Bedwetting: the causes

Heredity

You might be surprised to learn that bedwetting is often due to a genetic predisposition. If one of your parents was a bedwetter as a child, there's about a 40% chance their child will inherit it. If both your parents were bedwetters, the percentage is roughly 70%.

Messages between the bladder and the brain

Sometimes, the brain doesn't respond to the signal indicating that a full bladder contracts at night. So your brain doesn't register it because your arousal threshold is too high.

A small bladder

Some children simply have a small bladder capacity, so they need to empty their bladder frequently, both day and night. A good way to train them to be more independent is to gradually increase the interval between trips to the toilet.

Not enough hormones

When we go to bed, the pituitary gland secretes an antidiuretic hormone that slows down urine production by the kidneys, so we don't have to get up to go to the toilet. Some children don't yet produce enough of this hormone, which explains why they wet the bed like you.

A deep sleep

Children who wet the bed often have a higher arousal threshold than other children. This means they are so deeply asleep that the urge to urinate doesn't wake them, and that's why they wet the bed. Furthermore, we know that a child's sleep is crucial for their growth and emotional and psychomotor development. Waking you up isn't the ideal solution: nighttime is for sleeping!

'It's nobody's fault...'

It's possible that none of these reasons apply to you, and that it still happens. It's not your fault. You can't control everything right now, but with your parents' help, their encouragement, patience, and, if necessary, treatment for bedwetting by your doctor, bedwetting will soon be nothing but a bad memory.