Alarm Sounding Too Late??

The alarm doesn’t sound until my son is already wet.  Isn’t this too late? His bed is already wet when we hear it. Shouldn’t it sound before his bed gets wet?

Everyone starts like this.  The bedwetting alarm detects the first drop of urine and immediately sounds.  It pinpoints the actual time that the bladder needs to empty, not a few minutes before or a few minutes too late.  There is no way to know precisely the time of the wetting until it begins to happen. 

Initially, the urine comes flooding out of the bladder, just as it has always done.  Even though the alarm sounds at the first drop, your son has not learned to stop the flow yet. So there will be a large amount in the bed and little to empty in the toilet.

Over time, his bladder and brain will work together when the alarm sounds to stop the flow of urine quickly.  This gives him a chance to get out of bed and walk to the bathroom to empty the rest in the toilet. This is a new conditioned response and takes some time to learn. 

Eventually, his brain will begin to recognize what a full bladder feels like and that he must be awake before the urine is released.  He’ll learn to get up before the alarm sounds or hold it until morning.

The first few weeks are the hardest and the messiest.  Using mattress overlays (waterproof pads on top of the sheet) make your job much easier.  Put one on top of his sheet before he goes to sleep.  When the alarm sounds, have him walk to the bathroom and empty any urine left into the toilet.  Simply replace the wet pad with a clean one and he can immediately go back to a dry bed.  In the morning, just wash the waterproof pads, not the entire set of sheets.