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QUESTION:
"Back storey she has had bed accidents since I came into her life at 9. Her dad and I have a great co parenting relationship with her bio mom. We also have two other children my son who I had when I met my now husband and we have a daughter together. Her mom has no other children. We have a good schedule with our daughter let’s call her L. The bed wetting we have been to drs we’ve tried medicine we’ve been to urologist they all say she will just grow out of it that nothing is medically wrong, at first we had a problem with her telling us she had accidents and she would just leave the soul linen. we’ve talked to her numerous times and she has been told she will never get in trouble we know she can’t help it, we’ve tried medication and it didn’t help, we switched to good nights to help with the linen and help her feel more comfort she can just get up throw them away her bedding will be clean and that really helped. Well we thought she had grown it and her mom had suspected she was having accidents again and asked and L lied when she went into her room she found soiled clothing linen and the used sanitary pads hidden all over her room, her dad and I talked to her reinforced she would not be in trouble but lying about it would not be tolerated that we knew it wasn’t her fault she had them that she didn’t have to lie about it just bring her mom the linen, we talked to her to try to see if she’d say why she had been lying cause as far as we knew she told us when she was having accidents at are house. We have always struggles with getting her to respond in conversation she just looks at you like with big eyes and cries and her answer for everything is I don’t know. We went to dr today and we have referral to have her talk to someone. Later after we got home something told me to check her room. I found tons underwear hidden with dirty pads tons of trash food and soiled linen. I am beyond overwhelmed we had that huge talk her dad and I told her we appreciated her being honest at our house that we would talk with her mom and all this just to find she was doing it here as wellSo my question is has anyone else experienced this type of behaviorWhat kind of consequences should this entail. Obviously she isn’t communicating with us and is lying and we are going to have her talk to someone but I just don’t know what to do or how to proceed She is with her mom tonight and we are all Going to sit down to figure out how to address her with the lying and what I found today she is taking her phone to go through her phone because at this point we want to see if she is communicating something with her friends about her feelings as she will not talk to us and tomorrow when she comes here she is cleaning her room with me in there with her but idk how we should approach it we tried be understanding and this may be unpopular opinion but I feel I should take her door to her room it’s the only thing I know that will get a reaction and ensure she isn’t doing these things in private if she has to change she can go in the restroom but idk what else to do."
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TOP ANSWERS (AS SELECTED BY MODERATOR):
The following top answers have been selected by a moderator from hundreds of responses to the original question.
"I used to do things like this when I was a girl. I wasn’t SA. I found out years later that I have ADHD (it presents differently in girls). It honestly sounds to me like she’s just trying to cope with having poor executive function - she doesn’t know why she’s different but she feels it. The lying is her trying to deny it and appear ‘normal’. I’m in my 40s now and managed to develop effective coping mechanisms over the years. She’ll do the same with the right support. Please don’t take her door. She’s struggling enough as it is."
"I think taking her door will cause more harm than good in this situation."
"Get a garbage with a lid for her room and for bathroom teach her to wash her bedding."
"You need to sit and talk to her, and make sure something worse isn’t going on. My mom was SA when she was little and this is what she did when she was little."
"maybe she’s just really embarrassed about it, and doesn’t need to be sat down and spoken to by everyone, I just don’t think that would work either I think she needs to be taken somewere to have a day one on one to try get to the bottom. I’d feel ganged up on and even more worried about it if I was in the situation."
"I am dealing with something similar with my son. We have seen every specialist and it is a trauma response they said. Something could ve happening to her that she doesn’t want to talk about about or could have happened to ger that she repressed. Therapy could help."
"Try taking her to a chiropractor. A few back adjustments might help her wake up when she has to pee in the middle of the night."
"I had a kid who wet the bed and he knew he wouldn’t be in trouble that I just wanted his bedding put in washer etc. he still hid it. It’s more of an embarrassment thing than anything else. Even if you’re not mad- they are still embarrassed. I highly suggest checking the bed each morning and just staying consistent with when there is an accident, not making a big deal out of it and just throwing into washer."
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