nightime potty training

[mossimo12]

My 2.5 yo has been potty trained for quite some time (going on a year I think).  The problem is we have always used a disposable diaper at night and lately (though it never used to be so much) her diaper is wet every morning.  We did the same thing with my oldest daughter (disposable at night), but at some point soon after she was potty trained she started waking up on her own and going to the bathroom (well at least waking up, and I would bring her to the potty).  That does not seem to be happening with my youngest dd.  Last night we went back to the cloth diapers we used to use during the day and she woke up in the middle of the night with it soaking wet and the bed smelling of urine (the sheets were damp, but not wet). When I went in her room she didn't say anything about having a wet diaper, she just wanted me to come put her back to sleep (which I did after changing her diaper).  I do have her use the potty before bedtime. 

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to get her to start using the potty during the night?

[Llyra]

Being dry at night isn't really something you can encourage by training. It's a physical developmental stage. There is a hormone that suppresses urination during sleep, and it takes awhile for some kiddos to start producing it in adequate amounts. It comes easily, and early, for some kids, and others don't start waking to pee until they are much, much older. I would encourage you to read up on bedwetting, to learn more. Although the medical community doesn't even call it bedwetting until age 5 or so-- until then it's considered normal.

I would encourage you to just give it more time, and in the meantime, do whatever you need to in terms of diapering, in order to make life easy on yourself and your child. And be careful with putting pressure on the child-- if she really can't control it, talking too much about it might just make her feel badly about it. Withholding liquids before bed can help reduce the amount of urine in the diaper, but it's not proven to have any effect on whether the child wets at all. Pottying at bedtime, and first thing in the morning, are great ideas, but I wouldn't count on them to help a child who's just not ready yet.

[Smidge]

OP, I could have written your post word for word.  I too am waiting impatiently for that hormone to start kicking in

[Llyra]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nocturnal_enuresis

Yeah, sure, it's Wikipedia, but it's also a great summary of what we know about night wetting. It states that 20% of five year olds are not dry at night, and that 5% of ten year olds still occasionally wet the bed.

[mossimo12]

OK, obviously I am just being impatient. 

"Bedwetting is frequently associated with a family history of the condition." Um I was wetting my bed until, well lets just say I was the 5% of the statistic "By ten years old, 95% of children are dry at night" so you would think I would be more understanding of my 2.5 year old (geesh a lot of kids aren't potty trained during the day at this age, much less the night).

I guess I just needed reassurance that she wouldn't be wetting her bed in college.  Thanks everyone :)

[Llyra]

Originally Posted by mossimo12 

OK, obviously I am just being impatient. 

"Bedwetting is frequently associated with a family history of the condition." Um I was wetting my bed until, well lets just say I was the 5% of the statistic "By ten years old, 95% of children are dry at night" so you would think I would be more understanding of my 2.5 year old (geesh a lot of kids aren't potty trained during the day at this age, much less the night).

I guess I just needed reassurance that she wouldn't be wetting her bed in college.  Thanks everyone :)

Happy to help. I have three bedwetters, here. They're six, almost four, and almost four, and all three of them are still in Good Nites. DD1 is down to just a few times a month, but she still feels more comfortable with the Good Nites as insurance. So I feel like I have some little bit of expertise on this one....