What is secondary nocturnal enuresis?
Secondary bedwetting can be a sign of an underlying medical or emotional problem. The child with secondary bedwetting is much more likely to have other symptoms, such as daytime wetting. When a child starts to wet the bed again after being dry for months or sometimes even years, there is often an identifiable cause. One of the most common is stress, when a sudden change rocks a child’s world. Almost any change in the environment – good or bad – can be a trigger; for example, a new baby, a death in the family, parents’ divorce or marriage problems, a new home or school, or even a long visit from relatives. Secondary bedwetting may be related to sexual abuse or to extreme bullying. Rarely, this form of bedwetting is related to a medical problem, such as a urinary tract infection or diabetes, and in these cases there are usually other obvious symptoms of medical illness.
