Your Experience with night training

amother

Gray

Sun, Dec 20 2015, 5:05 pm

I have been reading all threads about night training kids. some people say you can do it some say there is no such a thing. what is your experience with this matter? were you able to night train? if so by what age? if not till what age can it take? how old was your oldest kid with this problem? and how do you handle it? diapers? meds etc.? doctor says you can't really do anything and it's normal for kids. so is it normal or not? and is it a thing that runs in family?

amother

Pumpkin

Sun, Dec 20 2015, 5:26 pm

A heavy sleeper with a smaller bladder, who perhaps took a little longer than most with day training, may take longer for night training as well. Be sure to talk to the pediatrician to rule out any other problems.

After age seven a bedwetting alarm is useful. The child must be totally motivated for the process. Mine wore "good nights " (pullups for older kids) until age 8. She was dry once or twice demonstrating readiness, started the alarm, and was dry within a week.

It works by waking up the child at the very first drop of wetness (even before fully starting to "go"), so the child will get up and finish voiding in the toilet. The body learns to associate a full bladder with wakefulness. Our insurance covered the device as " durable medical equipment" (or DME) after age 7.

GetReal

Sun, Dec 20 2015, 6:34 pm

I thought kids couldn't be trained, that you need to wait for them to do it in their own. Finally my oldest was five or six and I had two younger ones who were also day trained, I night trained them all at once. Put them to sleep without diapers, took them to the bathroom at nine and eleven. Lots of accidents but they all stopped wetting soon. Then I tapered off taking them to the bathroom through trial and error. It was helpful to have a waterproof mattress cover as well as s waterproof pad on each bed. My daughter now wakes up on her own to use the bathroom and my sons sleep through. I think it was more a habit that needed to be broken than a physical incapableness.

amother

Khaki

Sun, Dec 20 2015, 6:44 pm

there are plenty of doctors who say that its something the child needs to mature on their own. I believe that its a combination of maturity, genetics, training. idont believe youcant be trained. tho my mother tried training us and for some it worked but most of us she had to wait till maturity. it was so frustrating for me. I was 16 yrs old and I still bedwetted on some nights. I used to go to bed wishing it would work, but I was a heavy sleeper. I might have succeeded had my mother used different techniques. I just dont know for sure. look, even the doctors have a hard time dealing with it. its not so simple. but we all come to our weddings fine. so thats what counts. emotionally I was quite down from it. I feared going to friends sleepovers and camp. it surely isnt the childs fault

amother

Brunette

Sun, Dec 20 2015, 9:47 pm

All my kid's night trained on their own accept one son who will be 8 soon. He was waking up soaked even with pull ups. He is a very deep sleeper. We even took him nightly to the bathroom at about 11 and it didn't help.

We have been using the alarm now for close to 3 months and I see a huge difference. He is a very deep sleeper which is a huge obstacle. In the beginning the alarm went off 3 times a night and he did not wake up. By the time I dragged him out of bed and to the bathroom (he is a large and heavy kid) his bladder was empty. I made him stand in front of the toilet and then change into dry clothing and change the towel on his bed.

Over the past 3 months he slowly made progress:
- Waking on his own from the alarm, going to the bathroom and changing himself
- He now only has 1 accident a night in the early morning
- He doesn't empty his bladder when having an accident, his underwear is barely wet, he goes to the bathroom and finishes there.

He is really proud of the progress he has made. He doesn't wake up soaked and his bed doesn't stink.

But it is taking much longer then I read it should. I'm assuming it is because he is such a deep sleeper (we did look into sleep apnea but I don't believe he has it).

amother

Pewter

Mon, Dec 21 2015, 11:58 am

amother wrote:

We just finished night training our 7 year old using the alarm. She was making great progress, but then at some point I realized her body was relying on the alarm to tell her when she had to go. (She also went from 3-4 alarms a night to one, and that one she also only went a drop and finished in the bathroom.) We stopped the alarm completely 2 weeks ago and she has been completely dry since. I'm not sure if that can help your son, but it might be worth a try.

amother

Brunette

Mon, Dec 21 2015, 12:33 pm

amother wrote:

thanks for the feedback. I see on shabbos when He isn't using the alarm he is still having at least on accident. The good news is that it is a small accident and I think he is waking up on his own earlier - which for him is amazing.

Maybe we should try one week off and see how it goes.

amother

Amethyst

Mon, Jan 04 2016, 9:19 am

amother wrote:

op so is it normal not night train and keep my kids in diapers? I cant deal with it now or im a bad mother for it?

My 7 year old is still a heavy wetter at night also.

My 5 year old night trained himself (he said, I keep waking up dry, can I stop wearing pullups?)

My 4 year old is still in pull ups.

It's not a big deal.

gp2.0

Mon, Jan 04 2016, 9:57 am

Maybe I'm unusual, but as soon as I day train them, they sleep with underpants. No pampers, pull ups or anything, cold turkey. Neither of them BH has accidents at night, though they did have accidents by day while training of course. The crib mattress has a waterproof cover so I was always prepared and accepting of the possibility that they'd wet the bed at night but they didn't.

So I guess my answer is, IME it works to do all the training at once, when they're in that frame of mind. (Also, training is so stressful, I'd really rather do it once than twice!) But I'm sure every kid is different.

sky

Mon, Jan 04 2016, 11:27 am

I think every kid is different. I originally took the approach of doing the training at once.
I have one daughter night trained since 2 1/2 and a son night trained since 3. (oldest and youngest children)
And then I have a daughter and son that never got the hang of it. And are still struggling at much older ages.
I think it is very individual.

amother

Brunette

Mon, Jan 04 2016, 11:31 am

My 7 year old (almost 8) was a very heavy bed wetter (see my post earlier).
He was wetting his bed 3 times a night, leaking through his pull up, waking up with soaked PJs and linen.
As time goes by I really find the alarm is helping, it just takes lots of patience and positive encouragement and following the plan. I think the kid also needs a desire to improve.
this past Friday night he slept without the alarm and without pullups and had a tiny accident that didn't even wet his linen. It was a huge accomplishment.

I don't think we are ready to give up the alarm yet, but I think it will happen soon.

(I also have kids that were trained at the same time they were day trained, it didn't work this child, who is a very deep sleeper)

amother

Orchid

Mon, Jan 04 2016, 11:37 am

I night trained two of my girls around the age of 2-2.5. I started night training after they were day trained by simply waking them up to go in the middle of the night. After a couple months or so, they either slept through without wetting, or they woke up on their own to go to the bathroom.

Another daughter was reliably dry at night starting at age 17 months. I was fairly consistent with practicing elimination communication with her, and she really took to it. I did elimination communication with my other kids, too, but this daughter really didn't to want to pee in her diaper at night from an early age.

My son, however, is almost eight and still wears pull-ups at night. I tried training him like I trained my girls, but it just didn't work. He is a very deep sleeper and waking him up just doesn't work. We can barely wake him the morning, let alone in the middle of the night. We have also tried programs using a bed-wetting alarm twice. He either sleeps through the alarm or is annoyed by it. He starts out motivated, but doesn't maintain that motivation. We've tried moving his bed into our room, so we can help get him up and deal with the alarm, but it is hard to keep him in our room for more than a couple weeks. We need privacy. Maybe we will try the alarm again in the future.

My youngest is three, and I just haven't bothered training her. I guess I was curious to find out if she would just train herself without my putting forth the effort. Also, I don't have any babies in diapers right now, so I figured it was no biggie to have a couple kids in diapers only at night. I do think I will train her in the future, assuming she doesn't train herself. She's not a heavy sleeper like my son, so I don't see any reason why it wouldn't be successful.

amother

Wine

Mon, Jan 04 2016, 11:45 am

My five year old daughter isn't night trained yet, she was day trained at 2.5. We have family history of bedwetting on both sides; many nieces and nephews are still in pull ups, including a 9 year old.
Because of this, I'm not bothering with my 3 year old yet. Maybe when I see the older one is ready, I will do them together.