Smiling Mom

Seve­ral years back I thought I knew everything about parenting.

OK, let’s be honest, most of the time I still pre­tend know everything…but I digress.

My son was extre­mely easy to potty train.  So easy, in fact, that by the time he was 2 years and 4 months old he was wea­ring big boy undies during the day and was dry most every night.

Nice, right?  Well, then came my daugh­ter.  She was also day potty trai­ned by two and a half.  But night­time trai­ning was a whole dif­fe­rent story.

Claire sleeps.  Like really sleeps during the night.  There’s no waking her.  And although this is great in so many ways, it is rot­ten when it comes to her abi­lity to recog­nize her body’s cues during the late hours of the night.

Fast for­ward to February.  Claire had recently tur­ned four and was still hap­pily wea­ring her large pull-ups to bed each night.

One day we acci­den­tally ran out of those damn absor­bent pads for­cing night­time potty trai­ning upon us.

Hold me now.

At an utter loss as to what to do, I reached out and asked for help.  I sent a mes­sage to one of my high school friends who has potty trai­ned all six of her dar­ling chil­dren. I asked what she did with any of her reluc­tant night­time potty trainers.

Here’s what she said:  For both of her difficult-to-train chil­dren, she deci­ded to take the dia­pers off all together and equip the bed with those potty pads.  She said she pre­pa­red her­self for a month of nightly sheet chan­ging.  At the end of the month, both children’s bodies had adjus­ted to the new rou­tine and there were no more accidents.

While men­tally pre­pa­ring for this month-long pee fest I found myself goo­gling varia­tions of the phrase, “night­time potty trai­ning” again and again.  On one blog post a woman was asking for advice and help trai­ning her daugh­ter.  A lady who had found suc­cess in an odd way left an obs­cure com­ment on her post.  (I wish I still had the link..)

Here’s what she said:  She suc­cess­fully potty trai­ned her daugh­ter by (get this) inc­rea­sing her daughter’s water intake during the day.  Let me say this again… She made her daugh­ter drink more water during the day.

Crazy, right?

Well she went on to say that she rea­li­zed her daugh­ter was never really fee­ling that “I gotta pee really bad” sen­sa­tion and the­re­fore her body never lear­ned which musc­les were nee­ded to “hold it”.  When that sen­sa­tion hap­pe­ned at night, her body did not know how to respond.

Something in her com­ment reso­na­ted with me.

I was super­mom with son and always made sure he was hydrated…But my daugh­ter?  Not so much.

My Plan:

Star­ting in the mor­ning I requi­red Claire to drink as much water as pos­si­ble, refi­lling her cup as many times as neces­sary.  I became vigilant.

After four o’clock, liquids were off limits with the excep­tion of a small glass of water directly after dinner.

At night­time I’d have her go to the bath­room two to three times prior to laying down, ensu­ring that she appro­pria­tely drai­ned her bladder.

I’d take her to the bath­room just before I went to sleep.

I pre­pa­red for a month long ‘battle’, so to speak, by making her bed with two water­proof mat­tress pads and two bot­tom sheets and one addi­tio­nal water­proof pad directly under her body.

Claire, true to form, began peeing her­self with regu­la­rity.  We (both Claire and I) chan­ged her sheets and paja­mas when that happened.

After two weeks, as if by some sort of miracle, Claire was dry almost every sin­gle night.

Dry.

Nightly.

Ama­zing.

Now I’m a belie­ver.  Once Claire was for­ced into the potty dance during the day, her body began recog­ni­zing the cues at night and res­pon­ded by not allo­wing her to relieve her­self all over her sheets.

Now it’s your turn.  Send me your paren­ting ques­tions and I’ll let you know what’s been effec­tive for me.