My daughter has been potty trained since early September 2011. She turned 3 at the end of October. We haven't had any accidents during the day. As a matter of fact she is excellent about telling me she has to go if we are out doing errands or playing outside. At night however, she still needs to wear a pull up. I cut off liquids at about 7pm every night, but that hasn't seemed to make a difference. Any suggestions that would help her to get through this phase?
In short, you can't. Nighttime dryness is a physiological development. She has no control over this. When her body is ready, she'll be able to wake up to use the restroom. Until then, just keep using a pull-ups.
Just know that this is not something you or she has any control over. She'll be ready when she's ready.
Night Time Dryness... is not something that is PHYSIOLOGICALLY attained, until even 7 years old, or more.
And this, is totally, normal.
It is about the body's brain/bladder/nerve myelin sheath development and connections.
NOT about a child's age.
Cutting off liquids, does not do anything to speed up a person's biological/physiological development.
If someone cut off liquids, for an adult... and suppose you couldn't drink anything after 7:00pm. Would that mean an adult would NOT pee at all... until the next day? And that, this would result in 100% consistency every single night?
You daughter is very young, to be 100% dry at night and without accidents. EVEN if potty trained, a child DOES have accidents. It is childhood. I do not know, of any child, that has never ever had a pee accident during the day or night.
My daughter, was already 5 years old, by the time shew as dry at night.
But even at 7 years old... she would OCCASIONALLY, have pee accidents at night.
Normal.
My son, is currently 5. He still wears a night time diaper at night and naps. Because, he is still wet. Whether or not, he drinks things.
All I do, is put a waterproof bed pad under my kids during sleep. Then, that way I have NO wet sheets. All I do is change out the pad and that's it. The sheets do not get soiled. Easy.
Daytime... and Night-time peeing ability or not, are 2 completely different things and processes.
It is not a "phase." It is a physiological, thing.
My daughter's Preschool, Kindergarten and 1st Grade Teachers... ALL unanimously said: that kids these ages DO have pee accidents and still wear a night-time diaper and it is normal. But their parents rarely 'admit' that.
And, please don't make the child feel bad/wrong/weird about it.
Your child, is NORMAL.
I simply would tell my kids: that their BODY is not ready yet, to be dry at night. It has to develop. They understood. No problem.
No matter how well a child is at pottying... accidents, happens. Day or night. It is, childhood.
Even at Preschool or Kinder or 1st Grade, accidents happens.
ALL of my daughter's Teachers, told me that.
It is childhood.
Get a waterproof bed pad, to put directly under her at naps or bedtime.
That way the sheets don't get soiled.
I have 4 of them that I got from Amazon.
My 5 year old son, who is still wet at night, uses it. (he uses a night time diaper, Huggies).
And IF his diaper leaks, no problem. I just rotate the bed pad and put another one under him. No biggie.
There is no potty training to do at night. When a child's body is ready, they will sleep dry. My daughter wet the bed, with decreasing frequency, until she was 8. She's had two wetting incidents in 9 months since she turned 9. So we are almost done.
I would recommend doing some "google" research if you want to know the percentages. There is a percentage of kids that don't sleep dry until age 12. Cutting off fluids does not work, rewards do not work. Keep using the pull-ups until she is dry for several nights in a row. Then be prepared to do laundry occasionally for a while after that.
You cannot do anything to make her stop urinating during the night. It is a connection between the brain and the bladder. The brain signals the kidney that the body is sleeping and to shut off urine production. Drinking or not drinking has absolutely nothing to do with if she wets the bed or not. It can hinder her staying dry too.
If she is to ever learn to feel her bladder and to know she needs to wake up and go to the bathroom she needs to drink to get it full. If her brain tells her kidneys to stop production of urine then as soon as she wakes up she will need to go because her kidney will start to produce urine right away,
Ah, the perennial night-training struggle. There are a few kids who 'could' train at night with a bit of effort and attention, but most simply cannot. They sleep too heavily to notice the full-bladder urge. Many of us (I'm an older adult who does this) incorporate the need to pee into our dreams, and search desperately for a bathroom while actively dreaming. So far, I have finally awakened before peeing, but one of these nights….
Unless your child is in a light-sleep phase so she can notice the need, she'll probably sleep right through until her bladder and/or the nerve signals get strong enough to either hold it or wake her. There's also a chemical response in the body that slows nighttime urine production. For some children, this doesn't happen until as late as adolescence. Those children would LOVE to have it under their conscious control, but they simply can't. Most, however, will get there by the time they are in kindergarten, or at least in their early school years.
Cutting off liquids may actually work against her ability to wake from a full bladder. One mom on this site suggests giving additional drinks before bed to increase that urge. Every 1.5 hours, the sleeping child enters a lighter-sleep stage, and if the bladder is full then (or the parent can get the child up then), she may be able to take a pee and sleep dry through the rest of the night.
I just want to echo something that S.H. said. I would not cut her off from liquids after 7 pm. I like having a glass of water by my bed, and sometimes I'm just thirsty at night.
My niece was wearing goodnights until she was 7 or 8. She was really embarrassed about it, but we reminded her that this is totally normal. My husband had the same problem as a child. I think it used to be believed that the child needed to be "trained," and I know my in-laws tried many methods to help my husband "learn" how to not wet the bed. Doctors are now saying that this it totally normal and part of development.
Give her time, and just let her wear those pull ups. Once she wakes up dry for a week or so you can try again.
Ditto what Gidget said.
Time...probably not what you want to hear but I would say just give her some time and in time she will get the hang of it. She will get to the point where she wants to wear her big girl panties at night and when she does you should let her...make sure you have your mattress protected though. :o)
She will get it. Good luck!!
Just keep what you are doing and be patient. Her little bladder may may need to grow up a little more. Be consistent and it will happen.
My daughter did the same thing! She just got out of the pull ups at night - she's 4.5. The way I see it is her little body was just not able to go that long without peeing, and she sleeps so deeply that she wouldn't wake up when she had to go. Gradually over the past couple of months she had more dry mornings - then she had several weeks where she was dry and she even woke up on occasion to go in the night! So I say don't worry about it right now - she's only 3 and I think she'll grow into it.
First, I have to say I think it is horrible to use food to teach children. So I admit somewhat sheeplishly that we used M&Ms. My daughters don't really get candy except for Halloween or holidays, so getting 2-3 M&Ms at breakfast did the trick. My older one was dry a lot in the mornings, so I think this only reinforced the behavior. My current 3 year old has been wetting the bed, but the M&Ms have really helped her not be lazy about getting up and going to the potty - she is the kind of kid who doesn't care too much if she wets her pants , lucky me :) The way we do it is we say = 10 days in a row dry (with M&Ms, and you get to go buy new underpants!! (then the M&Ms stop!)
PS - I agree that nighttime is more physiological. However, in our case, my three year old was waking up and wetting. She could clearly hold it, she just didn't want to use the potty because she knew I would jus tchange her. Is your daughter dry most of the night or does she wet only in the morning?
Get some cloth diapers. Both of my kids night trained in less than a week, before age 2!
