Is your baby peeing through diapers at night? As parents, we’re all familiar with the standard reasons for a baby’s nighttime waking or toddler’s nighttime waking. Newborns and young infants often wake at night out of hunger. Many babies wake out of habit, because they’ve formed sleep associations. But, when your baby is peeing through their diaper at night, it’s so frustrating because maybe they would sleep if it weren’t for the diaper, right?! Sometimes, one leaky diaper is all it takes to turn a peaceful night of sleep into a chaotic mess!
First, how often should you change your baby’s diaper at night? When they are newborns, you will likely change their diaper at each feeding time. By the time they are 3-4 months old, you will likely only change it once a night. And, by 6-8 months old, you most likely won’t need to change their diaper unless they are pooping at night. If your baby is sleeping through the night, no need to wake them to change their diaper.
Every child is different but most babies will sleep through the night without a diaper change at night from a young age. That is…unless they are peeing through diapers. So, what’s a parent to do? How do you stop baby from peeing out of their diaper at night?
Today, we’re spotlighting 7 tips that’ll help you banish those leaky diapers and keep your little one sleeping peacefully.
1. Do a Diaper Change Right Before Your Baby or Toddler’s Bedtime.
This one seems obvious, but not all parents take this step. If your baby or toddler is routinely waking up with a wet, leaking diaper, be sure to do a fresh diaper change right before your baby’s bedtime. If your bedtime routine includes a diaper change as most do, make sure it’s one of the last steps especially if you’ve noticed your baby pees after their last feeding, for example. In addition, bedtime routines get fairly long for some toddlers so that means 30-45 minutes might have passed by the time you’re tucking them into bed.
2. Do a Diaper Change Right Before Your Bedtime.
This won’t work for all babies and toddlers but if you think your child may sleep through (or at least wake only slightly during) a late-night diaper change, then consider sneaking in a diaper change right before you go to bed yourself. Similar to a “dream feed”, you can do a “dream diaper change.” If your baby is a light sleeper and/or has difficulty going back to sleep then skip this, obviously.
3. If Baby is Peeing Through Diapers, Use a Bigger Diaper at Night.
Once your baby or toddler starts approaching the upper end of a diaper’s size limit, the leaks will probably start. If your little one is waking regularly because of a leaky diaper, consider moving up a size (at least at night). Some parents find that this solves the problem completely.
4. Invest in Good Overnight Diapers for Baby Peeing Out of Diapers.
If none of the above tips make a difference in the leaks, consider purchasing separate overnight diapers. Huggies Overnites are a great solution; Pampers Extra Protection Nighttime Diapers are also a good choice. These overnight diapers are thicker and more absorbent than regular diapers, making them a good choice for nights. They’re also more expensive than regular diapers, but since you only need to use them at night, a large box will last longer.
One other option is to use these Bamboo diapers that have double the absorbency than regular diapers. They are also ink-free and hypoallergenic!
5. Consider Using Diaper Booster Pads.
Some parents swear by diaper booster pads as THE solution for their baby peeing through diapers. These booster pads look a bit like feminine pads, and they’re designed to fit inside a regular (or overnight) diaper. The booster pad acts as a first line of defense — it absorbs up to 8 oz. of liquid. Once the pad is full, the diaper absorbs the excess. These might make a good last resort option for those parents who find that even overnight diapers aren’t doing the trick.
Using cloth diapers? They have cloth diaper insert pads, too! GroVia also makes soaker pads and boosters for cloth diapers.
6. No drinks before bed (for toddlers).
Ignore this tip if you have an infant; babies need to nurse or take in formula frequently, and you should never withhold a feeding from your baby in order to prevent diaper leaks. If you have a toddler, however, it’s a different story. If your toddler routinely has something to drink right before bed, this could be part of the leaky diaper problem. Change your routine, and make sure that your toddler’s last drink of the night happens an hour (or more) before bedtime. And, if your toddler is taking off their diaper at night, it might be time to start potty training.
7. Keep Sleep Training
Although inconvenient, if you are sleep training and baby is peeing through diapers at night, you will of course want to clean your baby up, change the sheets, redo a mini routine, and still have your baby try to settle herself. You don’t want to let something like a leaky diaper lead to inconsistency in your behavior and undermine your progress.
When baby is peeing out of diapers at night, it can be very frustrating! Hopefully, these tips can help you fix that problem. Of course, if you need help in your sleep training – look no further! That’s what we are here for. Sleep training can be tough, and hundreds of parents turn to us for sleep coaching help every month. We can help you, too!
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Emily DeJeu says
@ Ashley — love the maxipad tip! Economical, and it’ll make a great, funny story to tell your daughter when she’s older 😉
Thanks for commenting, Ashley!
@ Loz — awesome tips! Thanks so much for sharing these. I especially like your 2nd point, about paying attention to food intolerances. I’ve heard that heavy bedwetting can be a sign of a milk intolerance specifically, but I don’t know much more than that. So thanks for pointing this out!
Sara says
Wool!! I love our wool diaper covers and longies to keep leaks away!
Becky says
Hello all.
My 3-year-old has gone through various spells of wetting through diapers over the last 18 months or so. I have actually read on other blogs that this can be a “developmental” thing where it doesn’t matter what you do to try to avoid it (withhold fluids, etc), it just .. happens. It’s an interesting philosophy and I’ve found it to be particularly true in our case. We’ve successfully used overnight diapers for months and months and about 3 months ago he went through a spell of wetting through EVERY night. It didn’t matter what I did to try to avoid it. Even on days he drank next to nothing (of his own accord), he’s still wet through. It was annoying to say the least. I used boosters and got through it with those, and he’s been without the boosters for several weeks and hasn’t wet through and we haven’t increased diaper size either. To me, it gives some merit to the idea that it’s just something their bodies go through. They certain have so many other changes occurring, why not changes to their process of elimination? Anyway, just thought I’d throw that out there. Sometimes, but certainly not in all cases, it might be a matter of waiting it out before making any drastic changes to see if the “phase” passes.
Also, let us not forget the repercussions of said diaper leaks: the wet bed! I spent weeks stripping and washing bedding daily before I got wise and invested in those Goodnites mattress liners. I think the intention for those is for kids that are potty training and still have accidents at night. But, I found them QUITE useful when dealing with the diaper leak incidents. Just pop one on the mattress (be it a crib mattress or toddler bed/regular bed), and let the leaking begin, and have NO bedding to clean (or, virtually none depending on if a blanket or lovey gets wet!). I found it to be quite a time-saver.
Good luck everyone.
michelle says
My son Brayden is 15 months and would always leak through his diapers he is pees quite a lot lol. After many months dealing with this I ended up buying a great overnight diaper because sometimes he does wake up for a drink they r human we as adults get thristy and get up & get a drink of water so why shouldn’t they. I only give him water no milk. Anyways I found if he needs a quick drink I change him than and sometimes use a little baby powder to help absorb. That has helped me a lot it takes 5 minutes at most of my time and prevents a big mess. I personally would never deprive him of a quick drink if he is thirsty!.
Meg says
My heavy overnight wetter/leaker is also my 26 month old son. We had tried cloth diapering when he was an infant but abandoned that after a few months. I still have all the diapers and doublers I bought so tried a hemp doubler in his overnight diaper (which he ALWAYS pees through regularly). Voila! He woke dry. Thinking of trying the disposable doublers for as long as we keep him in ‘sposies. Thinking of trying cloth again for the new one due in July!
Dale says
My twin boys have been soaking through their diapers since 5.5/6 months…they are 9.5 months now. We went up in sizes, tried over night diapers, doubled up, even tried the cloth diaper plastic covers…they soaked through everything! We found the diaper boosters, and have found those to truly work the best. They will actually still wake up wet sometimes, but they work about 85-90% of the time. I have only found them at Babies R Us, for $6 for a package of 30. I buy them out when I go 🙂 I’m hoping that they’ve now started to drink less and eat more, that we’ll slow down on the leaks!
Loz says
1. don’t tuck their shirt into their pants; this will exacerbate leaks
2. polyester fleece or wool pants will help, since this will evaporate off the runoff while still being breathable. you can also get fleece or wool nappy covers (to use over cloth or disposables), works a treat but must come well above the waistline of the nappy. alternatively a wool sleeping bag over their nappy, no pants at all. cotton is a bad pants choice if you are having leakage.
3. consider food intolerance, as heavy bedwetting at night is a food reaction symptom.
4. I have found heavily boosted cloth nappies much more absorbent than disposables. when we had bad night leakage I would either use a fleece or wool cover over the disposable or use a fleece pocked nappy heavily stuffed with bamboo (added advantage, more breathable for baby than a disposable). now we can get away with disposables at night again though as at 2, they aren’t weeing as much overnight.
5. you can put a cloth nappy and cover over a disposable to catch any leaks. this works better than disposable over disposable, because the backing of disposable nappies is waterproof and you have to stab through it to let the wee from nappy one get through to nappy 2. when I have done that the baby has ended up with poolyacrylate crystals on their skin which is not good.
Ashley says
We had this problem a few months ago with our now 18 month old daughter. We cut off liquids after dinner time and we started using the diaper booster pads inside her nighttime diaper. I now, however, just use a big maxipad in her diaper, because they are cheaper than the booster pads, and it works just as well!
Emily DeJeu says
To all the parents who’ve commented so far, here’s something I’m noticing: you’re all referencing your sons in your comments. Which leads me to wonder if leaky nighttime diapers tend to be more of a boy problem than a girl problem? Anyone have thoughts/insights on this?
Emily DeJeu says
@ kelly — way to wrap that little guy up tight in as many diaper layers as possible! His bum must look positively gigantic at bedtime 😉 So glad to hear you found a system that keeps him dry through the night, Kelly!
Thanks for commenting.