If your child (or an adult) past the age of three or four years old still wets the bed, you may have a serious problem, such as a persistent kidney infection. The first step should be to seek out the advice of a health care professional to be sure that isn’t the problem. Signs of kidney infections include difficulty urinating, a burning sensation when urinating or the appearance of blood in the urine. While an adult may notice and evaluate those signs, a child may not. Even if the symptoms are not evident, you should rule out a kidney infection or other urinary problem.

Once you know that a health problem isn’t at the root of the bedwetting, there are some simple steps you can take to lessen or eliminate the occurrences. The easiest steps to take include limiting drinks at or near bedtime and having the child go to the bathroom just before bed. If you make these part of a nightly routine, they’ll soon be accepted as such. For many children (and adults), these steps are sufficient to eliminate bedwetting.

Some people make more urine at night than their kidneys can hold. For most people, waking during the night to go to the bathroom is natural. But some people simply don’t wake up when they need to urinate. When their bodies can no longer wait, the bedwetting occurs. For an adult, setting an alarm for some point during the night will often be sufficient to help them get awake and realize they need to go to the bathroom. Children probably need a bit more prodding and an adult can set an alarm and wake the child to go to the bathroom. While there seems to be a difference of opinion with some people saying this isn’t a good idea, the fact remains that many who start getting up to use the bathroom during the night eventually make that practice a habit and the bed wetting stops. You may have to experiment to find the right time for the bathroom break. If you wait too long, you’ll sometimes have a wet bed before you get up. If you get up too early, you may have a wet bed before morning.

Remember that bedwetting is a problem shared by many people. There are some ways to lessen the impact of the problem. Wearing a nighttime protective underwear is probably one of the most cost-efficient and trouble-free ways to keep from having wet sheets. Even then, the problem should be addressed on a more permanent basis.