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Are Dry Nights Ahead?

Signs That Your Child Is Outgrowing Bedwetting

By Amy Carey Bowman

If your child has been wetting the bed for months or years, you may both be wondering if he'll ever experience dry nights again. Some parents are confused and discouraged when their child is dry for a few days or weeks, only to find that the pattern of bedwetting eventually returns. When are consistently dry nights really within reach, and when is the light at the end of the tunnel only a mirage?

Christy Castle's 5-year-old daughter, Maddy, has been struggling with bedwetting since she was potty trained at age 2. Sometimes she'll be dry for two weeks before having accidents again.

"Maddy's had two accidents in the past week," says Castle, who lives in Columbus, Ohio. "Her last dry period was 12 days. This is an average dry period for her."

According to Dr. Marc Cendron, a urologist at Children's Hospital Boston, Maddy's pattern of dry nights followed by the return of nighttime accidents is normal. "Some kids outgrow bedwetting quickly; others may do it in fits and starts, so there is no real meaning to the lessening of the frequency in wet nights," Dr. Cendron says.

Because children's dry and wet nights may come and go until wetting stops entirely, it's important to keep a positive attitude and keep your child's spirits up. Encouraging your child with positive reinforcement is a good way to try to recognize a period of dry nights.

In the past, Castle has praised Maddy's dry periods with reward charts. "We hung a calendar in the bathroom and each morning she would wake up dry she was allowed to put a sticker on that day," she says. "Once she received three stickers in a row, she got a prize. If that worked for a while, then we bumped it up to five stickers in a row and then seven."

Want to see more?

• Check out our Article Library.
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• Let's Talk About It: Talking About Bedwetting with Children
• Talk about it!