Causes of overage and adult bedwetting

[rubbersheetmike]

I often wonder about this because I grew up in a chaotic environment in a big family with an alcoholic mother. There are theories about emotional stress leading to overage and adult bedwetting but there's also fairly strong evidence that it's often an inherited condition. Or maybe both combine to make it more severe? I know there's an inherited aspect in my family that seems to affect mainly males. But during puberty and beyond I developed an attachment to it and to my rubber sheet, which became like a security blanket that i didn't want to give up. I wonder what the experiences of others on here is, especially where they believe emotional stress led to bedwetting.

[Little Sherri]

It's an interesting question - two questions, really, because of the inheritability aspect, and the stress aspect. 

As to heritability, I can comment first hand on that. I don't know of anyone in my ancestry who was an accomplished and inveterate bedwetter, like I was as a kid, but people tended not to talk about those things as much back then. However, of my two kids, one, my eldest, never had any issues with bedwetting, and was dry through the night by the time she was 3. My youngest, though, followed the same path I did - she was in pull-ups every night until she was around 12, and we still have a box of them in the linen closet for "just in case" wearing at sleepovers and hotels. Similarly, I have a buddy who was a pro-level bedwetter as a kid; he never wore diapers, but he had the rubber sheets and did a lot of laundry. He has two boys, 10 and 13, and the 13-year-old just got out of pull-ups full-time (at night), and the younger boy still wears them. 

In my own personal example, the stress equation seems to be almost inverted. I never really didn't wet the bed as a kid - I literally never got out of diapers at night. So, when my younger brother was born, for example, it might have caused some stress in the family, but, I had been wetting overnight before that, and I wet overnight after that, so, I don't think there's a cause-and-effect relationship there. As an aside, he never wet the bed. He occasionally pooped his pants until a bit late, developmentally speaking - I think it stopped when he was 4 - but he was dry overnight, and whereas my parents would diaper me for bedwetting, they would not diaper him during the day - they used to make him wash out his underpants in a sink, if he crapped his pants. I think they saw my issue as involuntary, and his issue as being one of laziness or inattention. 

My early childhood was somewhat idyllic - we were okay economically, and my parents didn't fight or drink much. I was somewhat stressed about wearing diapers to bed, in so far as I was terrified of anyone finding out, but, I don't think wearing diapers caused me to need to wear diapers, if you know what I mean. That was the effect, not the cause. Later in my childhood, things took a dark turn, when my dad died, and then my mom started dating, and eventually married, a mercurial alcoholic. At the point where he started more or less living with us, the stress level in the house went through the roof for my brother, my sister, and I, but, that's right around when I stopped wetting the bed. I still very much wanted to wear diapers - they were definitely a security blanket to me - but, I didn't technically need to anymore. I think that the shame and fear about hanging around this new, angry stranger, while I had Pampers on under my pajamas, probably, if anything, accelerated my ability to stay dry overnight. He was not shy about stating that he thought it was ridiculous that I still wore "baby diapers" at night at age 10. 

[rubbersheetmike]

1 hour ago, Little Sherri said:

It's an interesting question - two questions, really, because of the inheritability aspect, and the stress aspect. 

As to heritability, I can comment first hand on that. I don't know of anyone in my ancestry who was an accomplished and inveterate bedwetter, like I was as a kid, but people tended not to talk about those things as much back then.

I think heredity related bedwetting is fairly common. In our family it was on our father's side. I grew up in a family of seven kids and four were overage wetters, three boys and one girl. We had a cousin in his teens from my father's who stayed with us for several months and he wet the bed literally every night. Mind you he was staying with us because of disruption in his family so it may have caused by both heredity and stress.

Back when I was growing up we didn't have "products" to make bedwetting more comfortable, or at least we didn't have products that we were aware of. At a certain age we were just switched from cloth diapers to having to sleep with a rubber sheet and absorbing pad on the bed. My father felt diapers made it too easy to keep on wetting once we reached a certain age.

[rusty pins]

Heredity, getting older, overweight, diabetes, there could be many reasons.

[stevewet]

Hereditary for certain. My dead wet until he was nearly 10 and my mother was 18 before she was dry at night. I had a great uncle who wet the bed his whole life.

[oznl]

I recall secondhand information pertaining to this from a BBQ conversation with some friends who had three kids, all of whom were inveterate bedwetter into their early teens.

Affluent and driven, they’d found some expensive medical specialist who’d looked at the problem for them but lost interest after he learned that their father had also wet the bed into his early teens.  He told them that there was an enormous genetic component involved, that it was highly likely that all of the kids would follow their father’s trajectory (they did) and to just buy pull ups and wait it out.

Interestingly ALL of my younger siblings (I was the eldest) were nappy-clad bedwetters until 6 - 8 years of age.  I was the standout exception, out of nappies at 20 months and trained dry at night by 2.5 years of age.  Ironic that I’m the one who taught themselves to revert to bedwetting.  There’s probably some psychology lurking in there somewhere.

[babykeiff]

Night wetting or, more correctly referred to as secondary nocturnal enuresis is wetting at night after one has been toilet trained to be dry overnight. The time to achieve primary dryness is inheritory, but secondary behaviour is not. It is all in relation to environment. The mind has learnt to produce vasopressin as a way to reduce the bodys need to disturb sleep. Sleeping wet where it is not an issue, and the mind accepts the scenario. Where it is an issue - i.e. the body gets cold and needs to wake to clean up and warm up, then the body alters the situation to ensure that it doesn't need to wake up.

As a result, a child that deals with bedwetting by wearing a form of protection - diapers / pull ups etc, will remain a bedwetter. A child that has to deal with cold and wet bed clothes, pajamas etc on a regular occurance should revert to re-gaining night time control. When a parent / career is making the decisions of diapers / protection, all they are doing is removing the decision from the child as they were a baby - and the child will revert / regress. 

What has been proven, if the child is given the responsibility of chosing pull-ups if they wake up in the middle of the night in a wet bed that they have to change etc., although the child might wet the pull-up during the second portion of sleep, the child is not being deprived of sleep. As a result, the child learns, subcontiously, that if it wets during the first portion of the night, it will have disturbed sleep so what occurs shortly afterwards is that the child learns to stay dry and the first portion of the night becomes longer and longer until the reason to wake and change the bed etc becomes mute. - but this is contrary to the theme of this forum - people here want to become bedwetters etc.

Simply, stress, alcohol overindulgence and lack of sleep can result in bedwetting where the body is in a deeper sleep and when the bladder fills, it is more difficult to wake up. As a result, the person partially wakes, wets while partially awake, but due to being overtired, stays asleep while being wet. When they wake in the morning, it is not a shock to find themsleves wet - they recall the classic 'pee' dream.

For those who wish to relive this from a baby perspective, a baby does not have the classic pee dream as it doesn't recal the last time it wet similar to you don't recal the last time yawned as to you, like peeing is to a baby, it is just a natural event not worthy of remembering. As a result, to reinstate that scenrio, follow the behaviour of diapering each night to such an extent that it is expected that you wet and/or mess the diapers every night and everything is in place to keep you warm and comfy even when you fill your diapers and those diapers will be changed to fresh diapers in the morning for you to fill them again. A baby is expected to, and encouraged to fill its diapers and praised and loved for doing so - this has a strong mental teaching attached to the act that the baby learns to follow, and that you can repeat if that is what you want.

[Bret2]

I had some bed wetting issues into my early teens, probably average 1-2 nights per week.  No precautions were ever taken, my mom just simply dealt with it and never said anything negative about it.  I had a great childhood so I think my wetting now is do to conditioning with the use of diapers later in life (19yrs - current)

[stevewet]

I was a chronic nightly bedwetter growing up. The trouble was I just didn't care. My bedwetting didn't bother me. I just slept in it until morning. My folks eventually gave up trying to get me dry at night and it was just accepted I wet the bed and probably always would. 

By my teens I was actually enjoying my bedwetting and made no effort to become dry at night. I know with a little effort I could have beaten it when I was about 13 as I started waking needing to pee. I was so used to a wet bed I just peed my bed and went back to sleep. I did this every time I woke needing to pee and soon I was wetting in my sleep again. 

I don't know for certain but I have a feeling my mother knew I wet the bed deliberately but she never said anything. Anyway by the time I was 14 I was wetting in my sleep again more often than not. I never really knew why I wet the bed but knew I didn't want to be dry at night. Somehow being a bedwetter felt right and being dry was alien to me and I just didn't want to be dry at night.

I got dragged off to the family doctor when I was 15 following my mother's final attempt to get me dry at night.  She demanded something done. I was refered to the fledgling NHS continence service. The nurse arranged for me to get adult nappies and a "sandra" mattres cover for my bed.  No cure for my wetting was offered just a better way of managing it. 

After that I was expected to deal with it my self and nothing much was ever said. My folks split when I was 18 and my mother had no interest whethervzI wet the bed or not. I continued to wet more often deliberately but still in my sleep as well and finally became dry at night just before my 22nd birthday.

Not long after this I met my first serious girlfriend and guess what I couldn't believe it she was a bedwetter. She just didn't care. She never wore nappies just peed in her knickers in bed. We were together for a few years and she was still wetting the bed most nights when we split. She soaked my bed the first night we slept together and the last time as well.

Now at 60 years old I am back to nightly wetting and couldn't be happier. Some of us are just meant to be this way.

[rubbersheetmike]

1 hour ago, stevewet said:

I was a chronic nightly bedwetter growing up. The trouble was I just didn't care. My bedwetting didn't bother me. I just slept in it until morning. My folks eventually gave up trying to get me dry at night and it was just accepted I wet the bed and probably always would. 

By my teens I was actually enjoying my bedwetting and made no effort to become dry at night. I know with a little effort I could have beaten it when I was about 13 as I started waking needing to pee. I was so used to a wet bed I just peed my bed and went back to sleep. I did this every time I woke needing to pee and soon I was wetting in my sleep again. 

I don't know for certain but I have a feeling my mother knew I wet the bed deliberately but she never said anything. Anyway by the time I was 14 I was wetting in my sleep again more often than not. I never really knew why I wet the bed but knew I didn't want to be dry at night. Somehow being a bedwetter felt right and being dry was alien to me and I just didn't want to be dry at night.

I got dragged off to the family doctor when I was 15 following my mother's final attempt to get me dry at night.  She demanded something done. I was refered to the fledgling NHS continence service. The nurse arranged for me to get adult nappies and a "sandra" mattres cover for my bed.  No cure for my wetting was offered just a better way of managing it. 

After that I was expected to deal with it my self and nothing much was ever said. My folks split when I was 18 and my mother had no interest whethervzI wet the bed or not. I continued to wet more often deliberately but still in my sleep as well and finally became dry at night just before my 22nd birthday.

 

Did your parents make you use protection for bedwetting when you were young or did you just pee your pjs and sheets like I did? I wet deliberately in my teens too but mainly to keep the rubber sheet on my bed because it was like a security blanket for me. A counselor I had to see years later told me my post-puberty bedwetting including deliberate bedwetting was "attention seeking" behavior that was likely caused because I grew up in a big family and had other bedwetting siblings including an older brother who got more attention than I did. As for your mother having no interest after your parents split up Im not surprised. I helped a friend coparent her son for a year after her marriage split up. She was dealing with a messy divorce and custody battle while undergoing medical treatment for a serious condition and needed somebody to be at home during the week to get her son up, feed him and get him to school in the morning so I offered to stay over an do it. I quickly realized he was wetting the bed but she was oblivious to it. 'I thought he stopped that a couple years ago' was all she said when I told her. I bought a mattress protector for his bed and overnight pullups and I believe his bedwetting stopped several months later. My friend lost the custody case and she moved away to live with her mother so I lost contract both with her and her son.

[stevewet]

I was in nappies and plastic pants at night until I was 8 or 9 and then on the insistence of our District nurse they were taken away and I just peed the bed. I went back to nappies in my teens and wore them until my wetting finally stopped in my early 20s. My folks tried everything to get me dry at night before my teenage years but more or less gave up by the time I was about 13 or 14 and one the continence nurse issued me with adult nappies they hardly ever mentioned it. 

[babykeiff]

On 9/14/2023 at 12:55 PM, Bret2 said:

I had some bed wetting issues into my early teens, probably average 1-2 nights per week.  No precautions were ever taken, my mom just simply dealt with it and never said anything negative about it.  I had a great childhood so I think my wetting now is do to conditioning with the use of diapers later in life (19yrs - current)

I would have to agree. When children start bed wetting, there are many ways it can be handled, each have their costs and gains. The goal is to get the child to learn how to survive the night without wetting the bed either by the child reducing the need to urinate OR by the need to urinate waking the child so the child can void in a toilet.

1. Place diapers / pullups on the child - this supports the action, and reinforces the behaviour. The child will not stop as the need to stop has been eliminated as the child can wet the diaper/pull up and regress to infantile wetting behaviour. It is classed as coddling the child / forcing the child to regress.
2. Complain to the child thus telling the child it is the childs fault with or without agressive behaviour. This increases the level of stress on the child which strips the child of energy. As a result, even if the child gets the signal to wake before wetting, the child is overtired and will sleep through. This type of stress has been found to exagerate the issue to such an extent that the child might also start soiling while asleep also, and this stress can be carried in daytime which can lead to issues with daytime control.
3. Placing protection on the bed plus allowing the child, with the parents assistance, deal with it. This is almost the ideal situation, but has to be handled carefully. The child must not think, even if it is mentioned in teasing by siblings, that s/he is a baby cause s/he wets the bed. The protection on the bed must not resemble the plastic coating of a baby bed, and the relevant baby powder must not be used. The child normally drys up within a few weeks as the child learns to recognise the signals of needing to wet, which it takes as a wake-up alarm. It is advisable that the parent also wakes the child once in the middle of the sleep cycle as long as the child is not wet. If the child is wet, leave the child to deal with the wet bed in the following morning. If the child wets after the midnight wake, leave the child. The reason is so that the child does not loose out in sleep.

Action #3 is commonly used by prior bedwetters (parents etc) for their children as the parent who was a bedwetter in their youth, knows from experience what they went through. Most good doctors / pedatricians will prescribe this form of treatment with/without an alarm system that works as an undersheet that wakes the child as soon as they start to wet. This concept is Pavlov's dog training, where the child is taught to associate a need to void with waking up.  Unfortunately, this type of Pavlov dog training tends to reduce sleep cycles which can, without the alarm system, force the child into a deeper sleep as it is waiting on an alarm to tell it to wake to void.

The reasons for bed wetting in a toilet trained person is

1. the bladder is not large enough to hold the liquid being placed in it for the 7-9 hours of sleep. As a result, it needs to empty and will signal same to the sleeping person who is in too deep of a sleep to wake.
2. the body is not producing enough vasopressin to reduce the quantity of liquid being placed in the bladder.
3. the person was toilet trained in a rush, as a result, daytime control is reactive (rushing to a bathroom to void) instead of proactive (having learnt the signals when the bladder starts to expand, and schedule a bathroom visit in the next 15-45 minutes), and when the person relaxes - they revert to the normal (infantile) form of voiding (voiding as soon as any urge hits - which they are partially doing daytime but forcing a hold and rushing to a bathroom).

[babykeiff]

2 hours ago, stevewet said:

I was in nappies and plastic pants at night until I was 8 or 9 and then on the insistence of our District nurse they were taken away and I just peed the bed. I went back to nappies in my teens and wore them until my wetting finally stopped in my early 20s. My folks tried everything to get me dry at night before my teenage years but more or less gave up by the time I was about 13 or 14 and one the continence nurse issued me with adult nappies they hardly ever mentioned it. 

@stevewet

it is understandable that the district nurse insisted that the nappies were taken away, cause you been put in nappies was telling your mind to continue the voiding behaviour you had as a baby. I would have expected that at times - i.e. when you were overtired and/or unwell, you would have messed said nappies sometimes.

It was a bad idea of the continence nurse to re-issue you with nappies, but that was the concept of the era and what went through their mind - there is a problem so I must do something. Issuing nappies is something I can do, so therefore, I have addressed the problem cause I did something. It never crossed their mind that the something they did was incorrect, after all, they were given the power to issue nappies, so someone must think that is a good idea. Your parents trusted the continence nurse, after all, s/he is supposed to have dealt with this before.

The reason that your bed wetting lasted until your 20s was, prior to that you weren't interested in dating. I don't know you from Adam, but can surmise that due to the bed wetting, you socially isolated yourself. It was not until you started working / became interested in another where wearing nappies would preclude, at that time, you bringing another home OR the effort involved in the morning with dealing with a wet nappy meant that you presumed that you would have a baby smell all day in work.

It is surprising how the mind works, and how one seemingly unrelated item can change a persons life. In your case it was work OR a possible partner.

The fact that you went back to nappies is probably due to the security etc that you felt in younger life, and is also probably due to the stress you feel in the workplace. It is creating, in your mind, a time where your self percieved social awkwardness is an advantage. After all, a baby is not socially isolated as everything a baby does is considered cute.

In reality, your self isolation in your youth up to age 20 would have placed you to focus on what is around you, rather than people around you. This tends to increase your ability within academia, and I would expect that your one of the smarter people in most rooms, but due to your self driven insecurity, you are unable to show it and prefer a work associate to speak instead of yourself. This has probably been happening all your life, where these work-freinds have been promoted over you, but it is based on your ability and skillset, not theirs.

My best advise to you is to grow a pair. You are better than those around you, and you know it but you need to show it. I don't know how long you are in your current job, but if it is longer than 5 years, you need to change company - not skillset, company as you have become comfortable. You need a place that will push you, but you need to push yourself harder than anyone else ever could - after all, you know your own limits, and those limits should be a goal of yours to exceed.

 

[stevewet]

On 9/15/2023 at 3:31 PM, babykeiff said:

@stevewet

it is understandable that the district nurse insisted that the nappies were taken away, cause you been put in nappies was telling your mind to continue the voiding behaviour you had as a baby. I would have expected that at times - i.e. when you were overtired and/or unwell, you would have messed said nappies sometimes.

It was a bad idea of the continence nurse to re-issue you with nappies, but that was the concept of the era and what went through their mind - there is a problem so I must do something. Issuing nappies is something I can do, so therefore, I have addressed the problem cause I did something. It never crossed their mind that the something they did was incorrect, after all, they were given the power to issue nappies, so someone must think that is a good idea. Your parents trusted the continence nurse, after all, s/he is supposed to have dealt with this before.

The reason that your bed wetting lasted until your 20s was, prior to that you weren't interested in dating. I don't know you from Adam, but can surmise that due to the bed wetting, you socially isolated yourself. It was not until you started working / became interested in another where wearing nappies would preclude, at that time, you bringing another home OR the effort involved in the morning with dealing with a wet nappy meant that you presumed that you would have a baby smell all day in work.

It is surprising how the mind works, and how one seemingly unrelated item can change a persons life. In your case it was work OR a possible partner.

The fact that you went back to nappies is probably due to the security etc that you felt in younger life, and is also probably due to the stress you feel in the workplace. It is creating, in your mind, a time where your self percieved social awkwardness is an advantage. After all, a baby is not socially isolated as everything a baby does is considered cute.

In reality, your self isolation in your youth up to age 20 would have placed you to focus on what is around you, rather than people around you. This tends to increase your ability within academia, and I would expect that your one of the smarter people in most rooms, but due to your self driven insecurity, you are unable to show it and prefer a work associate to speak instead of yourself. This has probably been happening all your life, where these work-freinds have been promoted over you, but it is based on your ability and skillset, not theirs.

My best advise to you is to grow a pair. You are better than those around you, and you know it but you need to show it. I don't know how long you are in your current job, but if it is longer than 5 years, you need to change company - not skillset, company as you have become comfortable. You need a place that will push you, but you need to push yourself harder than anyone else ever could - after all, you know your own limits, and those limits should be a goal of yours to exceed.

 

I never self isolated my self at all. I wet the bed I didnt have leprosy. I had friends and they didn't care that I wet the bed.

Just now, stevewet said:

I never self isolated my self at all. I wet the bed I didnt have leprosy. I had friends and they didn't care that I wet the bed.

I left school at 16 and continued to wet the bed . I don't hold with what you are saying at all.

[babykeiff]

1 hour ago, stevewet said:

I never self isolated my self at all. I wet the bed I didnt have leprosy. I had friends and they didn't care that I wet the bed.

I left school at 16 and continued to wet the bed . I don't hold with what you are saying at all.

What I deduced would be usual with a person who bedwet past 7 years of age and where a parent would be diapering them, but I am happy that it didn't effect you that way as it has/does with many other people.

[stevewet]

20 hours ago, babykeiff said:

What I deduced would be usual with a person who bedwet past 7 years of age and where a parent would be diapering them, but I am happy that it didn't effect you that way as it has/does with many other people.

To be honest I just didn't care. My bedwetting never bothered me. I just couldn't see what all the fuss was about. By my teens although I had nappies again it was up to me to deal with hem and do my own laundry if they leaked which often they did. It was t discovering the opposite sex that stopped me wetting. I just one morning woke up dry not long before my 22nd birthday and that was it for quite a while.

[babykeiff]

9 minutes ago, stevewet said:

To be honest I just didn't care. My bedwetting never bothered me. I just couldn't see what all the fuss was about. By my teens although I had nappies again it was up to me to deal with hem and do my own laundry if they leaked which often they did. It was t discovering the opposite sex that stopped me wetting. I just one morning woke up dry not long before my 22nd birthday and that was it for quite a while.

I love your attidude and strength - and I could guess that it was the bedwetting, and dealing with same that gave you that, but I am not saying that is the case with you but that is the case with most people that deal with something different in life - it either makes them weak and dependent where another overprotected them OR strong and independent where they deal with the issues themselves. That is why it is not a good idea to re-diaper a child post toilet training for night wetting and/or even use some form of pull-ups etc as it can infantalise the child. There is the opposite issue where a wet bed can disturb needed sleep so that can be addressed.

Similar problems exist in what is classed as deprived / third world communities where, out of supposed kindness and support, money is given to these people to help. This creates a dependent society where the people in this demographic become reliant on the handouts. The axion of 'give a man a fish and he will eat today, teach a man to fish and he will eat for life' is apt. This is where most 'charities' worldwide fail - they presume that delivering food etc to a devistated area is helping. Actually it is not. What does help is the simple concept of sweeping and cleaning - so that these comunities can get their own act together and rebuild their lives. Most people in a devistated area not only loose their property, but also their place of work. They have the time now to rebuild their property and move on from there - where if they used actual money to pay a third party to do same, all they are going to do is get ripped off by profiteers - and these profiteers are being funded by charitable donations.

[stevewet]

2 hours ago, babykeiff said:

I love your attidude and strength - and I could guess that it was the bedwetting, and dealing with same that gave you that, but I am not saying that is the case with you but that is the case with most people that deal with something different in life - it either makes them weak and dependent where another overprotected them OR strong and independent where they deal with the issues themselves. That is why it is not a good idea to re-diaper a child post toilet training for night wetting and/or even use some form of pull-ups etc as it can infantalise the child. There is the opposite issue where a wet bed can disturb needed sleep so that can be addressed.

Similar problems exist in what is classed as deprived / third world communities where, out of supposed kindness and support, money is given to these people to help. This creates a dependent society where the people in this demographic become reliant on the handouts. The axion of 'give a man a fish and he will eat today, teach a man to fish and he will eat for life' is apt. This is where most 'charities' worldwide fail - they presume that delivering food etc to a devistated area is helping. Actually it is not. What does help is the simple concept of sweeping and cleaning - so that these comunities can get their own act together and rebuild their lives. Most people in a devistated area not only loose their property, but also their place of work. They have the time now to rebuild their property and move on from there - where if they used actual money to pay a third party to do same, all they are going to do is get ripped off by profiteers - and these profiteers are being funded by charitable donations.

My cousin wet the bed until he was 17 and my aunt kept him in nappies at night all the time. Where as from about 9 years old until 15 I was not allowed them.

[rubbersheetmike]

On 9/19/2023 at 9:00 AM, babykeiff said:

That is why it is not a good idea to re-diaper a child post toilet training for night wetting and/or even use some form of pull-ups etc as it can infantalise the child. There is the opposite issue where a wet bed can disturb needed sleep so that can be addressed.

 

I'm not sure that first line is necessarily accurate. A good friend had a son whose bedwetting had stopped a couple years earlier but then resumed in the middle of the turmoil at home caused by a nasty divorce and custody battle. When the problem became obvious the son was allowed to wear pullups at night to deal with it. I think he appreciated it and within several months his accidents decreased significantly. The solution has to involve not making a big deal about it.

[babykeiff]

1 hour ago, rubbersheetmike said:

I'm not sure that first line is necessarily accurate. A good friend had a son whose bedwetting had stopped a couple years earlier but then resumed in the middle of the turmoil at home caused by a nasty divorce and custody battle. When the problem became obvious the son was allowed to wear pullups at night to deal with it. I think he appreciated it and within several months his accidents decreased significantly. The solution has to involve not making a big deal about it.

I addressed what you are referring to - stress - and that is always dealt with first. Again, even if the child regresses as a way to handle the stress, it is NEVER a good idea to indulge the childs regression.

From a pscycological perspective, when a paitent has an issue that causes them fear, the best way for the paitent to handle the fear is to face the problem. i.e. a person with a fear of water can either face the fear and conquer it in a calm controlled environment, or hide from it until it becomes an adult problem that they are too embarrased to deal with it.

The child that regresses due to parental breakup is reverting to an earlier time in its life where there was no conflict with its parents - it is more correctly to say that the child didn't understand the conflict when it was that young. Supporting a child to regress is always wrong - as it is even harder for the child to grow up again unless the impossible occurs, the parents resolve their differences - which is rare. Even if they do, the child has seen that the regression age is a solution and then refuses to grow up due to fear.

Placing an absorbant pad under the child, and treating it as a child instead of a baby by lifting it before it wets enforces to the child that the regression behaviour is not working. Remember, the child doesn't realize that it is regressing.

Similar occured with numerous 3-7/8 year olds during covid - these children regressed to align with what they percieved as the time their parents were at home and where they were not going to school / creche etc. Some parents indulged these children and began to rediaper them (due to bedwetting and then full diaper usage). Other parents did not indulge these children, and the regression was only temporary. The real issue occured when the children went back to school the following year, some diaper dependant but gained full control within a few days / weeks, others that weren't diapered / indulged in regression, when in school were at a much more advanced level than their regressed & diapered class mates.

Allowing a child to wear diapers, and supporting the regression is abuse. The regression also regresses the mind almost back to the same level as an infant.

We in the AB world chose to 'play' as a baby, and go into little space. This is done since as an adult, we can compartmentalize the mind. A child has not learnt that, and usually doesn't learn that skill until school and learning multiple subjects from different teachers.

The bedwetting child is in turmoil. Your example, the turmoil was caused by parents. The child regressed to protect itself from the turmoil. It is similar to a problem one encounters, go back in ones mind to find a solution. The child is unaware that it has regressed. To it, everything should be solved. Supporting the regression by adding diapers is convicing the child that it has found a solution. It hasn't, and won't. It is not the child's problem. Since the problem has not been solved by the child, it goes back further, and further until the problem is not there. An infant may sence disagreement, but has roughly a 2-5 second memory. Therefore, the only way this child will end up is fully regressed as an infant - or as in your example, several months to a year in diapers almost constantly. He now has to regrow up with the disadvantage of blaiming himself for his parents breakup. I doubt if that was ever resolved. In relation to the years regression, I would suspect that he will be held back a number of years for the rest of his life. Mentally he is scarred. He will need years of psychotheraphy before this is addressed fully.

As I said, placing a post trained child back in diapers is abuse. The diaper is a key infant/baby object that is recognised by all as such. A parent or career doing that to a child is telling the child that s/he expects the child to use it as the child did as a baby - which is telling the child that s/he IS a still a baby.

There is a common trick in hypnosis to get the subject to touch, feel, image as deep as possible that they have a lemon in their hands. When the subject has done this enough, one gets the subject to bite the imaginary lemon.

This tricks the mind to believe one has a lemon, and after biting same, the same reaction of bitter taste in facial expressions and tounge reactions occur.

WHY? ... cause the mind creates what it percieves to be reality.

A child being placed in a diaper post training by a parent convinces the childs mind that the parent want the child to use it... and the mind creates the rest of the situation to comply with the instructions ..... which it gets from prior actions, which are as a baby / toddler, without fine muscle control, wetting and messing by reflex... sucking on thumbs etc.... all to suit the parents wishes.

So, NO, there is no reason* other than personal and/or selfish reasons to place a diaper on a post trained child. It is ABUSE.

*I will correct that - after an accident that damages bladder/bowel control, and that is done first in a medical setting

[Wet Knight]

Mother's Irish cousin lived with us after the war.  He wet his bed every night, it could have been stress because he had been living in London and was blown into a hedge when his house was damaged by the last V2, but, years later at a family funeral in N. Ireland, I overheard somebody's wife claiming that she should be a saint for all the sheets that she had washed.

[Little BabyDoll Christine]

Among the things that French-Canadians lived with was the reputation of being "piss-a-bed"'s. I cannot say that I ever found out if that was true for us more than for other ethnicities. But it was used amongs us as an insult, such as "queue jeune(sp?)" which means "yellow arse". And during the era of large families; 4 or more children, there was almost guaranteed to be one bedwetter. My sister was one and one of the girls I used to play with , Linda, was one. My mother's family had 14 ch8ildren and one of my aunts, Irene, was a bedwetter as a child. When my sister lived with us, which was twice, onece when I was 5 and again when I was 10, there was no evidence of here bedwetting, though she did bring a rubber sheet with her the second time. It was one of those horrible brown ones that had not stretchiness to it nor did it even feel like a rubber sheet and it was never used

[babykeiff]

8 hours ago, Wet Knight said:

Mother's Irish cousin lived with us after the war.  He wet his bed every night, it could have been stress because he had been living in London and was blown into a hedge when his house was damaged by the last V2, but, years later at a family funeral in N. Ireland, I overheard somebody's wife claiming that she should be a saint for all the sheets that she had washed.

A lot of people who survived blast explosions, suffered internal damage. Due to the inability to do an MRI (invented in 1977), internal damage was either ignored or dealt with. A partially full bladder, due to the way water can't be compressed as compared to body tissue, when hit with a shock wave, can stretch and/or tear bladder walls. As a result, there is a section of bladder wall that doesn't sense stretch. This can cause overflow issues and/or reflex issues. Bed wetting is one of the symptoms, and by the time it is confirmed (1977 or later) it is usually too late to do anything about it.

This didn't just effect Northern Irish people, but was a common problem with soldiers returning from the wars. It was originally misdiagnosed as part of PTSD or Post Stress Traumatic Disorder.

There is no known physical and/or medical reason for bedwetting. Even a new born child can sense their bladder.