Bedwetting Alarms

Keep in mind your older son is still only 3. Twenty percent of children are still bedwetting up to age 5. Most doctors do not consider nighttime bedwetting a problem until a child is 5 or 6. Bedwetting (also called enuresis) may happen occasionally, or every night, as with your son. Estimates are that five to seven million children wet their beds on a regular basis. A child should never be punished for wetting the bed.

Bedwetting is very common for children who are deep sleepers. If your son is still waking up wet around age 5 or 6, you might want to consider using a bedwetting alarm. Bedwetting alarms train bedwetters to be sensitive to their need to urinate and are helpful in many, but not all, cases. The bedwetting alarm that I recommend is called DRI Sleeper and can be purchased at www.dri-sleeper.com. The DRI-Sleeper alarm makes a sound at the first drops of urine and has an 80 percent success rate for night training. Bear in mind, that although the alarm trains some children in as little as two weeks, it's more likely to require several months before the child wakes up regularly on his own to use the toilet.

If you feel you still need an additional resource for betwetting, check out, Waking Up Dry: A Guide to Help Children Overcome Bedwetting by Howard J. Bennett, MD, FAAP (American Academy of Pediatrics) and for suggestions for encouraging bowel movements, please review my tips for getting your kid to poop on the potty.


For more potty training advice, check out:
Potty Training Tips from the Potty Pro, Teri Crane
Bedwetting While Potty Training
Child Won't Poop on the Potty

Talk to other potty training parents who are also in the pee-pee & poo-poo trenches on our Toddlers & Preschoolers Message Board!