Poor Kit is still a problem bed wetter at 9. I wanted to deal with it as soon as he moved in but there were too many other crisis fires to put out. The challenge was getting him to wake up and go to the toilet. He just can’t hold on the whole night. We started a wake up plan last spring but getting up twice a night was grueling on his ability to stay focused at school. So we canned the plan until the summer vacation.
The first couple of weeks of summer were trial and error trying to figure out when and how often it happened. He was a great sport getting up and going to the can a couple of times a night. But it was hit or miss and we couldn’t find a pattern. After school started again, I saw that the weekends were better than the weekdays and it occurred to me that the gap between supper and bedtime was significant. I had a plan!
After school the next day I told Kit that I had a new idea for solving the whole thing.
“We could have milk and cookies when you get me up?” he suggested hopefully.
I have to admit that made me laugh a lot. “No. No milk and cookies. We’re going to start having supper every day at 5 instead of 6 to give you at least 3 hours between eating and bed.”
“Can we have milk and cookies, too?” he asked.
I was about to say no and then thought ‘What the hell. Why not have a treat.”
So we’ve been eating an hour earlier for the past 2 weeks, getting up only once no matter how small the pee, and having a half cookie or spoon of ice cream.
Miraculously, it’s worked. We haven’t had an accident (cross your fingers) since. The longer gap really has worked. Now all we need is for him to start waking himself up to go to the toilet once each night.
Ironically, I think the cookie will solve that. He wakes up for the treat, not the warm, wet patch spreading through the sheets.
Go figure.
