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Jan
20
Riley wakes up early in the morning, earlier than the rest of the household. He used to come get under the covers with us but the sweetness of his presence couldn’t overcome the annoyance factor of having an impatient, squirming, pointy-elbowed bed partner who repeatedly asked if it was time to get up yet (to which we’d hiss back NO IT IS 5:45 AM OH MY ACHING GOD), so we asked him to stay in his room, which he does. He turns on his bedside lamp, he gets out books and toys, and he generally keeps himself happily occupied until the adults come staggering out in search of caffeine.
He also gets dressed on his own, which blows my mind. He goes to bed a pajama’d wee boy, his scrawny butt padded with his nighttime Pull-Up, and by the time we greet him in the morning he’s outfitted himself in t-shirt and jeans, Spiderman underwear lurking underneath. Suddenly he’s some kind of hulking kindergartner or something, chattering away at top volume and likely as not sporting his custom-made water pistol holster, fashioned out of a sock and a belt by yours truly.
Oh, he’s getting to be such a big boy. Which leads me to a delicate question about that aforementioned Pull-Up — at what age do kids typically stop using those at night? He’s rock solid on the bathroom thing and has been for a long time, but not peeing all night long (or waking up and using the bathroom) seems like a lot to expect from a 4-year-old. But maybe not? I have no idea, really.
As far as diaper-related issues go in my house that one overnight Pull-Up is pretty far down the give-a-hoot list, but I thought I’d ask those of you in the know. When did your kid start sleeping without a safety net, so to speak?
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159 Responses to “Goodnight moon”
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I’ve been wondering the same thing! Thanks for asking it! I’m anxious to hear what everyone says. Mine is close to 4 and she still does the pullup thing at night too. and it’s pretty far down on my give-a-hoot list too, but now that you asked… thanks :)
Eric wasn’t totally potty trained, pee and poop, until he had just turned 4. I have a bad memory but I’m pretty sure he slept in a pull up until then.
My son is 5 and I still can’t trust him without his “good nites”. I start to wonder if it’s just a habit now–if we were to go cold turkey, would he actually be ok after an initial adjustment or would we be changing sheets forever?
My 4 year old (Nov.) is still in a night time pull up too. From what I’ve read it depends on the child. When their brains (up there and down there) start waking them up to go they’re ready. I also have a friend who woke her child up every night at 11 or 12 to go….Fun, no?
Both of my boys needed a pull-up at night for awhile, until about 1st grade I think. One of The Captain’s friends will wet the bed sometimes when he spends the night; I don’t make a big deal of it but I will let his mom know (he’s almost 9). Some kids just have a small bladder and don’t wake up during the night to empty it; I’d try restricting fluids for an hour before bedtime and having Riley use the potty immediately before going to bed.
Both of my kids (now 4 and 6) were out of a Pull-up as soon as they were dry for about a week of through-the-nights (which was around 3-ish for both of them). I have plastic mattress covers on at all times, though, in case of *extremely rare* bedtime accidents or sickness. I just make sure they don’t fill up on water right they ‘go’ right before they go to sleep and we’re good. Good luck taking the plunge (if and when you decide to do so).
Also, we bought HUGE digital clocks for their rooms and told them they were not allowed to get up and get us until AFTER the first number was a 6. Works like a charm. Magically at 6 we hear two sets of feet hit the floor and a few seconds later, the elbows and knees and squirmy time begins…and ends relatively quickly thereafter.
Oh, sorry for the repeat wording there, I got enthusiastic with my cut and paste. Also, I would like to second whoever said that it totally depends on the kid and that wetting the bed past 6 is not that uncommon (especially in boys). They just play hard and sleep hard. (Brother experience talking here.)
g~
Sometimes kids have problems when they go through growth spurts… its not always an age thing.
There are waterproof mattress pad covers (not plastic! they have cloth like ones at Target) that are handy if the pullup thing becomes an issue as well.
Aha! So glad you asked this. My four year old girl (she’ll be five in August) sleeps in a pull up every night. We’ve tried to go without, and she’ll be fine for a few nights and then invariably wakes up screaming because she wet the bed. Which then wakes up her brother in the crib next to her. And then I want to die. This from an amazing sleeper who sleeps all night every night like a dream, no matter how much noise her brother makes. So I am LOATHE to mess with her sleep. And how do you train them when this is something that occurs when they are fast asleep? I don’t have the answer, but wanted to let you know we are in the same pull-up boat as you.
I think it’s a question of consistency. Is he making it through the night and you’re throwing away dry pull ups each morning, or is he peeing in them? My daughter was in pull ups for a while, but after she was dry for several weeks straight we moved her to underwear. She was three at the time, but I hear girls tend to go a little quicker in that dept. If his body is ready, and he’s consistently dry, great- go underwear full time. If he’s not there yet, however, I would suggest not pushing it and just let it happen naturally.
And when you do go pull up free, I agree with g~. My sister in law used the plastic mattress covers for her boys and they were wonderful for those rare middle of the night accidents.
Charlie eased out of the pull-up phase at night when he was a little older than 4 and 1/2. Last July. He went back into them for a couple weeks when his baby brother was born, but broke the habit pretty quickly. He will have the occasional accident but for the most part he’s good at keeping himself dry.
I found that restricting his liquid intake an hour before bedtime helps, and reminding him to drain the snake before bed. If you find yourself washing the sheets every day for too long, and it’s not working for you, you’ll know he’s not ready.
Good luck!
I am wondering the same thing myself. Our 3.5 year old refuses to wear a pull-up at night and has been potty trained since he was almost 2, but still occasionally has accidents at night. We’ve dealt with this by forcing him to use the bathroom before we go to sleep at night, usually around 11:00 and with that extra pee session he’s always dry. It seems here that the accidents seem to fall with growth spurts, like he’s sleeping longer and harder at night and just can’t seem to wake himself up so I worry that this will continue into the foreseeable future. Looking forward to what others have to say on this one.
We stopped using them when my daughter was a 3 or so. We did get her up before we went to bed for a final bathroom run for a few months after that, though. And then I think we forgot to do it for a few nights in a row, and she was fine. We still have the plastic mattress cover on her bed, though, just in case.
Funny b/c we just stopped the pull-up/diaper at night this week. My son is 4-1/2 (5 in June). It’s tough to give up since the alternative is waking up to “mommy/daddy, I’m wet” but so far so good. We make sure he goes/tries before bed and we moved his cup of water to the bathroom from the nightstand.
My daughter is 4 and will still wet the bed if we allow her to drink anything within an hour of bedtime. We stopped using a pull-up at about 3 1/2 years though, and just instituted a rule about no drinks close to bedtime.
My daughter was very nearly five. My son was 3.
We went cold turkey on pull-ups when my son was about 3.5. We put him in heavy cotton training underpants, and put a waterproof pad on the mattress. He did wet the bed every night or so for about a week, but since then he’s been fine (he’s just about 6 now). I figured he needed to know what it felt like to need to pee at night, and was willing to change sheets for a little while to help him learn. A pull-up is a diaper as far as he was concerned, and he peed in it because he could. After a few nights of waking up with wet underwear, he learned to wake himself up before he wet the bed and go to the bathroom.
My Ava stopped peeing at night when she was 3.5. But had daytime accidents daily until recently (she’ll be 5 in a week). I’d rather have had it the way Riley is doing it.
I think every kid is different. My girl only needed one for about a month after potty training. My boy-a little longer. Does he keep the pull up dry all night? If he does, I’d stop using them. There’s really no need if he’s not wetting it. If he’s still wetting the pull-up every night then keep him wearing it. If not, then really it’s only there for the ’safety net’ and for convenience so you don’t have to change the sheets in case he does wet the bed, right?
My son potty trained late – he was in full on diapers until 3.5, but somehow when it clicked for him, it totally clicked. We kept him in pull ups at night for the first week and then realized he was dry. He’s been sleeping without them ever since. I think he must have an enormous bladder or something because he also drinks a small bottle of water before bed every night. This isn’t something we worked on at all so I think it must simply be when their brains and bodies connect and give them the right message at the right time.
Now if I can just figure out how to get him to sleep until 7 am…
How often does he wake up with a wet Pull Up? If it’s not that often, I say it’s time to get a waterproof mattress pad and go without. He’ll wet the bed a few times, but big deal. He won’t like the way it feels to wake up soaked and hopefully that will help night-train him.
We never did Pull Ups; my kid just didn’t have very many night time accidents. He’s 4 and still occassionally wets the bed, but only if we aren’t careful to limit how much he drinks after dinner. I just keep two sets of sheets and mattress pads on the bed, so if he pees I just peel the top sheet and mattress pad off and back in he goes.
We night “trained” our 6yr old when she was 4. She was more than ready to go the whole night and even would wake herself up to go pee if she needed to in the middle of the night. Our younger one I think needed more time. She is 3 and is in panties at night but will sometimes still have accidents. We cut off all liquids for her an hour before bedtime and she HAS to try to use the bathroom right before getting in bed. Even so, we still often take her to the potty right before we go to bed. I think it depends on the kid. My nephew was closer to 5 when he stopped using pull-ups because he was such a heavy sleeper and he wouldn’t wake up on his own to go to the bathroom. It’s a tough call to make and once you switch to underwear, it’s better to stick with that decision, accidents and all. But if it’s not high on your list, then I say don’t worry about it. Why mess with a good thing, right?
My son gave them up at the age of 6 but we still drag his sleeping ass to the bathroom every night at 10 or 11. If we don’t, he will wake up wet. My daughter is almost 5 and still wears a pull-up to bed. It is so far down on my give a hoot list… They both potty trained at 2 1/2 years old but they sleep like the dead and don’t wake up to pee.
Yeah, I was a camp counselor in college and there were some older kids (3rd or 4th grade) who still wore the night-time pull ups to bed. I don’t think it’s a problem, it just takes awhile for some kids. Better to change a pull-up than sheets in the middle of the night!
My daughter slept without a “safety net” when she was 4. She’d still have accidents but I was still making her bed the same way I did when she was a baby & toddler, mattress pad, fitted sheet, waterproof mattress pad, fitted sheet, waterproof mattress pad. Yes, three layers, but if she wet the bed, all I had to do was change her and rip the top layer off and not have to remake a bed at 2am because I am lazy. I did this until she was about 6 or 7 because she sleeps so soundly. Now, we are in the clear. KNOCK ON WOOD!
With my kids it was 2.5 – but we used cloth diapers and those are pretty uncomfortable when wet. I think with a pull-up they can’t even tell they peed, so there’s not much incentive to wake up and use the toilet. But he will stop eventually. :)
I’m so glad you asked this question because I’ve been wondering the same thing. My son will be 5 in June and we still do night-time pull-ups. I can’t remember the last time he woke up with a wet one, though. This post has encouraged me to try the underwear once this package of pull-ups is gone. Of course, I’ve been telling myself I’ll do that for the past few months and I keep chickening out!
I don’t think that nighttime dryness is something that can be trained — at least, I’ve had no success with my 8 and 4 year old boys. It isn’t, however, something I’ve stressed about. Kids can’t help it and I see no reason to make them stress over something they can’t control.
The 4yo still wears a pull up to bed. The 8yo stopped when he was seven but I always wake him up at around 12 to pee again (it isn’t as onerous as you might think; he usually doesn’t even wake up enough to remember that I got him out of bed the next morning). We restrict fluids about two hours before bedtime, and he pees before bed, but I still have to wake him up just to make sure there are no accidents.
I think that generally, you can go by your own family history. My sister wet the bed consistently until she was about 11 or 12. Then she grew out of it. I think if you’ve ever read the Pioneer Woman’s site, she mentions that she (and her sister, I think) was a bedwetter until around 12 or so.
It’s just one of those things.
I didn’t even begin to potty train my boys until they turned three but it took only about three weeks. I didn’t do pull ups at night at all. I didn’t let them drink anything after dinner and I had them use the bathroom twice before bed. It worked for me. My daughter was potty trained at 10 months. My grandmother told her that she could not wear the “pretty panties” until she went to the potty and did not have an accident. She NEVER had an accident but she is six now and I am having the hardest time getting her to remember to WIPE!
We dropped our daughter’s pull-up when she turned 3. My husband or I get her up for a potty break when we go to bed, and the rare occasion we forget she has had an accident. But, it’s only been a few in the last 7 months.
But, each kid is different, blah, blah, blah.
My son just stopped like 6-8 months ago. He will be five in April. I guess we just started getting him to pee once or twice right before bed, I cleaned a lot of sheets at first and he started waking up (SCREAMING) to pee in the night which sucks but is WAY better then wet sheets!
My oldest was out of nighttime pull ups after a month of dry morning diapers. We had a plastic sheet (you can get them at Fred Meyer for $5) that went completly around the mattress and zipped up just in case. We took that off after 6 months. She has had not a single problem. But all kids are different. I wet the bed until I was 6 years old every night. I remember the first night I didn’t wet the bed and I didn’t from then on.
My oldest was 3.5 when we moved to underwear at night, youngest at 3 right now is not ready. I put the oldest in underwear and a Pull Up *over* the underwear. He wouldn’t wake up when he peed with a Pull Up. With the underwear on first he would wake up if he did (during the transition, which was about less a week), but it wasn’t a total Flip On the Lights Disaster at 3am. Good luck!
I’m trying to remember. My son was much slower, I know that. I believe he still wore a night diaper at almost 5. I agree with Maria and others, if you are consistently throwing out dry pull-ups, maybe it’s time for the waterproof pad and undies at night. If not, and as long as he’s not bothered by wearing it, keep the pull-up. Go with your instincts. But I wouldn’t change back once I made the switch.
I had to laugh, though, here Riley is getting ready to come out of night diapers and I’m personally starting to go in. Poise pads – wonderful for that slight leakage you get from old age and 8 pound babies leaping from your nethers.
I was wondering the same thing about my daughter so i did some research and found that overnight dryness isn’t really about being potty-trained. It’s something they have to physically grow into and it’s different for every kid. If he’s mostly dry, I would go with the above suggestion and put him in underwear but buy a plastic mattress cover just in case.
pretty sure my boy was about 3. i think my mother bought him some pull ups, but he never actually used one, and i don’t recally him ever wetting the bed. now..nightly barfing the bed? that went on for YEARS!
Ours were dry through the night around age 4, but there’s a lot of variation. I think the boy might have been the earliest, before he turned 4. One girl was a bit over 4, and the other girl had to be awakened (by me…) and taken to the bathroom every night until she was 5 1/2. (At first it was around 2 am, but we gradually moved it back to 11 pm-ish, which was tolerable.)
I agree with the other suggestions too, limit evening liquids if you can, and always always have them pee before going to bed (regardless of whether they “have to”!)
Oldest son in 6 1/2, still needs a pull-up and he wets it most nights. Younger son is 4, he’s been staying dry since he was 3. So he goes pull-up-less. The Dr. said the older one will stay dry when he’s developmentally ready and I’m not making an issues of it, when it happens, it happens. Thankfully little brother hasn’t harassed him much about it. My mom is more concerned about it then I am. I figure, ‘eh, when it happens, it’ll happen’.
Thank you for asking this as the comments are very reassuring!
My boy is 4 1/2 (will be 5 in July) and still wears a pull-up at night. Sometimes he wakes up dry and sometimes he doesn’t.
My six year old is pull-up free and has been for almost 2 years.
My 9, almost 10, year old only recently became able to handle the whole night without wetting his bed. He still has the occasional ‘incident’.
I think it depends a LOT on how their bodies are growing, how deeply they sleep, etc. For all of my kids (and myself!) we have waterproof mattress covers (they don’t crinkle like they did when I was a kid – no sound at all!)
We also limit his water intake (zero!) after dinner. We remind “go pee!” every night before bed. And that, combined with his body and bladder finally matching up in size seems to be working! Yay!
My just turned five year old still needs a Pull Up every night. He is a very deep sleeper and just does not wake up when he needs to pee.
Of all the things I worry about, this isn’t one of them. As my pediatrician said: it’ll happen when he is ready.
It was right around the Monkey’s 4th birthday that we did away with the night time pull-up – he had benn potty trained during the day for almost a year at that point.
I was out of town on a business trip and my husband (who was a SAHD at that point) started on a Thursday night. Hinny made sure the kid peed before putting him to bed, and then woke him up around midnight to go again. By Sunday the Monkey was fully trained, and he only had to change the sheets the first night.
In the grand scheme if things, I don’t think it’s too much of a big deal that he still needs a pull-up unless he’s going to be under someone else’s care at night who doesn’t like throwing the pull-up away in the morning.
Hope this helps!
Both my kids(a boy and a girl) weren’t even interested in potty training until right after they turned 3…and both of them were potty trained in one day, night and day, it’s like a switch was flipped in both. They didn’t have accidents at night. I certainly did nothing to cause this lol.
It really depends on the child, is he staying dry? I would try a waterproof sheet and at least see how it goes.
We knew our kid hadn’t wet her pull-ups in forever, but we were too chicken to go without. Finally, around her 4th birthday, we gave it a try. She’s only wet the bed once in the past 3 months. We don’t really pay attention to what she drinks, but we do make sure she goes to the bathroom right before bed.
Jen at 6:31, that’s a great idea. If there IS an accident, no changing the sheets in the middle of the night!
When my girls started consistently waking up with dry diapers/pullups, we stopped putting them on at night. My oldest was 4 when that happened, my younger daughter 3. My son is 3 and has only in the last week fully daytime-trained and still wakes up yet, so we’ve got a while longer to go with him.
When we first go diaper-free at night I put absorbent pads on their beds (something like this http://bit.ly/Iin7) so if they do have an accident, it’s quick and easy enough to switch out the pad rather than having to change the bed in the middle of the night. I’d also initially wake them in the night (on my way to bed) to ask if they needed to go potty, but both girls hated that so I didn’t do it for long.
Good luck!
We switched Mia to night-time underwear right before school started to address a recurring rash. I thought it would be a disaster – she had two or three accidents and then just learned how to hold it until morning. We were pretty shocked.
I have twin boys, almost 3.75. Within a week of being potty trained, Nate woke up dry every morning for a week. We switched to underwear at night and he’s had one nighttime accident in a year. Alex is still in a pullup. He asked for underwear at night once and peed in it throughout the night, then woke up at 4:30 drenched in cold pee crying. So we’re sticking with pullups.
My daughter refused to potty train AT ALL. Until, one day, right before she turned 3, she decided she was done with diapers. Pull-ups, diapers, NOTHING.
She wanted no part of it. So I bought a waterproof mattress pad and put towels under her sheets and prepared for the worst.
And a year plus later, never one accident, save for a very unpleasant stomach virus issue for which I was very thankful I kept some extra pull-ups around.
I think all kids are different, all bladders different, and there’s no real right or wrong here.
I fully expect my son, however, will go to high school in a diaper with his bottle.
My son just turned five and still needs a nighttime safety net, unless a parent were to wake him up every 3 hours to pee, which no one has signed up for yet.
His doctor said kids that sleep really heavy often need pull ups longer than others. No biggie.
4 1/2 yr old boy was pee potty trained right before his 3rd bday.
He was pooped trained 6 months later.
6 months after that, we took the pull-ups off at night and never had an accident since. BUT, he had been dry in his pull-up for a good two weeks and that is when we knew we should just pull the plug.
He does get up in the night to go the bathroom if needed, or really early in the morning…
It’s a tough call. I guess when it really matters to you, and he’s ready, go for it?
Putting training pants or underwear *under* a diaper is what helped two of my kids night-train, at the age of three or four. The other two started waking up dry in the morning at two and a half, so we started potty-training then.
what’s a pullup?
yeah, joking. love the blog as i have a 15 yr old and would go back to pullup stage over the what-is-this-crusty-sock-under-your-bed-o-my-god-nevermind stage in a minute.
My ped said that if my son is still peeing at night when he’s 6-7 then we’ll start working out a fix…what ever that means…hoping there is some switch or button. Many of my friends’ peds say the same thing. My son is 5yr 3 mos & still fills a Goodnight nightly, probably once every other week he actually pees out. He gets 3 ozs 30 mins before bed & pees before getting in bed…NO IDEA where it comes from!!
Oh should add he’s been day potty trained since 3.
My 5 year old is still in pull-ups (has ben potty trained for years). I think about it every once in a while, but not enough to really do much. We’ve tried cutting off drinks early….half heartedly. Recently I bought a mattress cover to attempt to go without pull-ups. Again, half hearted attempt. Tonight we’re trying the mattress cover because we ran out of pull-ups! Our problem, I believe, is that my son is SUCH a hard, deep sleeper that a marching band could come through his room and he wouldn’t wake up. A little pee in his underwear doesn’t stand a chance of waking him up. I always forget to speak to the pediatrician about it at check-ups — maybe at his 6 year I’ll remember. I’ve heard about medication, but I’d hate to have to go that route. I read something recently about it being hereditary – I did wet the bed until a later age…… I don’t worry too much about it until I think of sleepovers coming up soon, I’m sure. I’d hate for him to feel self conscious about it and it would break my heart if he was made fun of by friends about it.
from my point of view as a pediatric nurse practitioner, i would definitely tell you that there is no magic age limit. every kid is different. (duh!) it more has to do with the maturity of his nervous system being able to sense that his bladder is full, tell his brain to wake up, then actually get up and go to the bathroom and fall back asleep. everything has to catch up and get in sync. at some point, you’ll notice that he will wake up dry some mornings, meaning that things are starting to “catch up” and it might be time to start losing the pull up. some kids may be night trained by 4, others by 7 or 8. some kids don’t reach that point until puberty, especially if there is a family history of bed-wetting. [although that's definitely not something i'd worry about now, especially given that riley is only 4!] if you want, you can start limiting his liquid intake after dinner, make the ritual trip to the potty immediately before bedtime and see how that goes…then transition into the underwear and give it a whirl.
as always, ill end by saying discuss any concerns with your pediatrician. they know you and your children best.
My older daughter is almost 4 and still in pull-ups at night. She potty trained late (3.5) and had accidents almost every day for months. She’d get all absorbed in some game she was playing, not realize she wasn’t wearing diapers and… oops. What finally worked was not wearing anything at all from the waist down for a couple of days. She thought it was hilarious and it kept her aware of her body. We recently tried to get her to give up nighttime pull-ups – no liquids before bed, getting her up around 10 for a final pee, etc. What happened was that she still had to pee again around 3 or 4am, and it was such a production that she was then wide awake and couldn’t go back to sleep for hours. Or at all. So yeah, she’s back in pull-ups and I’m FINE with that.
My younger daughter, on the other hand, is not quite two and wakes up dry almost every morning. Go figure.
My 2 daughters (not biologically related) slept in panties all night by age 1.5. I did the 3-day training thing in the daytime, which trained their bladders to go longer and longer between pees (once the understood the mechanics, they would rather hold it a while than stop playing to pee every 10 minutes.) Since that worked pretty well, I ordered waterproof mattress covers and when they came, about 1-2 weeks after potty training, I put the girls to bed in the same undies (regular thin ones) that they wore all day. Told them to keep their undies dry. Somehow I knew the could sense the difference and do the right thing. They had a few accidents but were nearly 100% dry within 1-2 weeks. They were able to go about 10-12 hours without peeing. I did eliminate any drinking after dinner and make them pee just before bed as a precaution.
Shortly after age 2, they were able to take themselves to the toilet (if necessary) without waking anyone up at night. So I could relax about the liquids and making sure I got to them by x hour of every morning.
One of my daughters started coming to my room at ungodly hours when she was a little over two, just for company. I would always send her back to bed, but what stopped this behavior was: at bedtime, I told the girls “wake me up after the sun comes up” (with emphasis on “after”). That says they are very welcome provided they come at a civilized hour. It worked.
When you’re ready to go commando double sheet the bed: mattress pad, sheet, mattress pad, sheet. That way when you have to change wet sheets in the night (and you most likely will) you just pull off the top layer and voilà clean sheets. Also good for cribs and when kids are puking.
make him pee before bed and just kind of take your chances, no big deal if he has an accident. i bet he is completely ready!
My (then) 6 y/o didn’t become fully night-trained until we cut out the Goodnights. Not saying that will work for every kid, and his age was probably a factor too, but I think some kids, boys especially, become complacent. They have the pull-up on, why bother getting up? We had a few (expected) accidents right after he stopped using them, but it took less than a week for him to figure out that wet sheets are no fun, and he’s had a perfect record ever since.
With my older daughter, she was fully trained, day and night, at 2.5 and she never wore any nighttime diaper. And I didn’t even know how lucky I was!
Oh, the joys of the nighttime potty. My son is 7 and I always joke that there could be a mariachi band in his room and he wouldn’t wake up. Like someone else posted, we still pick him up and take him to the bathroom each night before we go to bed. He doesn’t wake up at all and pees like he’s been holding it for hours even though usually he’s only been asleep about an hour and a half.
I do think it’s hereditary. My moms tells a story about catching my brother about to pee in a drawer when he was little. I’m hopeful my son will have a dry bed on his own before he goes off to college.
I don’t have kids so this is seriously just assvice but I’d hazard a guess that if the pull up hasn’t had to do its job for a while he’s probably ready to segue from the Pull Up to the mattress protector.
My son was almost five.He never had a dry night with the pull-ups but one night he came stumbling out and used the bathroom on his own and went back to bed.That was the end of that. I truly think, in most cases, the brain is catching up with the body.I wouldn’t sweat it.These things tend to work themselves out.
So, I asked my pediatrician the same thing since my 5yo still leaks through his diaper – doubler and all. She said until he is 7 or 8, she isn’t so concerned. sometimes some kids don’t stay dry at night until 12. That seems like a long time to me, especially since he has been potty trained since he was 2 years old!
My 3 year old potty trained himself, day and night at the same time.
We’ll see what happens with #3 in a couple years.
All it took for my 4YO was him falling asleep with his big boy undies on, just purely by luck. He slept through the night that night accident free and we said good-bye to them the following night. He was probably about 3YO at the time.
If Riley is doing a-ok during the day in underwear, I bet he’d be fine through the night in underwear. Just make sure (as several of your other commenter’s have suggested) that you have a waterproof mattress pad on the bed. Just give it a whirl and see, you might be surprised!
My daughter wore the night time PullUps until she was almost 6. They were SOAKED every morning, and I finally learned (she admitted!!) that she was peeing in them on purpose, just cause she knew she could and it was “easier” than getting up and going to the bathroom. I stopped them cold turkey after she admitted that. And I felt like an idiot for thinking that she still “needed” pullups. She wet the bed almost every night for about a month, and then only every once in awhile. She is now 8 and hasn’t wet the bed in over a year. I also have a 2 year old boy, and when the time comes I will not rely on the pullups the same way I did with my daughter. We turned PullUps into a laziness issue, both her and I.
Not saying you should take them from Riley, not at all. Just saying that even if his PullUp is wet every morning, it may possibly not mean that he can’t stay dry at night. He may just be relying on the convenience.
It’s funny that what we used to call “wetting the bed” we now call “wearing a pull-up to bed”. I am so grateful to be raising kids during the Pull-up era!
My oldest two wore pull-ups (that were always wet in the morning) until one day right around her 5th birthday Kate was dry. And then she was dry 2 more nights in a row and wanted to wear underwear. She’s been out of pull-ups and dry ever since.
Her identical twin sister, however, STILL wears a pull-up (and soaks it) every night. She will be seven (7!! also: ???? how did that happen?) on Saturday, and is showing no signs of staying dry.
We’ve never made an issue of it at all, though David has asked her for permission to wake her before he goes to bed for a bathroom break. That doesn’t help though- she’s often already wet, and even if she’s not, she’s still wet again in the morning.
The only thing I worry about is her friends making her feel weird for it. So far, she’s just shrugged off the comments, but I hope she’s not internalizing them.
wow, you got really lucky there, but I’m sure it’s also a mixture of good parenting : – ) I can only hope my son will reach that point some day. Right now he’s insistent on sticking his every limb in my clothing while he sleeps – in bed with me – leaving my husband to sleep in the guest room.
I’ve heard scuttle about a hormone nasal spray available from the pediatrician that helps. I’d google it… But lazy prevails.
Dax wasn’t out of pullups until he was 3 and a half (right after his brother was done) when he decided “diapers are for babies”. I totally would have put a pullup on him if he was peeing in the night at all but he had been waking up dry for months.
That being said, my friend’s little girl is firmly in her fours and wears a pullup to bed every night. No biggie.
Now my boy is FIVE and he can’t dress himself to save his life. Seriously. And forget about tying a shoe. Ugh.
My little guy will be 7 on the 31st. He SOAKS a pull-up every.single.freaking.night. I hsve talked to the ped about it, but at this age, it’s still pretty normal. I was a bed-wetter about once every other month or two until I was 12 so it’s no suprise that he is also. Just dying for this everynight thing to be over.
We have one that is almost four and still wears the pull up at night (and then it is always wet in the morning). My other one just turned 5, and she started being fairly consistent around 4 1/2 about not going at night. We removed the pull up but then she suddenly started having accidents and I was tired of washing sheets almost daily so we regressed and used the pull ups again. Once she started being more consistent (a couple of months later), we tried again – only this time I didn’t let her drink too much of anything a couple of hours before bed, asked her to go before she went to bed, and then reminded her to get up and go in the middle of the night if she woke up and had to go (which I think may have been part of the problem in the first place because she is on a 3/4ish high bunkbed). It seemed to work like a charm and I can say that we’ve seen no accidents since then. Now, as for my other daughter that is almost four, I think it might take a different approach which I haven’t quite figured out yet…GOOD LUCK. It’s quite a great feeling saying goodbye to pullups for even just one child!
Crazy timing on this. I’m pretty sure Riley is the same age as my Sophia within a couple weeks or so (she was 4 as of Sept. 7). Anyway, we literally JUST decided it was high time we kicked the pull-up habit. I feel like that is just what it was becoming for us. A bad habit.
My daughter sleeps like a log. Really. A train could ride through her room and it would not wake her up. She was potty trained on time, but we just could not get the nighttime thing down. We tried at various intervals since she was 3, to no luck. We’d have a night here and there dry. But mostly it was stripping the bed down in the middle of the night or every morning with a wet little girl in it. So we would always go back to pull-ups. We tried the whole waking her up to go potty thing before we’d go to bed, but many times we’d either forget, or by the time we were going to bed and got her, she’d already be wet. Enter genius husband. He suggests no more pull ups and that we buy a cheapo alarm clock from Target for her room that we set early enough to catch her before wetville. Not that we can’t just use an iPhone alarm or something. But there’s something about an alarm going off loudly in her room to rouse her just a little from her deep sleep to get her eventually able to wake up on her own when her body is ready to go pee. And then we never forget because it’s set to the same time every night (We started around 10:15, but after about a week of that she was wet by the time we got there, so we’ve moved it up to around 9:30). It’s worked like a charm. We’ve only been at it for a couple weeks, but I haven’t had to buy a new pack of pull ups! Thank god! Good luck. I hope it works out for you guys. Because really, when you’re already spending your paycheck on diapers for the younger one (we are!), it sucks to have to throw in a pack of pull-ups for your already-potty-trained older child on top of it. I know this song and dance way too well.
We had one child who started being consistently dry at 4, so we did away with the Pull-Ups at that point. I now have a 7-year-old who cannot make it through the night without peeing. It’s only become an issue lately because of sleepovers and girls already being meanies.
Our solution has been to get her up around 11pm every night and take her one last time to the potty. We’re hoping her body might pick up the clues and start waking her up on her own. So far, no dice, but it’s not a big deal for us to take her since she goes right back to sleep, and she feels better not being in a Pull-Up.
All that to say, everyone is different, which of course you know. If he’s not waking up dry for you and you’ve tried to bring him to the bathroom before you guys go to bed, I wouldn’t sweat it. I wasn’t actually too worried about it either except that my daughter had started waking up dry more often than not, which is why I said it was becoming a bad habit for us. Because for us it was easier to just put a pull up on her than to remember to make sure to get her in the night to go to the bathroom. But my ped said some kids continue to have nighttime bed-wetting well into their 5 and 6 years.
Obviously, there are a zillion ways to go at this, so you have to decide what you want and what you think would work for Riley. In our situation, the 4 year old was 100% accident free during the day (and pretty much was that way from day one). His nights took awhile; there was a lot of laundry in there because we didn’t do the pull-ups. But that was helpful, because we learned what time of the night (actually, morning) he wet the bed (i.e., had to pee). We woke up the little guy to pee around 10:30-11:00 at night for the last time. Then, he would wet around 6:00 in the morning. So, for awhile, we woke him up at 5:00 am to go to the bathroom. He got up, peed, went back to bed, and slept for a solid 1.5-2 hours after that (sometimes longer!). We then stretched it out from 5 am. Essentially, we helped him train his bladder. And, it worked! Every now and then, he has an accident…but it’s a rarity now. It definitely took a lot of time and effort (and laundry!), but it was well worth it. He’s still so happy when he sleeps late and gets up by himself to pee in the morning. And, most importantly, he is a well-rested (and, thus, happy!) boy. Good luck!
By Kindergarten Nick as out of pullups. When he learned his other classmates didn’t wear them he wanted no part of that.
We’d cut off liquids after he ate dinner. He’d pee before he went to bed and then he was fine.
Boys take longer I think.
I know the feeling of those early morning squirms oh so well – both of mine love to snuggle in, but no sleep can be had with such a fidgety child in the bed, so they get send back to their own room!
For both of my girls I took them out of night nappies a few weeks after their initial potty training. I never used pull ups either – for day or night time.
For a few weeks I would also take them for a night wee just before I went to bed, but that quickly became unecessary.
Both girls have a beaker of water by the bed, and my eldest can often drink it all in the night, but has never wet the bed. My youngest has wet the bed all of 3 times in her life, so when things like that happened I would restrict the water in the evening before bed.
I know that friends with boys had a lot more trouble than I did with my girls, I thank my lucky stars that I had it fairly easy – it really is down to the individual child.
My youngest will be 5 at the end of Feb. He stopped the pull up thing about 2 months ago. We still have “accidents” but I can see his body is starting to get it.
If he can keep the pull-up dry, then he’s ready for underwear at night. My son potty trained this summer at just under 3, and we ditched the night time pull-ups a couple months later. He has the occasional accident, but that’s what waterproof mattress pads are for :-).
If it stresses him out, don’t worry about it. But you can ask him, he may be ready to go without the pull-up.
My husband really wanted Leila out of a night time pull up around 3 (I couldn’t care less, and since I was the one washing the wet sheets every night, I said no). But then more and more often they were dry, so then we let her go without them (she didn’t want to wear them), but if she peed the bed, she had to wear them again until she had another dry night, etc. We also take her to pee at 10 every night. Sometimes she’ll wake up on her own around 4 or 5 and pee, but often she makes it til 6.
My daughter (who is now 6) didn’t stop using her pullups at night until about 6 months ago. And she was fully potty trained right at 3.
My son, who is 5, still uses them at night. And he’s been potty trained for well over a year and a half. We’ve tried to get through the night, but the morning I woke up to a pee design on the wall from where it had somehow leapt four feet from the bed as he dreamt was the morning I decided that until he went through the night for a week without wetting, he’d be hanging in his pullups.
It’s a brain/body thing…some kids just aren’t ready until later on.
My Twin sisters were between 5 and 6 before they were finished with pull-ups. I wouldn’t worry at all at 4.
My son potty-trained around 2 1/2, and lost the pull-ups just about a month after that. We had, maybe 2 nights with accidents, but it was those accidents that made him realize he needed to get his ass OUT of bed to pee. After that, we had a few nights of getting up to assist him (we live in a TINY house, and the bathroom is only 3 feet from everyone’s rooms). After that, we was on his own.
I wear pullups at night and I’m around, oh, say 49 and alot.
Oh, wait, I guess I should say I’m BACK in pullups. Guess I’m no help. I’ll be here when you ask at what age he’ll need to go back into pull ups. 50, the age is 50!
LOL.
my daughter was okay without the nighttime pull up around 4 but the pediatrician has told me that some kids are late in their fifth year before they can go all night without an accident.
I didn’t read all of the responses, since once I got to g~’s I knew I’d just be echoing what she said. My daughter, who turned 2 is December, now sleeps in her big girl panties and has for the past couple weeks. Once she was dry for a week in her pull-up, we took the plunge! We also do the mattress pad under her sheets, limit fluids before bedtime, and make sure to go potty as part of her nighttime routine. So far, we’ve only had 2 accidents – and both this week because she is sick so we haven’t done so well on the limiting fluids at night since we feel her health is more important than us having to wash her bedsheet. Luckily though, they’ve both happened around the time she would get up anyway so no pain-in-the-arse middle of the night changes, thankfully!
Long story short, if he’s dry in his pull-up when he wakes up, I’d say he’s ready – but really only if you are! ;) Good luck!!
My daughter is 4 and also wears pull-ups to bed. Right after she turned 4 in October I tried to transition her to big girl pants at night and I was up at least once a night changing sheets. I tried doing the usual — limiting drinks at least an hour before bed, going potty before bed, etc. After three weeks, I gave in. We’re back in the pull-ups. She has definitely expressed interest in going back to the big girl pants, but I’ve told her until she is dry three nights in a row — it’s pull-ups for her! She’s okay with it and I’m okay with it. I like my sleep and I figure she’ll do it when she is ready, ya know?
My daughter stopped wearing pullups at night right after she turned three (she’s two months younger than Riley) and I could probably count on two hands how many accidents she’s had (and some of those were very minor–just getting on her pj’s). Sometimes, yes, I’d have to help her in the middle of the night, but that doesn’t really even happen anymore, she takes care of it herself. So, in my opinion, a four year old should have no problem going w/out a pullup (though, you still might have the occasional accident), especially if he isn’t really using it overnight (is he?).
Gah, I don’t know how we will get out of pull ups and diapers with ours when the time comes. Having a cup of water handy is what got him to sleep through the night in the first place.
I’ve heard that first kids can take longer, and that boys take longer too. All the advice I’ve read here sounds good, though! Good luck!
Our son is 5 and still wears a pull up to bed at night. I think partially it is a comfort thing for him at this point, but he does have nights where he soaks right through the pull up. We have talked to his doctor about it and she said to wait until he is 6 to be really concerned. She said somethings their bodies are just not mature enough until about 6. Hope that helps!
Interesting question because I always thought potty trained was potty trained. Except for the occasional kid who has bed wetting issue, that is.
Yeah, we kept my youngest in pull-ups at night longer than she probably needed to be but she’s got a funky sized bed (thanks, IKEA) and I couldn’t find a plastic mattress cover to fit it. By the time she was four, though, I found a pad and decided just to let her go without. It had been a lazy crutch for both of us, I think. But, lo and behold! We had maybe on one or two incidences of nighttime peeing. She’s been high and dry ever since. I just had to take the plunge and trust her. And myself.
My now 5 year old (girl) completely trained herself just prior to her 4th birthday. By trained herself I mean she just stopped wetting in the pull-ups and would wake up in the night to go pee.
Now my now 9 year old (girl) was a completely different story. She JUST got out of pull-ups last month. We went to the Dr. a few times at different ages and he talked to her about her options. I never made it a big deal and he didn’t either. She tried a couple of medications that he suggested, her choice with our help with the decision of course. So just before her 9th birthday she brought up the subject again so I started researching options and ended up ordering an alarm that clips onto their underwear and has a cord to the alarm that you can get with sound, vibration or both. She wore a pair of undies with it clipped on and a pull-up over it for about 2 weeks. Then felt confident enough to no wear the pull-up over for another 2 weeks. And now she is done and not wearing the alarm anymore. She’s had 1 accident in the 1.5 months since then and she is over the moon with excitement. She just needed that extra kick so her body new when it was to wake up, and it worked. I really don’t think it would have worked any earlier because she was soaking every single night up to a few months before we started this process and then she would have about 1 dry night a week.
Very long comment…sorry.
My daughter is about to turn 4 this weekend but she gave up the night time pull-up maybe 6 months ago? Maybe a little less: it was possibly the end of last summer. Mind you, this kid toilet trained herself for solids at 20 months and then took what seemed like forever to reliably pee in the potty.
Oh and by the way, lest you get too jealous, our son is verging on 20 months and there is no way I can imagine him asking for a potty. For one thing, he doesn’t even say potty, whereas his sister was using sentences by now.
I have been wondering this too. I thought my 4 year old daughter would never stop wetting at night, but we seem to have been having some success recently. However, it does depend on the child, I know some friends with heavy sleepers who wore pull-ups until much later, like age 6 or 7. My theory is, don’t make a big deal about it. Our recent success has nothing to do with anything we did, it just happened.
I’ve read that nighttime training requires the brain to produce a certain chemical, which is a different matter than daytime training (more of a conscious decision) and can take different times for different kids. That said, I don’t see a lot of kids in other countries wearing pullups (or using diapers) to the ages that people do in the U.S. There is a huge incentive for the industry to encourage people to use these products for much longer than necessary. It’s also much easier for kids to pee when it is conveniently wicked away. Perhaps it might be worth not using Pull-ups for a while and relying on a mattress cover to see whether the discomfort of wetting the bed causes him to wake up. Or perhaps his brain just needs some more time to produce the chemical. Good luck!
Our daughter potty trained pretty late, for a girl, anyways- she was three years and four months old. BUT. As soon as she was potty trained, she was also night trained, so that was awesome. Even before she was potty trained she was waking up dry more often than not, and we’d rush her to the potty to, uh, break the seal, so to speak. Often that would be her only potty success of the day! But it made the process of potty training feel much more complete because once she was done with diapers, she was totally DONE. In the year she’s been trained she’s only wet the bed twice, I believe- and both times because we forgot to take her to the bathroom before bed.
I think that’s pretty rare, though, honestly. I remember my little sister wetting the bed occasionally until she was about nine.
This is our ongoing dilemma. I am so reassured to read that others face this and sometimes it takes a lot longer for some kids. My almost 5 year old son has woken up dry maybe 3 times in his whole life. He was soaking through pullups every night and starting to have rash/itching/skin problems (and had been fully trained during the day for a year) when we decided to take the pull-ups away and wake him to go to the potty. Unfortunately, he is such a heavy, heavy sleeper with such a tiny bladder that in spite of limiting liquids, we need to wake him 3 x per night in order for him to stay dry (and frankly, we barely even wake him – he just sleep walks to the potty that is how heavy he sleeps). We wake him at 11 pm (when we go to bed) and 2 am and 5 am and even now (after almost a full year of doing this) he STILL wets the bed sometimes (often).
But since we got rid of the pull-ups, he refuses to wear them. He has a baby brother and they feel like diapers and he won’t wear them. We recently decided that we need our sleep and can he please try to wear these special overnites? BUT no, they are just like diapers and he won’t have any part of it. He would rather wet the bed a couple of times a week than wear a diaper! I SO wish we had just kept him in the darn pull-ups (with maybe one wake-up so he didn’t soak through). So I say, just play it by ear – when he starts waking up dry and waking at night when he needs to go, then it is time to take them away. Until then, just keep them on (and our pediatrician agrees with this approach and said her own child was in pull-ups until almost 6 years old).
Ok, so you have probably heard this but we did our older son between the ages of 4-5. We limited the water/juice/milk intake before bed and we also have plastic cover on the mattress. We have him go before bed. And then while training him, one of us would get him up and take him to the potty when we were heading to bed – usually around 11ish. This was just to get him used to getting up and going to the bathroom. We did this for about a week to a week and a half and then stopped and just reminded him – if you have to go be sure to get up. Left a night light on in the bathroom so it’s not completely dark. And the first week, there were some accidents. We did not make a big deal, just reminded him that he needs to get up to go and then after that all was good. Keys that we found to making it work:
1) limit intake of beverage about 1 hour before bedtime
2) do not chat, turn on lights when getting him up to go (before you head to bed) (the key is not to get him used to you helping him, just get him used to getting up to go)
and 3) not over-react with any accidents.
Good luck. I am sure you will be great!
My son was 2 when he stopped having accidents at night. He wasn’t potty trained until he was three, but at 2 we had dry diapers in the morning. So I think as long as he is dry in the morning you are safe. Good luck!!
@Deb, my son is also a heavy sleeper. After we had baby #2 he regressed and started wetting the bed (after getting up and going and keeping the bed dry for over 6 months). My mom gave us an alarm to try. It worked great. You pin the alarm to the shirt and the outside of their underwear – and one tiny drop – the alarm sounds – bing bing bing – and wakes the kid up to go to the potty. We did this for about 10 days and now he’s back on track. This helped us out – I thought you might like to hear about it. It saved many sheet washings.
Our daughter was potty-trained at 2 1/2 and stopped wearing pull-ups just a couple months after that. She wakes up and uses the bathroom if she needs to pee at night. Which, if it’s in the middle of night, means she wants me going with her.
My oldest sonjust turned 6 and he can soak through 2 nighttime pullups and onto his sheets even if we get him up to pee before we go to bed. We recently put him on desmopressin at bedtime, which is supposed to work to keep him totally dry, but while it helps slightly he still has a full pull-up in the morning AND we’re paying $80/month for medication. Super awesome! My 4 year old and 2 year old started staying dry at night as soon they were daytime potty trained, though.
Oh, and sorry to post again, but it doesn’t matter whether we restrict liquids before bed or not. He’s also a heavy sleeper and will sleep right through the night in a completely soaked bed if we forget the pullup.
My son was potty training just as he turned 3. For the first month or so he wore a diaper to bed, but I found he was waking up to tell me he had to go so we ended up ditching the diaper just after he turned 3. There has been the rare accident… once or twice when I’ve forgotten to put him on the potty right before bedtime or if he’s sick and sleeps through etc, but more or less he’s been good. We do have a plastic padded sheet under just in case and I make sure to put him on the potty right before bedtime and try not to let him drink more than half a glass of water at bedtime (he’s totally a “give me a drink!” kinda kid as soon as he’s in bed!) He’s a few months over 3 now and I’m surprised how easily it came (given that nothing else has been easy with him lol). I think it may also help that he’s a super light sleeper? Oh and some nights if I think he’s had too much to drink in the evening I will put him on the potty when we come to bed later at night just to be sure :)
Mary: night-time pull-up free from the word “potty-trained” at two and a half.
Keith: night-time pull-up free within about six months? He was probably about three and a half.
Izzy: It took over a year and a half for her to stay dry through the night. She was four.
They’ll do it when they do it. *sigh*
My kid started sleeping without any kind of diaper at age 4, and never had an accident (though he continued to have them during the day occasionally – go figure). My nephew, however, wore pull-ups at night until he was 8.
I think how the child feels about wearing a pullup is important – is he embarrassed by it, made more secure by it, apathetic about it? You might suggest trying a night or two without it and see what he thinks and how he does. Plastic mattress covers are great for that in-between stage (I think the one on my now-seven-year-old’s bed is still lurking under the mattress pad – oops).
10 years old. So…yeah.
My daughter was daytime potty trained at around 3, even for naps, but I didn’t know how to even start doing nighttime training. The summer when she was 3 1/2, I spent a few weeks at my parents’ house and for some reason that I can’t remember now, I had Ella sleeping with me. It suddenly dawned on me that this would be an excellent time to try getting rid of the nighttime diaper, since she could wake me up immediately if she needed to use the potty. After a week, I realized that she didn’t need to get up in the night, we just had to get her straight to the toilet when she woke up in the morning. We have never had an accident since then.
On the otherhand, my sister’s two boys are still wearing pull-ups at 6 and 9, although the older one has just started being able to get through the night dry. She talked to tons of people about this (she is studying early childhood development) and everyone told her to not worry til they were 10 (!) as there is a development stage that takes boys longer to reach.
My Riley (girl) potty trained during the day at around two and a half. She’s been without pullups at night since about three months after that. Girls are earlier, I hear. Yes, we still get wet beds every once in a while. For a time, it was one or two nights a week, and over the last nine months, it’s decreased to once a month or so. If I KNOW she’s had a lot of liquids right before bed I usually check in with her before I go to bed myself. She’ll at least nod yes or no if she has to pee and I carry her into the bathroom if it’s a yes!
we gave our guy the option of pull-up or underwear (around 3 1/2, when he was fine during the daytime). He’s been great. He gets up to pee at night. Sometimes three times. And its heart breaking to see him bleary and stumbling and trying to aim. We’ve had one or two close calls (wet underwear, damp bed spot). But it all part of the learning curve. Just sucks to have sleep interupted. But that’s parenthood- right? My advice: ask him. He knows.
It really depends on the kid. I have 4-year-old twin girls, and one needs a pull-up every night. The other one has slept in underwear for months, with only one accident I can remember. The one in pull-ups just has a smaller bladder than the other one does, and until her bladder grows some more, we’ll keep her in the pull-ups at night (actually the Good Nites brand – she’s too big for toddler-size pull-ups).
My son was done wearing the pull up at night a few months before turning 3 (he was completely daytime trained by 2 1/2) what i did was put the pull up over his underwear so he still got the uncomfortable sensation of being wet, but we didnt have a huge mess in the middle of the night to deal with (and we also have waterproof mattress pads on the kids beds)….. I know it can be tougher on boys they say, so its sort of whatever works for you—in my opinion….. but if you think it might just be a habit, ie he knows the pull up is there so why get up, you might try the over the top of underwear thing. As an added bonus, I would reuse the dry ones (since they were over his undies) and I actually never went through a whole package of them!
You guys are AWESOME! So many good ideas in here, and lots of reassurance that not every kid crosses this milestone at the same age. (Which, duh, right? But sometimes it helps to HEAR that.)
My son was 3.5 and he had gone a while being dry every night. SO i told him it was up to him to decide when he would wear underwear to bed. I kinda wanted it to be a very conscious decision for him(as much as it can be for a 3 year old) and one day he said he was done with them and i told him that meant he had to make sure he didnt “go” at night. And he never has. Everyone told me the “they’ll do it when their ready” and i thought it was B.S. but lo and behold….its apparently true.
I am very lucky and have had a fully trained boy since 27 months. Day and night. I never used pull ups at ALL and never had a nightime dryness issue at all.
Knock on wood right!?!
Night wetting generally runs in families, especially with boys, so ask your husband if he was a bedwetter. My oldest son was still wetting when he was 8 or 9, I think. His oldest son is 10 and still wetting through pull-ups nightly. My kidlet, his other son, is still wet a little over half the time in a pull-up at age 7, and part of his night wetting is emotional. He is more likely to be dry if he didn’t have milk at school that day, but no guarantees. NO MILK, juice, soda, or other bladder irritants in the evening will help. Goodnites actually has a very helpful website (and coupons) you can consult.
My husband has a teeny weeny bladder. He cannot get through a movie without a pee break (even if he doesn’t have a soda in the theater). Our oldest now 8, grew out of the nighttime pullup last summer at 7 and a half. She had a wet bed last week but it’s rare. Hurray for waterproof mattress pads.
Our youngest is 5 and we just tried to go without the pullups. It works fine as long as I am willing to get up twice a night and take her unconscious body to the toilet to pee. I’m giving up on that for now. Time will take care of it.
My oldest boy still has the odd issue with nighttime wetting so he wears them on sleepovers, but my 5 year old hasn’t needed anything since he was 3.
My dear, I wouldn’t even waste the time thinking about it.
My son, who is a heavy sleeper, had no issues with sleeping through the night and staying dry – he’s 5 now, but we cut him off of pullups around 3.5. My daughter, who I would have expected to be faster with staying dry through the night, was extremely resistant to sleeping without a diaper – we started weaning her off the diaper around 3 years old (she is almost 4 now). She threw the biggest fit when we told her she had to go without a diaper. I think she was relying on it, but didnt need it. She woke up with a wet diaper every night, but had no problem staying dry during the day. Finally we cut her off and she had a few misshaps, but after a week or so, she started staying dry through the night and only very occasionally wakes up wet. For us it was cutting her off and staying the course, because we knew she could do it and was just resisting the change (this is a recurrent theme with her!) Good luck!
i’m not sure if it’s a girl/boy diffrence thing, or a STUBBORN thing, but our daughter didn’t wear them for more than 2 weeks. We tried potty trinaing (2months before her 3rd b-day) with them, but it was like she KNEW it was “ok” to go in those, so she put no effort in to ever TRYING to hold it. when we took away pull-ups, everything seemed to click for her. for a week I kept her in them at night, but she complained that she was “a big girl all day, so she was ready to be a big girl at night”. i felt showing her I trusted her would be a good way to improve her confidence w/ the training. She had maybe 3 or 4 accidents the first two weeks, but potty training in gernal was still new to her, and she was that weird kid who didn’t get herself out of her own big-girl bed – always waited on us. But (OMG I am SOOO gonna regret this, I’m SURE) we’ve been accident free for about 5 months now. (she’s almost 3.5)
My assvice would be to try it on a weekend (that way if there is an accident, it’s not messing up a morning routine) but definitely invest in some rubber sheets first.
Not a parent, but work with a lot of kids, LOL. Isn’t it supposed to be, once you’ve noticed they’re consistently dry in the morning anyway then you try just underwear? :-)
Our son is now 3.5. He was pretty much fully potty trained at 2.75, and at just over 3 we noticed he consistently woke up with a dry pull-up. I started to think maybe I was wasting my money on those damn things, so we just decided to throw caution to the wind and send him to bed with underwear. He’s never had an accident. So, i’d say consistently dry in the a.m. and you’re good to go.
My kid was NEVER dry in the morning but he wanted out of the nighttime pull up at 3.5/4 so we let him try it. He wet the bed a few times but mostly was fine. He still wets the bed occasionally–a few times a year (he’s almost 7) but that’s it. Give it a try–if you are having to change sheets every night maybe it’s too soon. I would expect once a week for a few weeks and then you’re done.
Thank you for posting this so I can read the comments and feel ok about having a 6 yr old son who has a wet pull up EVERY morning. He sleeps like a log and I fear will be in a pull up for some time. It is pretty far down on my list of things I give a crap about but glad to hear some other kids aren’t dry all night at that age too.
my son has been completly potty trained during the day since he was two. But at night was a different story. He stopped wearing pull ups at night about three weeks ago right when he turned 5. I was with you I just didnt care. ONe pull up a day I can handle that.
We were encouraged to NEVER put a pull up on a child once you have started potty training.
My son pooped in the potty consistently at 2.5 and by three had figured out the peeing thing. We never used pull ups at night, we just covered the mattress with a plastic sheet. We had the occasional nighttime pee accident once a month or so for the next couple of months. Honestly I think not using a pull up and letting him get wet is what finished training him. FYI, this is coming from some one who wet the bed till she was 7 before pull ups ever existed…sooo…ya…
My theory is that night time and day time potty training are two COMPLETELY different things. Alex stopped peeing at night when he was just barely 2 years old, yet he was over three before he was day time trained. There was also no “training” I did to have him stop peeing at night, he just did. The only time we have night time accidents is if he doesn’t remember to go pee before bed.
Now, he was NEVER a big night time wetter even as a baby. My 19 month old however, SOAKS his diaper EVERY NIGHT. So I expect night training him will take much, MUCH longer.
My oldest was about 4.5 when we ditched the nighttime pullups. It was getting to the point where they were dry 9 times out of 10, but he refused to let us “re-use” the dry ones..so it was such a waste of money. I started by limiting his drinking close to bedtime, then I started with a sticker chart, for every morning he was dry he got a sticker, and then when he got 5 or whatever, he got a small prize (even just a piece of candy) I don’t think they can really control it though. I also reminded him that he can get out of bed during the night and go pee if he has to. It will come in due time!
My little dude is about the same age as Riley and we were in the exact same situation until a couple of months ago (perfectly trained during the day but pullups at night). We started waking him up to pee right before we went to bed at night and he has been dry through the nice ever since!
We kept Nathan in a pull up until he was consistently keeping it dry all night long (I was not about to have someone waking me up in the middle of the night with a wet bed or needing to go potty for the sake of a $0.50 pull-up.) We make him go before he goes to bed at 7:30 and he has no problem staying dry until he wakes up in the morning. We weaned ourselves off the pull-up when he was about 3 1/2. I think the bottom line is if he’s dry all night you can make the switch. If not, no big deal- it sure beats changing sheets at 2am.
My daughter will be 4 in March and has been potty trained for over a year. She still sleeps in a Pull-Up at night and 75% of the time, it’s wet when she wakes up. In my opinion, both of our sleep is worth more than the cost of a Pull-Up so we’ll continue on this way until she is ready to be night trained. I suppose I could wake her in the middle of the night to help her stay dry all night, but that just seems like an INSANE thing to do. I mean, I get thoroughly pissed off when someone wakes me up so I’m certainly not going to do it to my child.
they will do it when they are ready. You can ask him if he wants to sleep without the pull-up and get up to pee by himself, and work toward that goal.
Four is pretty young i think, my grown up 7-yo wakes up by himself but he misses once every few weeks.
My daughter just turned 4 this week and we told her now that she was a ‘big girl’ she had to sleep with panties at night. She was excited and has done great. This was after about 3 months of no pee in the pullups at night though. I talked to our pediatrician at her 3 y.o. check up about this and she said “Eh, anywhere between 3 and 8″ so apparently there is a fairly wide spectrum there.
When my daughter was potty trained and doing great in the day and the pull ups were mostly dry every morning, we invested in an incontinence pad (like they use in nursing homes) and put it under the bed sheet. they are pretty big and covered a good portion of the bed and we didn’t have any problems. any medical supply store or maybe a pharmacy will carry them. Good luck! We also kept one folded up in her car seat for a while since it would be easier to wash that then the entire car seat pad.
S started sleeping through the night with no pull up about five months ago. He’s had a handful of accidents but it hasn’t been too crazy. We’re REALLY REALLY careful about not giving him a shitload to drink after 6 pm though. I think that helps a lot. And he doesn’t seem dehydrated or anything.
What I’ve noticed is that it definitely contributes to him waking up at the flaming ass crack of dawn to pee. But sometimes he’ll actually go back to bed. He’s allowed out of his room on his own but he hasn’t gotten up to pee in the middle of the night yet.
I tried the no pullup thing after noticing that every other day or so he’d wake up dry. Then I went a week with the careful evening liquids regiment and noticed fewer overnight wetting. Then we explained what the deal was and how he should probably try not to let ‘er rip and night and he rolled with it.
I think overall we got lucky. And FYI every single time my mom puts him to bed he wets the bed that night. I think she gives him Big Gulps.
Also I’ve heard that picking up a couple of cloth training pants type overnight things can offset the cost of those effing pull ups. We were going to try that but then S figured it out on his own. I cloth diaper the little guy but the thought of an older kid in cloth kind of freaked me out. But apparently the whole wetting sensation helps them figure things out and the whole training pants issue helps you not have to change the sheets every day.
Getting fitted for a bra the other day at Nordstrom, I had occasion to use the phrase, “penis-wilting contraption” to describe the 34D triple-hooked Wacoal monstrosity they sold me. The salesperson laughed.
Two boys, 5 and 7 1/2….still using the GoodNights :( Just when I think we can chuck them we have a bout of accidents even through the goodnights! I’ve talked to their pediatrician and he confirmed that the older may be at it for awhile yet. He has a small bladder and sleeps like the dead. I did find a potty alarm that I am thinking about getting to see if we can get past it. I feel bad for him because it makes him self conscious when he has sleepovers.
My son who is the same age as Riley, older just by a few days, would probably still be wearing a pull up to bed if it wasn’t for my MIL that was making me feel like the worst mother in the world with the “I can’t believe you’re still putting him in those.” statements.
He does do great staying dry all night and the other night he did get up once and went to the bathroom and then went right back to bed, like some kind of big kid. Blew my mind!
Good luck!
My daughter just turned 4(late Dec). We JUST stopped using nightime pull-up about 3 days ago!
We started talking to he about it a few months ago, as she approached her 4th birthday, explaining the concept of getting up to go pee in the night and seeing if she could have dry diaper in the morning. We also started offering a small reward if she was dry in the morning (the girl responds to the thought of chocolate, just like her mom). Soon after we started talking about it and offering a reward, she started having a dry diaper in the morning. We finished a pack of pull-ups a few days ago, she’s been dry in the mornings for a while, so just decided NO MORE DIAPERS! (collective family chant).
So far so good. But it’s only been three days. One night soon, I fully expect to get a shriek and find my sobbing child soaked in urine. We’ll see. Bound to happen at some point.
Good luck!
Um, I have too many kids to remember. My almost 3 year old is sleeping with a safety net and waking up dry most nights of the week. WILL NOT STOP PULL-UPS THO. HATE DOING SHEETS IN MIDDLE OF NIGHT.
My youngest will be 3 in March and he potty trained right before Christmas. I kept him in nighttime diapers for a couple of weeks until he flat out REFUSED with a capitol R! to wear them any longer. He has been dry every night since and I am completely and utterly astounded because the boy seriously pees a gallon in the morning when he wakes up. Now, if he would just start wiping his own butt and pulling up his pants we’d be golden!
Me again. I forgot to ask if Riley could come over to my house and show my 5 yr old how it’s done. I have to pry my son out of bed with a spatula and then when it’s time to get dressed his arms mysteriously break or something and he’s suddenly incapable of dressing himself. He’s very close to arriving at school in his PJ’s.
We went for that three-day potty training gig when he was 3, which was cold turkey on all safety nets, so never did the night-time pull up. He never once wet the bed but I’ll also add that he’s perfectly capable of peeing only twice a day, must have a bladder the size of a small house. This probably wasn’t useful advice, but am a big fan of just doing it and seeing how they do. Is the pull up ever wet in the morning? How often? If it’s only once in a while, I’d sit him down and explain that when he needs to pee, he’s required to get up, no wetting the bed please. I bet he’ll never pee at night again. I mean, in his bed.
Firstborn, son = Pullups till AGE 9!poor guy
2nd born, daughter = at age ONE, could go all night!woohoo
3rd child, daughter = age 3 & STILL loves her a Pullup at nite lol
The baby is 7 months & I’m just concentrating on getting her to SLEEP all nite lol
We have never bought a Pull Up before. When each of our 3 boys showed all signs of being ready (around age 2.8) we committed to a weekend of staying home. We have a ton of new underwear and did lots of laundry. Made his bed up with a shower curtain on top of sheets and then another set of sheets on top, so if there is an accident in middle of night, it is easy to strip the bed and everyone get to sleep again. IMO kids have to know what it feels like to wet the bed and something in their brain at night shuts down the peeing as a result. I think it is key to be in “big boy bed” before this starts. It takes one weekend and it is done. P.S. also have worked outside the home always.
P.S. I think my Hubs may have told the boys we are out of diapers.
Well after skimming the comments it really looks like you don’t also need my two cents, but I saved this post in my reader because my five year old daughter still soaks her pull-up nightly.
She’s been day-trained for nearly three years but nowhere near ready to go w/out at night. And forget waking her to pee – I would rather wake a bear from hibernation. She’s horrible to wake, which probably has a lot to do w/ the still soaked pull-up.
Our ped. says no big deal and I choose to believe her. Glad to know there are others out there because once in a while I start to feel paranoid about it!
P.S. For what it’s worth, we tried just letting her feel what it’s like to wet the bed at night. I washed the sheets every damn day for two weeks and decided that approach wasn’t working for us…
I have the same question/problem. We use 2 pullups a day, one at night and one at nap. I am too lazy to change the sheets daily so we haven’t done anything yet. But I guess we are going to have to give it a try soon….
I should add my daughter is 4 and also refuses to pee at school. WTH is that about?
The day he came home and said “I don’t want to wear pull-ups anymore” was the end of pull-ups, day or night. We had 1 accident. He was approximately 3 1/2? We do keep a plastic mattress pad on his bed and enforce the “pee before bed” routine but even with a sippy of water with him in bed (which I think is more of a comfort thing more than anything since it’s almost always still full first thing in the morning), only the 1 time of having to change sheets in the middle of the night.
Now you watch…tomorrow he’ll be soaked.
Wow, I am late to the party. But I just wanted to say that my son just turned 6 (SIX!!) and is still in a pull-up at night. He has been completely potty trained since he was 2, mind you, but the whole night thing…nope. He is a really sound sleeper, and just doesn’t wake up. We tried for a whole month last year, to just let him sleep and wet and hopefully wake up. No go, and I washed pissy sheets and clothes to the point that the smell of piss was so far up my nose that it was all I could smell. SO we will try again sometime, though the dr assures us it is completely normal.
Hi Linda!
I have a 6 1/2 year old son and we still use the night time pullups. He is such a hard sleeper (as I’ve heard many boys are) he really doesn’t have that alarm that goes off when he needs to go. If we eat late, that means he’s had a drink late and that would induce the night time wetting. I make sure he goes before he goes to bed, but sometimes that doesn’t matter. He just wets anyway. I have seen an improvement over the course of the last year, but he is nowhere even close to being without them. We don’t make a big deal about it… never have. I suspect we’ll be needing them for at least another year. We’ll see. Good luck with yours!!!
My dd was 12 before she was regularly dry at night. And even now 6 years later has very occasional accidents. Thank God for protective underwear her ’safety net’ even now!