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5 Phrases to Make Your Child Feel Better About Bedwetting
Statements That Have a Positive Impact on Your Child
By Donna Smith
Parents praise children with "Great hit!" or "Way to go!" after a line-drive double in a baseball game. How many times have you told your child what a great job she did on the math test, or how creative the clay sculpture is that she did in art class? For children who wet the bed, the right phrase can keep them in positive spirits and help boost their self-esteem.
Amy Scranton's son did not have a dry night until he was 6 1/2 years old. Now 7 1/2, he still has some wet nights. She feels it's important to encourage with positive phrases because you want to give the child a sense of confidence that they can do it. "But it's also equally, if not more, important to explain that much of what is causing them to wet the bed isn't something they can physically control," says the mom from Gilbert, Ariz. "Most kids don't want to wet the bed and would stop if they knew how; it's a matter of maturing into it."
Here are 5 phrases to make your child feel better about bedwetting while waiting for those dry nights. "These statements are helpful because they can really empower the child to face a problem in their life without it becoming all encompassing," says Tonya Freymiller-Hazen, a psychotherapist at the Family & Children's Center in La Crosse, Wis.
Bedwetting, which can be caused by genetics, physiological or environmental factors, is not the child's fault, but children may have a hard time believing this.
"Children cannot rationalize or think through things the way adults can, and as a result, feel most things are their fault," says Dr. Gretchen Phillips, a hospitalist with Fairview Hospitals and a private practice family physician at Fairview Lakes Medical Center in Wyoming, Minn. "We often don't even realize they are taking blame for things because to us it just doesn't make sense. Helping a child understand that their bedwetting is a medical concern can ease the pressure they put on themselves to fix it."
