urologist?

Coming from someone who wet the bed until I was 12 or so.... He cannot help it!! I say, yes, get the good nights "pull ups" for him and let him relax.(That's why they made them, for older kids) I didn't have that option. He WILL grow out of it! Do NOT let anyone tell you he is lazy or he can control it. We tried everything with me growing up (Including the alarms, meds, etc....) and nothing worked. (My father had the same issue as a child, it is hereditary) One day it was just over. Please let him know there is NOTHING wrong with him and never punish him for this! Give him support about this. It makes all the difference. Good Luck to you and your son.

Call the pediatrician and ask for a referral to a pediatric urologist. My son had this - forget the alarms, they don't work and they make everyone miserable. The Pedi Uro explained to us that many, many kids (particularly boys) have this issue - it is neurological and developmental, and can't be "trained" away. There is a simple medication that stops the problem until his body develops fully and his brain starts getting the "bladder full, wake up!" signal. The urologist told us he has teens and even kids up to college age on this, there are no side effects, it's one pill at night, simple. I don't run for medication for every little thing, believe me - but this time it was worth it. It changed our lives.

Your son needs his sleep, he needs to be able to go to sleepovers, and he needs to be done with this. Our son was able to go to overnight camp and have sleepovers - if he went to someone's house, we sent a plain pill bottle over with one pill in it. We told the parents to give it to him before bed. If we knew them well, we told them the reason - otherwise my son told his friends it was an allergy pill, and no one was the wiser.

Good luck.