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i am not parent, but my brother is, and his 13yr old son still wets his bed. at the moment they are a little worried, shouldnt he have stopped by now? when they are visting us, like when we were together for the summer holidays, he creates such a pile of laundry, and some gets left with me to deal with, btw - i am not married. and then theres the damage to the mattress. his poor parents have had to change them far too many times, i feel it for them. the boy is so sweet, and now big, but this has got to stop, if is his friends find this out he d be done for. so please mumies and daddies - what advise would you have for our little predicament, my mattress is in dire need of your words of wisdom.
At 13 he needs to be medically evaluated to see why this is happening. Several things can cause bed wetting...urethral stenosis, sleep apnea, overactive bladder....
Tell your brother to bring him to a doctor and get him evaluted. In the meantime tell him to buy him nightime diapers...goodnights come in larger sizes and if he's too big for those then depends would work well too. Allowing it to happen is embarrassing for the child and only compounds the problem.
There are many things that can cause this,
It can run in the family,he could be a heavy sleeper,or his bladder can be to small,
They should take him to his Doctor,and they should buy him the older kids diapers,they work.But the 1 thing they shouldn't do is make him feel bad about it,My 13y has just stopped wetting the bed,he is a heavey sleeper and it runs in the family,we bought him the big kids diapers which help him and the mattress and his cloths,Its nothing to be ashamed of its just something that happens,
its not an age thing. possible reasons for bed wetting.
disturbance mental or emotional.
molestation. high possibility all the cards are not on the table on this one.
see a counselor asap.
stephen s
san diego ca
Whatever you do... disregard the above post!
Granted secondary enuresis (bedwetting after an individual has acheived nighttime bladder control for a period of at least 6 months) could be the result of new or heightened levels of stress, so stressors are worth exploring in that case, along with possible physical problems.
But primary enuresis, as the op is describing, is a common developmental problem related to physical and physiologic factors. It does NOT come from emotional stress, poor self-esteem, or emotional immaturity. (ie: mental or emotional disturbances or molestation)
It's also interesting that for many years, parents of bed-wetting children have claimed that their children were deep sleepers. Physicians have usually disagreed with this, citing evidence from sleep EEGs showing that bed-wetting children went through the same stages of sleep as other children, at the same frequency, and that bed-wetting can occur at any stage of sleep. However a more recent and better designed study showed that children in the bed-wetting group were dramatically more difficult to wake up than normal controls. I think it's safe to assume that scientific research still has a long way to go where bed wetting is concerned.
Don't rule out Sleep Apnea. Millions have it and don't know it. One tip off is that they stop breathing while asleep and then snort very loudly when the body rouses itself enough for breathing to re-start. However, the body does not rouse itself enough for the eyes to pop open and the person to recognize they are awake. This plays havoc with sleep cycles and shows up in various ways, such as drowsiness during the day (and may be mis-diagnosed as Attention Deficit Disorder, or ADD, etc).
Apnea is a KNOWN cause of bed-wetting in children, they don't have to be overweight to have it.
Basically, the tongue or soft palette or tonsils are oversized and flop around in the throat while sleeping, usually falling backwards and shutting off the airway. When that happens the diaphragm tries harder and harder to make the lungs inhale a breath of air, which it does by pushing down (the diaphragm pushes UP to make you exhale). The more the body needs oxygen while the throat is restricted, the HARDER the diaphragm pushes down.
The repeated and forceful pushing DOWN of the diaphragm puts a real drubbing on the bladder, which is, you guessed it, BELOW the diaphragm. Eventually the poor bladder just says "oh the hell with it" and lets go.
Do NOT rule out sleep apnea until you have the child evaluated. Sometimes (but not always) an ENT can see the excess tissue that is blocking the airway and remove it with surgery. There are other causes too.
In some cases a CPAP machine is prescribed after a sleep study is done.
There are many sleep disorders that affect people of all ages. If your loved one sounds like they stop breathing and then snorts, or has other symptoms, best to see an MD and probably a Pulmonary Specialist. Young children should be seen by a Pediatrician who is also certified in childhood sleep disorders. I know, I've got Apnea and it ruined my heart. Apnea is a killer, robs the heart of oxygen while you TRY to sleep, killing heart tissue. Some people with Apnea snore, some do not. Snoring is not always present and sometimes snoring is not Apnea.
I come from a family of bedwetters, myself included. My 7 yr old wets about 1-4 times per week, and my 3 yr old wets the pullup probably 3 times a week.
My son wears a washable underpant from leaps and bounds. they are about $13, I dont know what size they go up to but they contain most of the accidents. It sounds expensive but is much cheaper in the long run than disposables, and much better for the enviro., we also have a pee pad.
I heard a good idea, my friend said to put a plastic sheet, then a cotton sheet, then another plastic sheet, and another cotton sheet. this way if the child has an accident in the middle of the night, they can take off the first cotton/plastic sheet and have the fresh one to sleep on.
Some kids can not help this. They make medication called DDAVP nasal spray that helps with bed wetting, they also can buy "pull ups" in large kid sizes that look just like shorts. The parents can try to have him not drink alot to close to bed time and make sure he goes to the bathroom before bed, also setting an alarm to wake him a few hours into his sleep so he can go again. Most bedwetting happens 2-3 hours after they have fallen asleep, so that should help to empty his bladder.
My son was also a bed wetter. First and foremost, I can promise you this child does not want to wet his bed. It is very embarrasing and I am sure he feels ashamed. You mentioned that your nephew is a big child. My son was also big for his age. What happens is that while they may be growing on the outside it takes a while for the inside to catch up. His bladder may not have grown at the same rate. We used medication for awhile so that he could go to sleep overs and not worry about being "found out". Many, many boys have this problem, girls too but it seems to be more common with boys. We just always kept a plastic sheet on his bed and he was responsible for washing his sheets and clothing. Just when it seemed it would never end it did, literally almost overnight.
I would never admit this to anyone I know, but I was a bed-wetter until age 22. Yup, 22. Here is my theory: It most definitely runs in the family. I have a few siblings who wet the bed into their adolescent years, as did several of my cousins. Now, one of my sons wets every night, and also several neices and nephews. I still don't know which, if either, of my parents did. I've never asked, because to this day, they blame it on us kids. We were too lazy to get out of bed and go to the bathroom. If they want to believe that about a 5-year-old, fine. But in high school? Sorry, there is no payoff to waking up wet and cold before heading off to school. In the late 90's, researchers found a hormone that basically tells your bladder whether you're awake or asleep. Some people take longer to develop this hormone, and they will empty their bladder while sleeping. This theory rings true to me, because when I was 22, I woke up dry and went to the bathroom. I have not wet the bed since. That's why I quoted the above post...it was literally overnight that I went from wetting every night to not wetting at all. Perhaps, my hormone finally kicked in.
If your older child wets the bed, please understand that it's not being done on purpose. Just be patient, and it will go away sometime. Help him hide it from friends. My room in high school wreaked of urine, and I was mortified when a boy secretly decorated my room to ask me to a dance. I always wonder why my mom would let him in there. She also sent me to girls camp and sleepovers without any protection or explantion to parents. I would try to stay up all night, so I wouldn't wet the bed. A lot of that time was spent saying silent prayers that I wouldn't fall asleep and wet the bed. Please, don't make this mistake with your kids. Help them...they are embarrassed enough as it is.
It is hereditary and your nephew will grow out of it. I was a bedwetter and so was my husband and all our kids were too (lovely, right?). I think I stopped at about 10 or 11. My husband says he wet the bed into his teens but he finally did stop.
I can't believe his pediatrician hasn't prescribed DDAVP. My middle child used to spend the night with friends a lot but was so embarrassed about her bedwetting. DDAVP = no wet bed. She would take it as a nasal spray before bedtime. We didn't use it on a regular basis (i.e., we didn't use it at home - we used pull-ups at night at home). But when she spent the night somewhere else we did use it. We didn't know about DDAVP till our first had already quit bedwetting, and I think our youngest didn't wet as long so it wasn't something we needed to use for him. But I can vouch that it definitely works.
Other than that, all you can really do is wait for him to outgrow it. Between me, my husband, and our three kids, I think we tried about everything. My youngest brother was also a bedwetter and i remember going to bat for him one time when I heard my parents discussing it as if they thought he could stop if he wanted to. I knew he couldn't help it because I had lived through it.
With my own kids, we tried the Potty Pager (an alarm), not drinking anything for hours before bed, waking them up and taking them to the bathroom through the night. Being a childhood bedwetter myself, I can tell you that your nephew can't help it. It has nothing to do with drinking something before bed. He doesn't want to wet the bed. It is embarrassing and humiliating. My parents used to send me and my brother to spend the night with our cousin. We were stairsteps, and i was the oldest. They didn't wet the bed and I did. I used to try to stay awake all night so i wouldn't wet the bed. I used to stay awake as long as possible so I could empty my bladder over and over to make sure there was nothing in there so maybe if I accidentally fell asleep I wouldn't wet the bed. Nothing worked; I still wet the bed when I finally fell asleep. It's horrible to be so sleepy and be afraid to go to sleep because you don't want to wet the bed. I never got in trouble for it but I felt terrible anyway.
The only thing I know to work as a temporary solution until the person outgrows bedwetting is DDAVP. They should really ask their pediatrician about it.
[quote=runnergirl731;6444759]I would try to stay up all night, so I wouldn't wet the bed. A lot of that time was spent saying silent prayers that I wouldn't fall asleep and wet the bed. [quote]
Yes. I just described this same thing in my post above. My cousin had one of those black kitty cat clocks on her wall with the tail that went back and forth and I would lay there and listen the tick-tock tick-tock, my cousin and brother sound asleep, afraid I would fall asleep, praying I could stay awake all night so I wouldn't wet the bed. And going to the bathroom every 10 minutes to make sure there was no urine left in my bladder. I felt like such a loser. I knew it wasn't my fault but I didn't understand why I couldn't be normal.
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It's hormonal
