I prefer dry nights!

This post is inspired by a sleepless night that was peppered by a full moon, a two month old with the sniffles, some really bizarre dreams and a bed wetting incident.

Let me explain.

Our son, who I will now refer to as “Smarty Pants” in this and all future posts (because he is so smart, and because I am tired of always writing “my son” in these articles), has been potty trained for some time now.  We also noticed that he started peeing less and less at night at around the same time that he started potty training.

We took the plunge about five or six months ago and stopped putting diapers on him at night.  It has gone really really well.  Since we started, we have had very few bed wetting incidents, and the times when he has wet his bed (including the last one) have been times when we have broken one of our three cardinal rules for a dry night’s sleep.

So here they are, in no particular order, the Dad Jam’s Cardinal Rules for a Dry Night’s Sleep:

1. Be ye not thirsty – we make sure Smarty Pants has enough to drink about two hours prior to his planned bedtime, and then after that, no more drinks.  If he does want a drink after that, it is a small one.
2. Pee ye before going to bed – right before we bring Smarty Pants to bed, we sit him on the toilet.  Even if he says he doesn’t have to go pee, 9 times out of 10 he pees when he is sitting on the toilet.  If he really doesn’t have to go pee, and he has tried, then that is okay too, it could be because he peed not too long beforehand.
3. Be ye observant – this one is for the parents.  Our bedroom is right beside Smarty Pant’s bedroom, so if he wakes up, or even if he moans loudly for a little bit, we are light enough sleepers (unfortunately) that we wake up.  We found that these moans, or the waking up, usually means that he has to go pee.  Sometimes he is too tired to say he has to pee, but from experience, we know this is the case.  So, at the sound of moans or crying, we jump out of bed, run to his bedroom, carry him over to the bathroom and plop him on the toilet.  Ninety-nine percent of the time he pees and falls right back asleep.  If only we could fall right back asleep after too!

When we had the last incident, we had forgotten to make sure that he peed before going to bed (it can be easy to forget when you have another child and you are tired and trying to get everyone sorted out for bed), and then we didn’t wake up on time to hear him when he woke up.  So, by the time we got to him, it was too late.

Overall, following these cardinal rules has worked really well for us.  If you like these ideas, try them out yourself!

Feel free to leave a comment and share your experiences with bedwetting and things that you did to prevent it.  Do you have any additional rules for a dry night’s sleep?

Popularity: 1% [?]