(WYTV) – As a parent, you rejoice when you no longer have to buy diapers! Then a few accidents start to happen.
Maybe it’s been years, and all of a sudden, a few bed-wetting accidents occur. I chatted
with Dr. John Cox, a Canfield Pediatrician, and he says it’s not all that uncommon.
“Day time dryness and night time dryness are different ballgames. If I have a seven or eight year old and they’re still wetting the bed, I don’t get too concerned about that thing,” said Dr. Cox.
And a big reason for this is constipation.
“Yeah, and that is more common then parents want to realize. They think when a kid goes daily, they’re not. But it’s really what comes out that’s constipation, Not days in between. Your sigmoid colon is right behind your bladder, so it will press, and when those kids are tired and their relaxed, it presses On their bladder and that’s when those kids have accidents,” said Dr. Cox.
You don’t want to punish the child. And don’t punish yourself by buying special products.
“Trying to cut off water, trying to wake them up, those bed alarms, to be honest with you, very infrequently do those things work,” said Dr. Cox.
So an eight, nine or 10 year-old boy or girl having an occasional accident is not uncommon. It could be brought about by puberty, and it could also be hereditary.
“Because if there’s a family history of that, sometimes it’s a neurologic switch, and the dad says yeah, I was 11 when it stopped for me. Well the kid might go until 11. And it will just stop. A switch will go off and it’ll be done,” said Dr. Cox.
It’s very rarely a bladder issue.
“I mean, that’s like 2% of the time. So if we’ve gone through every other modality and we can’t figure out why, then sometimes urology will get involved. And it’s a neurologic issue or a bladder issue of some sort,” said Dr. Cox.
