ADHD and Bathroom Accidents - CHADD's ADHD Pare...

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ADHD and Bathroom Accidents

peachy1107 profile image
14 Replies

Anyone else have issues with pants wetting during the day and not being able to nighttime potty train with their ADHD kiddo? My son keeps having accidents. Usually once/twice a week and multiple times on the weekend. We keep reminding him and it usually ends in a fight how he doesn’t have to go even though he pees buckets when we make him go. He tells me he recognizes the urge, but chooses not to go. We can’t figure out what to do and I’m worried about kids making fun of him since he’s in 1st grade.

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peachy1107 profile image
peachy1107
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14 Replies
Onthemove1971 profile image
Onthemove1971

You could put him on a potty time schedule, set a timer and tell him he must go, same a school.

Good luck

Adam081911 profile image
Adam081911

My son is going to 3rd grade in a week. He started to have BM accidents at the beginning of 2nd grade. His pediatrician suggested toileting schedule every 2 hours also Kegel exercise. My son's situation is different than your boy's though. My son started NOT to recognize when his poo was coming vs your boy knows when his urine is coming. So Kegel exercise is probably not necessary. But I suggest keep a record of his toileting patterns (usually after snack & lunch) and he must go every 2 hours. Get his school on board to avoid social embarrassment.

Good luck.

NikkiPearl profile image
NikkiPearl

Omg! I had the same issue in 1st grade with my son. He would have both pee and poop accidents. It was a horrible year for us. Kids and teachers were cruel. The nurse would let him come to a private bathroom, but he still didn’t. He’d be so busy and would wait until it was too late. I would have to remind him and limit his computer/IPad time. He did much better during the summer. He is in 2nd grade now and looks like things are good. He hasn’t had accidents. Still occasionally wets the bed at night though.

gramirez189 profile image
gramirez189 in reply to NikkiPearl

Hi, how did you make it for him to be able to go to school. My 5 year old has ADHD and having similar issues now. Not sure how will get accepted into school

katcald profile image
katcald

My son only had a few accidents during the day when he was older like that -- and only when he was too engrossed in what he was doing and didn't want to stop. BUT he consistantly wets his bed at night, so much so that we had to put him back in pullups. He just turned 12 and only now is he consistantly dry at night.

ASMomma00 profile image
ASMomma00

Yes! We tried EVERYTHING for years with our daughter. Her doctors believe it’s a combination of her anxiety and ADHD. For many years she suffered with chronic constipation and that compounded the issue because when she was “backed up” it was difficult for her to feel that she had to pee. ADHD medication helped.

GrowthMinded profile image
GrowthMinded

For nighttime bedwetting issues, we found this alarm very effective:

Malem Ultimate Bedwetting Alarm. It's expensive but it worked well.

Cjkchamp profile image
Cjkchamp

My son waited too long to pee a lot. He carried and extra set of clothes in his backpack through first grade. The accidents decreased during first grade, but he just had an accident this summer at the mall of all places. Omg, there I was trying to dry those pants off and of course they were jeans! Peed all the way into his shoes. Lucky the shoes were crocs and lucky I had on an undershirt. We tied my second shirt around his waist and left. My husband was like, “why didn’t you just went his pants with water so they were completely wet and you couldn’t tell....well, I didn’t think of that. Anyway, someone once told me you don’t see adults walking around with wet pants so at some point things click. You could always consult a pediatric urologist just to make sure things are working okay. My daughter, who is not ADHD, wet her pants day and night and turned out her bladder was stretched. We had to get her a vibrating potty watch and a nighttime pee alarm. Good luck!

abryans profile image
abryans

I think he is very young and it is form being so busy and not wanting to stop what he is doing to go to the bathroom. My son was similar and until very recently he was wet every single night. We used pull ups, protected his privacy and did not bug him. Gradually, he has stopped being wet at night. Young humans do things in their won time and I am not sure we can make it happen sooner. It is important that he is not embarrassed- , private reminders from the teacher, scheduled times to go, not going overboard on the liquids, and extra clothes can all help. The best help of all is telling him its okay- you know he will get it when his body is ready!

UsuallyStressed profile image
UsuallyStressed

My son (8 years, ADHD, DMDD) has had BM problems during the day and is hardly ever dry through the night. He was diagnosed with Encopresis when he was in 1st grade. He avoided BM's to the point that his colon was impacted and started loosing sensitivity due to nerve damage. We started a pooping incentive and Miralax campaign which seems to do the trick if we stay on top of it. But he will still go through the occasional phase each year (usually during a stressful time of year like just before school) when my husband and I will sniff the air, look at each other, and do a mental rock-paper-scissors for who's going to confront him and help him get cleaned up.

His Pediatrician said that kids with ADHD and especially boys, are very late to stay dry all night. We have found that the brand Goodnights leaks the least often.

KMLMPLS profile image
KMLMPLS

I have been meaning to post this question for a very long time. I have to say, although I know it is very frustrating for all of you because we have been going through it for a long time, it’s comforting to know it’s not just us. Our son (ADHD/2e) will be in second grade and just turned 8 years old and it has been 6 years of stress for all of us. We have tried everything. And we’ve come to the conclusion that it just is how his brain is wired. We took him to specialists to get scans and tests. Physically he is fine. And sometimes he can go for months without accidents. But he’s never been dry at night a day in his life. We need big Under Jams for him at night. And quite frankly we don’t really talk much about night time because we still struggle with daytime. He went through a few phases with BM problems but it’s mostly pee. And boy, do we carry a lot of guilt. We have been so inconsistent because nothing has worked and we have been all over the board. And shamed him, not on purpose of course, but we have been so exhausted and exasperated by it that i know he feels shame and I feel horrible. I’m so sick of it but it is what it is. This is the one of the side effects of ADHD that impacts him. And I have to remind myself that the side effects of his ADHD mean that he legs behind his peers 2 to 3 years in that area.

There was one point when we got him a potty watch, you can get on Amazon, which helped for a good chunk of time. And he went about four months with no accidents. But each solution only last for so long. Of course we all know that kids with ADHD are motivated with rewards. Charts and rewards have worked pretty well. He also resists going when we tell him at times. But we are consistent to say that when he has dry for 10 days in a row then he can be in charge. ADHD meds helped at first (7.5 mg of Adderall XR) but didn’t last.

We have come to the conclusion that it really will just be time. And that we have to tell him to go and he’ll rarely go on his own. It isn’t every day like it used to be. It is getting better. And hopefully, as we say, it won’t be like this forever. Our deal now is, you are going to have accidents, but you are old enough to know and you need to change yourself right away and bring your close down to the laundry room. If he holds his BM too long and it’s in his underwear, he has to wash his underwear in the toilet by himself. It seems to be a decent current state.

gramirez189 profile image
gramirez189 in reply to KMLMPLS

Thank you. Exactly the same here but at 4 yo. I'm concerned about school, what did you do? Was he accepted at school? How you managed it? 🙂

kcluanne profile image
kcluanne

We have the same issue, I always have a spare pair of pants and underwear just in case. My daughter just turned 7 and is in 2nd grade now and she will still occasionally have accidents, and always because she doesn't want to stop what she is doing to take the time to use the bathroom. I always remind her to go when we are in public and at school the fact that she has a dark uniform meant that no one really noticed her accidents (or at least it didn't become an issue she seemed ashamed of).

Also I think sometimes kids need to experience the natural consequences of their actions. In first grade they are more than capable of not ignoring their urges to go. Having ADHD of course means that it is going to be harder for them to pay attention to that but I find that if my child thinks something is going to embarrass her, she is more highly motivated to pay attention to it. I support and love her when that happens, and we brainstorm ideas of how she can prevent that from happening in the future. She has really great ideas too as ADHD'rs are very creative and think outside the box! When we were struggling with her getting dressed every morning before school without it becoming a huge fight, she came up with the idea to just sleep in her school clothes. Sure sometimes she is a little wrinkly but it fixed the problem and it gave her a boost of self esteem because she solved the problem with her own idea. It would have never even occurred to me We will also talk about how ADHD makes it harder for her to remember to use the bathroom so she knows that it isn't something she should feel ashamed of and that she doesn't do it because she is a bad kid or stupid so it hopefully won't effect her self esteem.

Lastly, I would ask the teacher if he or she can set something up so to help remind him. It could be as simple as having her hand him a slip of paper with the reminder on it or have her use a code word or phrase to remind him to go at set times during the day without embarrassing him in front of the class. It might also be helpful if the teacher is willing to do that to set an alarm on your phone for the same times so he can be consistently using the bathroom on the weekends as well.

Hope this helps! Good luck!

sebastianadhd profile image
sebastianadhd

My daughter is 12 and still pees or poops her pants occasionally during the day. She wears a pullup to bed. She also wears a pullup for outings like the zoo, parks, movie theater, etc and for car trips. I know we really want to treat our big kids like neurotypical big kids, but my opinion, sometimes we can't. I would suggest 24/7 pullups at that age if he's having issues until he's ready to use the potty more consistently. My daughter started to wear big girl panties at age 6 for a bit, but then we went back to the pullups 24/7 until shortly after she turned 9.

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