My daughter will be 5 in December, and she is still wetting the bed every night.
At first we allowed her to wear pullups to bed, but recently her pediatrician advised that we stop using them altogether, as they were just enabling her.
We got rid of the pullups, and I explained to my daughter that she was going to be sleeping in her panties. I told her if she has to pee, to either wake me up so I can take her, or that she could go all by herself if she wanted to.
It's been one week, and she has peed in the bed every night so far (not just little amounts, and on occasion more than once a night [you can just think of the laundry!]). I've cut off liquids before bedtime, I wake up her 2-3 times a night to use the bathroom (she pees every time although she looks as though she is going to fall asleep on the potty, lol), I praise her for peeing in her potty while she's sleepy, I've explained to her that big girls wear their panties to bed, and yet nothing is making any improvement at all.
Yesterday morning I found the bed wet, and I asked her, "How come you didn't get up to go potty?" and she replied that she didn't know she had needed to pee.
Tonight, not even an hour after I had taken her to use the bathroom, I checked the bed, and sure enough, it was wet. I had been watching her to see if she stirred around, or woke up, but she hadn't, and had clearly peed while she was sleeping.
There have also been two mornings where she has awakened to find herself and the bed wet. She told me, "I'm sorry, Mommy. I'm so sorry." I felt absolutely horrible! It was heartbreaking.
I realize we haven't been at this long at all, but since she's not aware of her bladder while she's sleeping, is it really enabling her if she wears pullups to bed? Her pullups had always been wet in the morning, and so I thought she simply wasn't ready to sleep without them yet, but as I stated, her pediatrician was quite adamant about getting her out of them, and appeared to think we should have stopped letting her wear them awhile ago.
I'm thinking of putting her back in her bedtime pullups, but keeping up the routine of no liquids/waking her to go potty every night, however I don't want to enable her, and allow her to think that she can pee in them instead of having to get out of bed.
Help! :(
(Sorry for adding to the never-ending list of potty-training questions.)
Thank you to everyone who responded! After I posted this question, she was wet again. I asked my husband to go straight out and buy more pullups. While changing the beddings/getting her ready to go back to sleep, I asked her, "Do you want to wear pullups to bed, or do you want to keep wearing panties?" I explained to her that either way was perfectly fine, and she told me she would rather sleep in a pullup right now. I put it on her, told her I was proud of her for trying so hard, and then she fell back asleep, lol.
Absolutely pull-ups! You are not enabling her, because she is not CHOOSING to do this. She is asleep. Don't take the pull-ups away until she has woken up dry in the mornings for a week or two. Many children need night-time pull-ups until they are 6 or 7. This is NOT the same thing as day-time potting training!
If she was my daughter, I'd put her back in the pull-ups. It seems like your pediatrician's advice is just causing misery for you and shame for your daughter, neither of which is a good thing.
Some kids just don't have developed bladders til 6 or 7. She likely can't help it.
A good time to ditch the pull ups would be when she has a consecutive week of dry pull ups in the morning. Good luck!
Definitely put her back in the pull-ups! Her body just isn't ready yet, and its silly to put yourselves through the extra stress/laundry. My son is exactly the same way you describe your daughter. He won't wake up for anything! Doctors don't always know what they're talking about. I had one tell me once to feed my naturally small-framed, thin children butter and cream to fatten them up! Needless to say, we switched doctors, and the new doc. said that was the most ridiculous thing he had ever heard a doc. say. :) Use your own judgment and trust your instincts. Good luck!
I have a daughter who will also be 5 in Decmber and she still wears pull ups to bed , they are wet every morning , not a little but a lot and the bed would be soaked. Some kids become dry at night soon after training in the day (my son did) but others do not. I would not listen to the doctor on this and put her back in the pull ups , she sounds like a very deep sleeper like my daughter and no they do not know they are wetting the bed until the morning when they wake up and everything is soaked. I am not too worried about the fact that my daughter still wears them to bed , I was exactly the same as a child and wore them until I was around 7.....I am perfectly fine now and it has had no lasting effects on me. Your doctor wouldn't know she wore them to bed unless you told him/her , sometimes with the doctors questions you just need to nod your head and agree with them it's easier!
Put the poor kid back in her pull-ups. My friend who is a pediatrician told me that some kids take up to age 6 and it's perfectly normal! He said if we were having the same conversation at age 6 then we would look to see if there were causes but my son became night trained right before age 5.
This is causing lots more work for you and more importantly it's causing embarrassment and upset to your daughter about something that she can't control. Her body isn't ready yet. Reassure her that some kids take just a wee bit longer.
You won't be enabling her if you talk with her and explain that it's just for protection until her body is ready, that she is a big girl and she will get there soon. We used to have our son pee before bath, after bath, right before bed and we took him before we went to bed a few hours later. That did help but his body just had to be ready to either wake or make it thru the night.
Pediatricians are there to give advice, it's our job as Mom to decide whether to take the advice or leave it.
That being said, my 5 year old daughter can't make it to morning dry, she just can't. No matter what we do, she doesn't wake when her bladder needs to be emptied. This is totally normal for many kids. My daughter sleeps in pull ups. I feel that making her feel bad for wetting the bed is much worse on her self esteem. She will get there one day and we will celebrate!
Your daughter is ready to leave pull ups behind when the pull ups remain dry in the morning. Some people want to get rid of them as soon as possible, but frankly I just can not see the point of dealing with a wet bed every day. My son was day potty trained at 3 1/2 yrs, but he wore pull ups at night till he was 7 yrs old. Young children sleep through peeing at night. They don't wake up and think about it. So wearing a pull up is not enabling anything - it's just keeping the sheets, blankets, pajamas, stuffed animals, etc dry and not having to be changed/washed every day.
Go with your instinct and what feels right.......let her wear them. It's easier for you and less emotionally damaging for her. I promise, she will eventually out grow this. For my son, he was about 7 before he got the hang of being dry at night. He is just such a heavy sleeper!!! Even when I would go in to wake him up, it's like he just wouldn't wake up, not really. Even if he got up and walked to the bathroom, he was like seriously half asleep. That made it obvious to me that his heavy sleeping was to blame and there could be nothing "learned" from letting him pee all over himself every night. Doctors don't always know everything. Older doctors aren't always current and some doctors don't even have children, so how would they actually know!!!!!!! Don't be afraid to say "this is the decision we've made" or "this is what's working for us right now, we will revisit this decision in 6 mo and try again".
wow...your daughter sounds like my 3 1/2 year old. so sweet with the "i'm sorry mommy!" it means she's really just not ready. don't sweat it. i don't think you're enabling her - you've tried it and it's not working. a week is long enough. i vote pullups - yay!
I say, yay! Some children aren't aware of their need to pee during the night until they're much older. You've tried what the dr said and it isn't working. Go back to what works. To insist that she get up when she's unable to do so is not fair to her or you either.
Both of my grandchildren wore pull ups to bed. They continued to wear them for another month or so because they didn't always get up in time. When they were dry for a week straight we put them in regular underpants. Wearing the pull ups didn't cause them to not stay dry.
I talked with my granddaughter about the process: how bodies are ready to stay dry all night at different ages and that when her body was ready to stay dry she would be able to stay dry. I told her not to worry about when it happened. Wearing pull ups was no big deal. Being dry all night was no big deal.
What is important is to find out if there is a physical problem that can be fixed. You took her to the doctor. He says she's physically healthy. So you do what feels right to do. For me, forcing them to stay dry or for that matter anything else is just as not good as enabling them. And putting her in panties and allowing her to have a wet bed is a form of force, in my opinion. It's good that you tried it but it didn't work. Leave it up to her to stay dry. Let her have the security of the pull up.
A reminder that just because he's a pediatrician doesn't mean that he knows what's best for every child. His method does work for some. It didn't work for yours.
I say YAY! BUT:
Something to try for a week:
Give her a TON of liquid before bedtime. Drink and drink and drink (not forcing, obviously, but the opposite of restricting). I know it seems backwards, but it really works for a whole lot of children... for the simple reason that when liquids are restricted... it's a LOT harder for the body to learn to "feel the need", and learn to trigger them awake.
There are usually a couple giant accidents the first night or two, although sometimes none at all.
As Marda said, some kids just don't have the ability wired yet... and some kids' sleep cycles are just waaaaay too deep... but others just don't have enough stimuli.
We did this on accident, but there are an increasing number of parents who are doing this, and our Ped is even now recommending it for toddlers. It sounds very very backwards... but it also makes a lot of sense. So it might be worth giving it a try.
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