Peeing on walls and furniture...

[chosenfour]

Recently we have discovered that there is a smell of urine in my sons room.  We were confused because although both boys occasionally wet the bed, they were overnights so that is not as big a deal.  This continued to confound  my husband and myself, not to mention my older son(6) who swore that he had not messed, and could show us the clean overnights.  

This afternoon I put my younger son in for a nap at his regular naptime.  He was VERY angry and didn't want to go.  His request was denied.  After a few minutes I decided to go up to his room and talk to him about how it wasn't a punishment and that he just seemed tired, so should rest (we had some company at the time).  What I found was my almost 5 year old standing, pants down, on my older sons bed peeing on his pillow!  Well this explains everything.   I admit that I lost my cool and gave one good smack on the bum.  Why would he do that?  It is clearly not the first time and I need it to be the last time.  What should I do?  I understand probably needs some therapy help, but that is gonna be hard to find at his age and with such a significant speech delay... There is a right and a wrong way to proceed.  Please help!

[portuguese mom]

I agree with the doctor about the nap issue. I have been there and it is not worth fighting or forcing kids to take a nap who do not want to nap anymore.  You are better off letting him stay up, most of all if you have company, and send him to bed earlier at night.  You also need to make sure that he uses the bathroom before he goes to sleep.  This should include nap, if you decide to continue to have him nap.  I also have a child that used pullups for more years than needed like your sons.  The reason being that she was scared of getting out of bed and use the bathroom in the middle of the night or nap (when the room was dark). She outgrew this phobia by the time she entered elementary school.  Good luck and keep your cool with these little things.  He might learn from you to overreact.  Please do not smack him (timeout is a better alternative to calm you down and him).  Smacking does not work according to most specialists in child development.

[Kevin Kennedy, Ph.D.]

Most likely this was a gesture of anger, albeit misdirected. Might he need therapy? Possibly. It does make sense to arrange an evaluation and see what is recommended. The fact that he has speech delay indicates he may have other developmental immaturities, and this needs to be figured out. As an aside, perhaps you should question the nap issue. Once children outgwow the need for a nap, even if they are tired, it often does not make sense to enforce it.