Bedwetting

Bedwetting is a very tricky problem. Sometimes kids as young as 1 year old stop wetting their beds. But sometimes they continue to do so even at the age of 5 -6. It’s very difficult to decide when to seek a professional help or guidance.

I feel, it’s normal to sometimes wet beds. Many kids wet their beds involuntarily and is not a cause for concern when done occasionally. But if bedwetting happens frequently beyond 5 -6 years, then it could be a sign of some problem. Some of the main causative factors behind bedwetting are:

1. Under developed bladder control: in some kids, the bladder control is not age appropriately developed. Sometimes they even fail to feel the sensation of bladder being full. They only feel the urge when the pressure is too hig h to control for another second. In this situation, even daytime toileting accidents are very common.

2. High liquid intake just before bed time: many children drink warm milk just before they sleep. While warm milk induces sound sleep, it may also cause the bladder to get full in the middle of the night. While adults can get up from sleep when the urge to use the toilet is there, most kids cannot get up from sleep to indicate the same.

3. Cold weather: bedwetting problem increases during monsoons and winters. Many children kick away their blankets and then wet their beds due to the cold.

4. Stress: loss of someone dear, being bullied at school, some underlying phobia, threat of some impending doom or experience of a bad accident are some of the situations that can a dd a lot of stress to a child’s life. Since children are not very receptive about their inner emotions and even less expressive about them, it gets difficult to know and find out what’s haunting them. These anxieties lead to nightmares, du tot which the mi nd’s control over bladder shifts to mind’s need to
control the anxiety.

5. Too early training: when children are trained too early, they learn that they need to depend more on their own ability to manage toileting and less on their parents. Such children do not like to use the toilet when asked by parents, because they feel they can manage. However, ability can develop with time only and this causes a lot of misjudgement about the urge. Too early training often leads to too late mastery in the case of bladder control.

6. Too sound sleep: some kids sleep like a log. They just cannot get up from their sleep no matter what. So if the blanket is not there and they are feeling cold, they fail to get up from sleep and get into blanket again. Such kids face bedwetting more.

7. Chronic constipation: the unpassed hard stools in the rectum do not let
the bladder to expand in response to increase of urine level in it. As a
result the bladder squeezes when urine volume goes up and the urine
come out.

Fingersucking

Fingersucking is very commonly seen in most of the preschoolers. In many kids it is limited to thumb, but other 4 fingers, especially index finger and middle finger are also seen going very often in the mouths.

When infants put their fingers in their mouth, it doesn’t cause anxiety in parents’ minds. But when toddlers and preschoolers
do the same, it causes a lot of anxiety and embarrassment in parents. Most of the times children are told not to do so and when children continue to mouth their fingers, it compounds parents’ concerns. Perhaps, if as parents we realize that no mouthing is without any reason, we would be able to look at the reasons before trying to stop the behaviour.

Fingersucking means different things for a foetus, infant and toddler. Many babies are seen putting their fingers in their mouth when they inside the womb. They do it for sheer pleasure. Infants do it to satiate their sucking instincts. That’s why infants who are breastfed less are more prone to sucking their finger. Developmentally, by the time babies start taking solid food, their sucking needs fade and they neither crave for breasts, nor bottles nor fingers. So when a toddler is mouthing his fingers, it’s definitely not developmental and needs to be looked into.

Reasons behind fingersucking during toddlerhood and beyond:

1. Gum pain: some children teethe a little late and might experience a lot of gum pain when new teeth come during toddlerhood, as by then gums are not as soft as they used to be during babyhood. Suc h children like to press their gums
with their fingers to relieve the pain. Since they are not very verbal at this stage, they can’t express the gum -pain and parents mistake mouthing with behavioural issue.

2. Comfort: sucking for milk provided comfort to the tummy and now sucking at anything provides comfort to the psyche. Many children tend to believe in this and put their fingers into their mouth to express their frustrations, hunger, anxiety, anger, and boredom. T he act of sucking is sort of self -soothing for them.

3. Regression: in many cases a toddler starts sucking his fingers upon the arrival of his new sibling. This is his way of getting the attention of his mother who seems to be spending a lot of her time with the new baby. The child feels that by acting like an infant again, his mother will love her more as she seems to be loving another infant lately. Children regress to lower levels when growing up looks threatening or when previous stages of development look more attractive and beneficial.

After effects of too much fingersucking:
1. Thickening of the skin of the preferred digit.
2. Skin and nail infections.
3. Stomach infections.
4. Protrusion of front teeth.