Articles

Oh Boy! Oh Girl! Gender Differences in Bedwetting

By Beth Skarupa

Fourteen-year-old Kelly Cohen* accidentally falls asleep on a recliner at a slumber party and wakes up in the morning to a wet seat. Kelly has a problem with bedwetting that no one knew about – until now. Kelly's mom helps by attributing the incident to a recent illness and being overtired. Most of the kids accept that explanation, although a few tease Kelly about it in the following days. Would you have guessed that Kelly is a girl or a boy?

In this case Kelly is a girl but if you thought the child was more likely to be a boy, that was a good guess. In fact, more boys than girls have a problem with bedwetting (also known as nocturnal enuresis). While there are more similarities than differences, this is just one of several distinctions between the sexes when it comes to wetting the bed.

Bedwetting and Boys

According to the National Kidney and Urologic Diseases Information Clearinghouse, nocturnal enuresis affects twice as many boys as girls. While experts are not exactly sure why, there have been studies, according to University of Alabama at Birmingham Health System, showing that girls tend to develop bladder control before boys.

Dr. Michael Ritchey, a pediatric urologist at the University of Texas Health Center at Houston, agrees and says this could be attributed to the fact that the pressure to urinate is higher in boys at birth, affecting their ability to hold urine. However, he says, this has never been studied in connection with bedwetting.

It could also simply be that boys' bladders mature more slowly than girls'. According to the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, in most cases bedwetting is caused by a slower than normal development of the child's bladder control.

Dr. Christopher Cooper, director of pediatric urology at the University of Iowa, points out that this difference between boys and girls tends to disappear by the time they reach adolescence.

And while boys are more likely to wet the bed, there is no apparent difference in the severity of bedwetting or age of dryness between boys and girls.

Coping Methods and Management

There also seems to be no difference in how boys and girls respond to various coping solutions. "This may be related to the treatment since [the treatments] are aimed at different aspects of the problem," says Dr. Cooper.

Gender differences also give little insight into how to manage bedwetting. "Just get to know your own child very well," says Tammy Cohen* of Minneapolis, Minn., mother of 14-year-old Kelly (above) as well as 12-year-old Michael*, who also wets the bed. "Be a detective and work on any little thing that you notice works."

Cohen has used the same approach when talking to both children about bedwetting, telling them that it's a hereditary condition and no one is to blame. Using GoodNites® underpants has helped both children cope with the problem.

Varying Reactions

Kelly was embarrassed at the slumber party and was teased about her bedwetting. Would this have been any easier to handle if she were a boy? Some parents who have both boys and girls with enuresis think that it's more difficult for their daughters to deal with the emotional and social aspects of the issue.

"My daughter's self-esteem has really suffered," says Cohen. "She thinks she is the only one of her peers with such a problem. She is somewhat comforted in knowing that her grandmother wet the bed until age 17 and her aunt until age 15. Also, I wet the bed until age 5 and my husband until age 12."

Marcia Henderson* of Memphis, Tenn., the mother of two girls and a boy, also thinks her children reacted to bedwetting differently because of their gender. "My younger daughter most definitely was affected more emotionally than my son is," says Henderson. "She was very concerned that others would find out. Girls seem to do the ‘sleepover thing' more than boys do, and she was very social while my son is very shy. Both of the girls wanted ‘out of diapers' at an early age – my son was a late potty-trainer and could care less if his clothes were wet or not."

Dr. Ritchey, however, offers a different perspective. He hears more concerns from parents of boys about their sons attending sleepovers and the impact of their bedwetting on social activities.

Similar Needs for Support

Whether boy or girl, all children need to be reassured that bedwetting is a common problem and is not their fault.

"Parents need to be supportive," Dr. Cooper says. "They need to realize this is beyond the control of the child and nothing they're doing on purpose. No child wants to wet – day or night … Boys and girls both need their parents' support."

Because boys and girls have different needs when it comes to bedwetting, GoodNites® brand has redesigned their products to tailor them specifically for girls and boys. These new underpants provide customized protection for both boys and girls where each needs it most. They've also added underwear-like prints – kid tested and approved – to help your child feel more comfortable and confident in his GoodNites®.



* While bedwetting is a perfectly normal part of growing up, we have chosen to change the names of individuals in our articles to protect their privacy. Remember, according to the National Kidney Foundation, as many as five to seven million kids over age 5 in the United States wet the bed.