Video: How to Stop BedWetting in Older Children
So as you can see from the title of this post, the video today will not be about deal shopping and coupons. Instead, I am discussing a topic that I don’t think gets discussed all that often…
Did you know that 5-7 million kids wet the bed regularly? And did you know that 10% of 7-year olds are still wetting the bed and 5% of 10-year olds are still wetting the bed? In fact, I had an older child who struggled with bed wetting for years – I had tried everything from limiting liquids at night to waking him up at night multiple times to use the bathroom with absolutely no success. It was disheartening, frustrating and expensive (I was spending tons of money on GoodNites BedTime Underwear and was having to wash his sheets literally every day!). Watch the video below to see how I was able to stop the bedwetting altogether!
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0fv_rw9vlc]* If you can’t see the video, go here to watch it.
As I mentioned in the video above, it wasn’t until I tried the Malem Ultimate Bedwetting Alarm that we finally found success! Yes, it is on the pricey side… BUT it does work. It wasn’t easy (it definitely requires a commitment!), but it was was well worth the time and investment! My son has now been bedwetting-free for over a year – he can happily and confidently go to sleepovers and summer camp. If you have an older child who is currently wetting the bed or know someone who struggles with this, I sincerely hope that this video provides some much-needed answers for you!
If you’ve had success with other methods, please share them in the Comments below.
* Note that this video was filmed a few months ago.
I also recommend a product called Peapod Mat. It’s basically a thick mat, but it’s soft enough that kids can sleep right on top of it, and it really does absorb the liquid! I often have to wash the mat, but the rest of the bedding is usually clean and dry. We tried every other kind of sheet protector on the market, and it’s oodles better. You can find it on Amazon-I think the mfq. is Canadian. It’s a little spendy, but once you’ve saved the mattress, it’s paid for itself! 🙂
Those are great! Used one as well. Also did chiropractor work to lower back, she has not had a accident since
My kids, so far, have not had a problem , but I did and so did my dad. I hated sleep overs!! It was so embarrassing! We tried medicine, you name it! I guess I just finally grew out of it. Wouldn’t wish it on anybody! At least there are solutions now if one of my three do like I did!
Missing the “deal” videos
Colin: I can’t thank you enough for posting this video! My son is 8 and struggles with staying dry throughout the night. I have heard of these alarms but wasn’t sure if they would work. I am definitely going to give it a try. Also, thank you for being so open and honest on this topic. It is truly appreciated.
When I was younger one of my siblings had this same issue, every morning he will wake up wet. I remember my mother getting so upset. He just stopped doing it. But I always wonder if it was a mentally or stress problem. All comments are so interesting. Thanks Collin for sharing! 🙂 you rock!
After several unsuccesfull different treatments, I found a pamphlet at my chiropractors on it, and decided to give a try, she had 3 adjustments and hasnt wet the bed since! That was over 3 years ago. He said different activities such as sports, or even just somersaults can shift things and nerves get pinch, that signals brain. something like that. lol
We used this very same alarm with my oldest – and it worked wonders in just a week! I highly recommend this investment – and you can sell it on ebay when you are finished & recoop some of your initial investment. Totally worth it!!
I haven’t seen anyone in the comments mention this and I feel I must. Sometimes bed wetting can be caused by constipation and a condition called Encopresis. Those interested can Google it. But basically, a child refuses to use the toilet for pooping and, over time, it causes their colon to stretch out, causing a mega-colon. The enlarged colon then presses on the child’s bladder causing day and nighttime wetting. This is fairly rare but if your child is having day and night accidents, monitor their pooping. My child was diagnosed with Encopresis at age 3 and 3 years later we are still struggling. It is devastating to see your child have accidents that embarass them, especially at school! My child takes enough medication for 3 ADULTS and has had to endure many tests, hospital stays and doctor appointments. I beg any parent who feels their child could have problems to please see their doctor. You know your child best so always trust your gut.
I recommend this book: “It’s No Accident: Breakthrough Solutions To Your Child’s Wetting, Constipation, Utis, And Other Potty Problems” by Dr. Steve J. Hodges
and apparently, my doctor said it is often linked to ADHD as well because the child wont stop long enough to go to the bathroom when they need to so they then get clogged up. My son has not/probably will not be diagnosed because we plan on doing things other than meds to treat but he definitely has ADHD tendancies and definitely deals with constipation and definitely took quite a while to stop the bedwetting…and he often had accidents during the day (and still does occasionally at age 6) well into 5 years old…despite being potty trained at age 4ish. (I know…very late).
It’s interesting that you mention ADHD. My son has been diagnosed with ADHD. He hasn’t had a problem with bed wetting but he did potty train really late. I’m just curious now if a lot of kids with ADHD potty train late.
I have 8 yr old son that has bed wetting problem too. Thanks so much for the tips!
Chiming in a little late, but wanted to throw this out there. I struggled for 4 years with my now 8 year old son. I am a complete believer in trying everything before resorting to meds in situations like this, especially for my kids.
My son didn’t wet every night, but enough that it was an issue. And it seemed to go in spurts, maybe twice a week for awhile, then back to 4-5 nights a week.
I started waking him before I would go to bed, but that didn’t always work. I used the bed mats, underpants, even washable bed mats since the disposables were getting so expensive. And I looked into the alarms, but couldn’t bring myself to spend the money, thinking there has to be something I haven’t tried.
I finally talked to the ped about it last year.
I brought up that I thought it was because my son was such a heavy sleeper – doc said “no”.
Maybe because my son drank too many fluids – doc said “no”.
Maybe because my son always waits to the last second to go potty and doesn’t listen to his body cues – doc said “no”.
He mentioned the meds, but quickly dismissed it as my son was still so young and it is a very common problem, maybe if he still had this problem at age 12.
He explained to me that the reason kids wet the bed is because their bladders are not yet fully developed. And because the bladder is a muscle, the best way to get the muscle to perform better is to work it.
He mentioned that many people suggest lowering fluid intake, but said that just adds to the problem since the muscle is now being used less frequently. That’s the complete opposite of what to do.
So he suggested I load my son up with fluids.
I know.
Sounds crazy.
But it worked.
He said fill him with as much water as possible in the morning and early afternoon (obviously, not late afternoon and not before bed). This will start working the muscle more and helping it to work better. After a couple months, it happened maybe twice a month and in the last 6 months (knock on wood), he’s been dry.
I was very leery at first, as I contemplated that if the reason is truly bladder underdevelopment, and this is such an easy fix, why don’t all doctors know about it? And why isn’t this solution all over the web? But, thought to myself “what do I have to lose?”.
I’m so glad I tried this first. My next step would have been one of these alarms.
It doesn’t cost anything and there’s no getting up in the middle of the night. Hey, its worth a shot, right?
Our pedi told us the same thing at age 5-6. It made perfect since to us because he been dry throughout the night before starting school. Once we pushed the fluids and made him use his bladder…his brain was able to read the signal.
We purchased a bedwetting alarm when our son was about seven years old. It was well worth the money – it helped him go from wet every night to completely dry every night in the matter of a week! We have also lent it out several times to others whose kids were struggling with bed wetting – so it really has paid off since at least half a dozen kids have been nighttime trained from one alarm!
You are a gift from heaven Colin! I have struggled with my 7 yr old now for a few years and it’s been so hard! I love this idea and we will probably use it, however, my concern is that we also have a 2 yr old ( who gets up screaming at least twice each night) and a newborn (1 month old) who wakes for feedings…..so nights are already hell around our house and to add this to it will be even tougher however, it’s the lesser of two evils when i think about the pull ups, clothes, bedding, etc that needs washed so much it makes me crazy! and the smell! 🙁 I appreciate that you went to a subject that isn’t spoken of because I felt lost and embarrassed myself. Thank you!!
i think the smell the mess pull ups and craziness are probably nothing compared to how it makes your 7 year old feel
OMG! I thought I was the only one struggling through this. My grand daughter is 9 and we have done everything we can think of. She is’t allowed drinks after 5 (tried 6 and 7) and she has to go to the bathroom every hour before she goes to bed. On top of that she wears overnight pants and then wears another one on top of it and sometimes she has dry bedding (not her overnight pants though) but not very often. It is getting way to expensive to wash her sheets and blankets every night. I am going to get the mat and see if that works.
Thank you so much for sharing. It really made my day to know that others are struggling with this also.
I borrowed this device from a friend when my son was about 8-9 years old and it worked like a charm. He desperately wanted to quit. It was embarrassing to him when he went places overnight. This helped him in a very short period of time. I would highly recommend it.
I will try the mats as I have survey dollars I can use on amazon. I can’t afford to purchase the alarm and the baby monitor at this time. I will try to get her up every three hours though and see if that works. Thank you for the wonderful ideas.
I have something called Interstitial Cystitis it is an extremely painful bladder condition that affects men, women, and children, and can result in going 60+ times a day or more for people. Many have not heard or know about this as well!
I have Interstitial Cystitis too. 17 years ago many Doctors didn’t even know what it was. There are still some that don’t know. Limiting caffeine and spicy foods can help relieve some of the pain.
My daughter just started wetting her bed again after about a year of being dry. She is age 8. We recently tried a urine alarm, but she sleeps right through the noise, flashing, and vibration! We would try waking her up when it would go off, but when she wakes up she is SO irritable and hard to deal with, that it is just easier to put her in a pull ups and let her sleep. 🙁
OMGosh Collin I loved your site before but I now LOVE it!!! Your video is my almost exact struggle with my 8 yr old daughter and I just ordered an alarm with the still hesitant hope it will work for her too. Hearing her say “I really wish I could stop” is heartbreaking, fingers crossed. TY TY TY
Does your child snore? This may be a possible cause for bed wetting. A child can have sleep apnea due to a constricted airways/large tonsils. Just like an adult, the child will struggle for oxygen and during this episode, can lose control of their bladders. Please check your child, because not only can it result in bed wetting, it can cause a host of other health and/or behavioral problems. This may not apply to your child but worth checking into.
This alarm has made all the difference for my 10yr old son. I was really hesitant to buy it because it was expensive, but I’m so glad I did, it took him one week of waking up to the alarm. Now we are 7 months out and he does not need to wear anymore. Not one accident! I am in the process using this on my 7 yr old daughter, she is doing great so far but thinking it may take a little longer than a week. Overall great product and very accurate!
After a normal sleep study result, I took my 6yo (ADHD) kid to a Ped urologist. She suggested the WetStop Alarm from Potty MD. It clips to your underwear & goes off when wet. It costs about $45 but the Dr gave us a discount code. She said that it’s better than meds & re-trains the brain. She warned that it can take anywhere from 1wk-6m. We are beginning the 2nd week of this & it seems promising.
On another (ADHD) note, we’ve been using Vayarin (Rx-medical food) & PCIT (PARENT Child Interactive Therapy) for his ADHD. It has done wonders for our son! The Rx did take longer (4 months) than expected to kick in but has no side effects!
This is the alarm that my pedi recommended for my daughter. She had great success and accidents stopped completely in about 3 or 4 weeks. Good luck to you!
Thanks! I hope that he has a short turnaround like your daughter.
Malem worked for my son too, cannot recommend it enough. And after I sold it on Craigslist for 1/2 of what I paid!
I know this post is about bedwetting but my child had a different problem. Thumb sucking. I solved and it was very hard seeing as how you can’t just take away their thumbs. And now is the perfect weather for it. I took sleepers with the long sleeves and the ones that cover the feet with the zipper down the front. I sewed a pair of winter gloves on the end of the sleeves and had the child wear this until the problem was gone. Yes the sleeper did get messy with food and what not but in the wash it went and right back on them. Sleeping was a night mare so I killed two birds with one stone. I put the child to sleep and got my daily walk in. Put child in stroller and walk as far as possible until asleep. Then transfer sleeping child to bed. Took about two weeks from start to finish. I know you all can do this too. I was doing this with twins in a double stroller.
This is crazy timing! I was just about to buy a Wet-Stop3 for my 8 year old, does anyone have experience with that brand? It is half the price of the Malem with good reviews. Not sure which one I should go for now…
I highly recommend the Wet Stop! Worked great for my then 9 year old daughter!
I recently used the Wet Stop with my 6 year old daughter. She pretty much potty trained herself at 2.5 years old, but at 6 years old was still waking up wet every morning. She literally had never woke up dry. It took about a month of consistent use with the Wet Stop bed alarm, but she finally started waking up dry and has been dry every morning for the last 4 months. I would definitely recommend trying it. Here is some advice “Don’t give up!”. I was exhausted and ready to give up thinking it just wasn’t working and all of a sudden she started waking up on her own to go to the bathroom.
Urologists will tell you that under age 8 bedwetting is not an issue – use pull ups and mattress pads – parents need to be understanding
if bedwetting persists you should see an urologist to find any underlying issues rather than do something like this. There may be underlying infection or there may sleep issues.
Really disturbs me to see something like this promoted
I have been an advocate for abused children for about 20 years and I see this topic differently. Something which has not been said but must is that bed wetting is often a sign of extreme stress. Sometimes it is caused by stress of family fighting, or bullying at school. Sometimes though it is a warning sign of sex abuse or other severe abuse.
I worked a case this week where sex abuse was discovered because of bed wetting caused a trip to the doctor.
If you child is wetting the bed over and over again, it could be normal aging but it is always good to check in about empowerment, talking to parents about bad things, when it is ok to disobey and good vs bad touch. It is also time to do an objective assessment of who has access to your kid and what you know about them. Also look for mood, preference and friend changes.
This should not be done at the same time as bed wetting conversations. It does not have to be a big deal. Just check in and support.
Most of the time bedwetting will nothing more sinister than e a little bladder in bigger body but there is nothing wrong with a parent double check.
We were having night problems with our then 5 year old boy, then we bought the Wet Stop alarm and it worked great. We decided to use it a little while later on our 4 year old daughter and when our 3rd son was 3.5 years old we used it for him and he did better than his two older siblings. Seriously, the bedwetting alarm is the way to go. I don’t know how or why it works, but reading reviews and seeing it work on my children was enough to make me a believer for life. And yes, we had tried the holding water at night, having them pee as many times before going to bed, setting our alarms for 2-3 hour increments at night to wake the children up, but nothing worked, until we decided to just go with the pee alarm for each child. We would try all the other methods first for a while and see if they worked, which they did not for us, so we resorted to the pee alarm each time. We even had to reconnect the wiring for the third child because somehow it stopped working between my 2nd and 3rd, and it still works like a champ. HIGHLY RECOMMEND PEE/BEDWETTING ALARMS!!!!
There are many options out there to help bedwetting children. My son and daughter stopped bedwetting using a Chummie Bedwetting Alarm – https://chummie.com/store. Its great for deep sleepers. Good luck.
My ten year old son still struggles with this issue. Thank you so much for posting this. Excited to see if it will work for him. 🙂
Dr Hodges who wrote the book mentioned earlier helped my 10 year old. Started with a colon clean out using a large dose of miralax and then a daily dose. This was accompanied with having him urinate immediately before going to bed. Before starting he was using goodnights and still getting the sheets wet. After the miralax and going right before bed we reduced the bed wetting by 50% the first 2-3 weeks. Now 1 year later at age 11 he has no accidents!!!! He actually will wake up and go sometimes which he never did before.
We didn’t even know he was constipated because he was using the bathroom everyday. They gave him a chart of what his poo should look like and everyday for a few weeks I would make him report which one it looked like.
My 15 year old was adopted as a toddler from Ukraine where they are placed on a pee pot until they go. This can lead to unique toileting issues as you can imagine. We also have the mega colon issue from constipation that was mentioned above. She also sleeps through alarms. What finally worked for us was a Rx for Desmopressin which is the hormone that normally kicks in at night to suppress urination. It has been our magic bullet. I am glad to find this thread. It is so tough.
The Chummie Bedwetting Alarm came recommended by my doctor. It stopped bed-wetting in my 8 y.o. within a month. I’d definitely recommend a Chummie to every bed-wetter.
THANK YOU for posting this video! My son is 8 years old and has struggled with bed wetting every night! I decided to invest in this alarm hoping it would work for us! It took only 10 days! He has been dry every morning! I just wish I purchased this sooner! It is worth the 100.00 for sure!
You are so welcome, Kristen! I’m glad it was helpful! 🙂
i cannot tell you how excited and relieved I am to see this video!!! Even if it doesn’t work (which I think it will) I feel empowered to do something to help my boy with besetting. He is so discouraged and we are starting to feel concerned for his little feelings. I am ordering tomorrow. THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!
That is my granddaughter. I usually get her up two times a night and she would fall asleep on the toilet. She is 11 now and we are still fighting it. Thank god she has a prescription for the good nights. I don’t have a baby monitor nor do I have the money to buy it but thanks for sharing.
That is my granddaughter. I usually get her up two times a night and she would fall asleep on the toilet. She is 11 now and we are still fighting it. Thank god she has a prescription for the good nights. I don’t have a baby monitor nor do I have the money to buy it but thanks for sharing. I did buy the pea pod mat and we take that to germany with us when my mother buys our tickets. It does keep the bed dry.
Hello, my son is 12.5 years old and has always wet the bed, pretty much every night, because he is such a heavy sleeper, and nothing wakes him up. After trying medication, tapering off fluids starting in the afternoon, setting alarms in the middle of the night and me waking him up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, we continued to struggle with nightly accidents. Then I saw an ad online for something we hadn’t yet tried. Hesitant to spend the money, we decided to try DryBuddy Flex 3 and it was the best decision I ever made. He started wearing the DryBuddy underpants on 2/13/18, exactly two months ago today, and he only had one accident on 2/21, and on 3/11 he stopped the DryBuddy and started wearing normal underpants. He feels totally confident he is finished with having accidents anymore, and wakes up on his own every time he needs to use the bathroom. (My son wanted me to rate it with six stars, and I would if that was an option!) I called DryBuddy and thanked them for their great customer service and product, and I’ll be letting our pediatrician know, too. No more medication when he goes on sleepovers or camping, no more worry, and no more daily laundering of his bedding! It has changed our life completely. Thank you DryBuddy!