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The Effects of Divorce on Children
A Potential Cause for Bedwetting
By Carma Haley Shoemaker
According to Dr. Sheldon, one of the most common causes for the development, reoccurrence or increase in bedwetting episodes is stress placed on children by one or both parents.
"Children feel overwhelmed when forced to choose one parent over the other," says Dr. Sheldon. "Although the parent may not mean to put stress on their children, gestures, comments or statements can cause an increase in stress, and ultimately bedwetting. Parents should not put their children in the middle, in a position where they have to choose between their mother and father, or make them decide where their loyalty lies. Regardless of what one parent thinks or feels for the other, they are both still parents to the same child or children. Seeing or hearing the two people they love and trust fighting and disliking each other can be a great source of turmoil and stress for a child."
"When my wife and I divorced, our daughter had been toilet trained for a few years and really didn't have accidents at night," says Richard, a dad from Kansas. "Not long after we moved into separate households she began wetting the bed. The accidents happened most frequently at her mother's home. At the time, there was more turmoil at her mother's home – crying, yelling on the phone while our daughter was there – and I've always suspected the stress had something to do with our daughter's accidents. It did wake her if she began to wet, but left her scared and confused. It took about six months for her to 'outgrow' the problem – just as things began to settle down between her (now-divorced) parents."
