Good teacher

I love getting positive comments on the Bog Standard you tell us pages but sadly they are few and far between. Most are stories of pupils having accidents in class because they weren’t allowed to go to the toilet or horror stories of pupils faced with loos without cubicle doors or locks, no cleaning, no soap, no toilet roll, no warm water… Anyway, I’m getting off subject – this is a positive post!

Today I received a comment from a very sensible teacher – I just wish more were like him. He posted on the access to toilets section and said;

“Allowing children to use school toilets is an education for both teacher and pupil alike.
Teachers must understand the needs of their learners. The route to effective classroom and behaviour management does not lie in the inflexible, unbending refusal to let students use the bathroom. A bad teacher can make students have accidents; a good teacher will not require displays of power to maintain a safe and effective learning environment. 

On the other hand, particularly in secondary school, students must learn to budget free time and remain aware of the effects of leaving a lesson. If pupils are engaged and hooked on what they are doing, often they will forget about the toilet. We are all human; mistakes can be made. Pupils forget about going to the toilet at break time as teachers forget to mark books or return projects.

Any system must be flexible yet clear in its consequences. The student who requests repeat toilet visits compared with the student who apologises and asks to leave before the others arrive are quite different, and require different responses. A flexible system will also allow those with anxiety/medical problems to visit the toilet discreetly and not stick out as the ‘only one who gets to go’.”

I’ve said before that teachers allowing access to toilets during lessons is something that causes a lot of intense debate. But the approach above seems very sensible and fair to me.  I’ve never really understood it when people argue that if you allow access it’s going to be toilet anarchy and all the pupils will be getting up and going every 5 minutes. Surely any good teacher can control a class and identify the genuine requests without fuss and disruption. And if a clear and fair system has always been in place, it’s not going to be something pupils will take advantage of – we need to give trust and respect in order to get it back.

Let me know what you think…

Natasha 

Rising cost of bedwetting

New figures have shown that bedwetting costs families an extra £716 per year.

To some, it might not sound much but it’s nearly a thousand pounds – and for a lot of families, an extra £700 a year could buy a holiday, 2 months worth of food shopping, a family membership to a country club and much more I haven’t even thought of yet!

But just a quick look at our parent’s message board will tell you it isn’t just the financial strain of bedwetting that can affect a family. It’s the broken nights, tiredness, extra washing, lack of understanding from friends or family and sometimes health professionals and the helpless feeling that you want to improve things for your child but don’t know how.

Jenny pointed out in her last blog entry  that over a million UK children suffer with continence problems, the most common being bedwetting.

ERIC is here to help children overcome bedwetting so that they can lead happier and more carefree lives and so that their parents don’t need to worry about buying pull-ups or extra PJs and sheets!

But to do this we need people to know we’re here. Many families hold off seeking help for childhood continence problems in the hope it will go away by itself. But why wait when there is often something that you can try to overcome the problem.

So if you agree that families shouldn’t wait, if ERIC has helped you or you believe in our cause – tell someone about ERIC today! Tell them to look us up on Google or give us a shout out on Facebook or Twitter and help us reach more families.

Natasha

No Bog Standard

Bad news unfortunately.

You may remember that our Bog Standard campaign has been lobbying for better regulations for pupils’ toilets in schools.  Sadly the government hasn’t listened to us and last week published changes to the School Premises Regulations that will actually make things worse for children’s school toilets!

There are NO laws that state school toilets must be cleaned regularly, must have toilet paper, soap, doors that lock or must be maintained – and as a result thousands of children across the UK are faced with disgusting school toilets, with no locks, no loo roll and no soap.

Would you put up with this in your workplace?

Toilets that teachers use are protected by laws that include minimum standards like regular cleaning and ensuring enough supplies of toilet paper and soap.

It seems crazy to me that there is nothing similar for pupils and that the government won’t do anything about it.

You might think it’s common sense that schools ensure there is toilet paper and soap available for pupils and that their toilets are clean and pleasant to use – and I agree it is common sense. But that doesn’t mean schools are doing it and I know from the emails I get and the comments on the Bog Standard website that thousands of children and young people are facing disgusting school toilets every day.

The toilets are probably the most rooms in a school – so why are they such a low priority?

Within the new School Premises Regulations, it stipulates that “suitable toilet and washing facilities must be provided for the sole use of pupils”

But what does “suitable toilet and washing facilities” mean? According to the pupils, parents and health professionals we hear from every day, it certainly isn’t the state of school toilets at the moment.  Without clear minimum standards, this new legislation will do nothing to improve things – it is so vague it is unenforceable. Parents and pupils will not have meaningful protection or be able to holds schools to account and schools will lack clear guidance on what to provide.

Because they are unpleasant to use, children avoid the toilets at school. This can cause or make existing continence problems worse and can lead to other health problems too. Toilets really are important. But do you know what the toilets are like in your child’s school?

Despite this set back, we will continue with the Bog Standard campaign and we will improve toilets for pupils in schools. If you have any suggestions or would like to support us by providing a case study please get in touch.

Natasha 

The Regulations can be read in full here. 

Ode to Potty Training…

Today’s post comes from Hayley, who shares her experience of toilet training her daughter with Down’s Syndrome. Hope you enjoy it and do let us know what you think!

Share this:

If there was something I wasn’t expecting to come across today it was an article in That’s Life featuring an 18 year old admitting to having bed wetting problems.  Already I have made it sound as though she has been doing something wrong, which is unintentional but probably what a lot of young people feel when they have continence issues.  Even more so when it’s something which either seems to be frowned upon or mocked.

The word brave gets bandied around quite a lot, unnecessarily on occasion; in this case however I feel that it fits just fine.  I know that I wouldn’t have had the nerves to open up about it to my friends, let alone a national magazine.  In this situation she was lucky enough to have the support of those around her but how many of us could say that they’d be willing to share in something that can be perceived as shameful.

So what can be done to change this attitude towards bedwetting?  Or any other type of continence issue for that matter.  We hear about hundreds of thousands of sufferers at ERIC so how is it right that you hardly ever read about it? Would holding assemblies at schools make an impact or just increase the chance of further embarrassment?  Should there be more discussions or stories about incontinence in the media, not just in the magazines for health professionals?  Either way it won’t happen unless there are people behind it, giving it some kind of backing.

This teenager came forward to tell her story.  A positive one where things had improved greatly for her.  Yes maybe there were times when she might have despaired about her problems but she overcame them.  And maybe that’s the message which needs to be broadcast.  It may not be cured overnight.  But what is?

Crescent 

That’s Life feature

We’ve just had our first feature of a young person, pictured in a magazine, talking about her struggles with wetting the bed and daytime wetting.

Having been a regular on the ERIC message boards for many years, Hannah came back to pay us a visit, bringing her positivity with her to tell other young people in the same situation as she was that there is light at the end of the tunnel. You can read her message here http://www.eric.org.uk/Teens/viewThread/2354

We got in touch with Hannah to ask if she could help us raise awareness through our media work.  We work hard to get continence problems featured in newspapers and magazines but these days, they all want case studies with pictures. They won’t even accept ‘disguised’ or blacked out pictures to hide identity. So sometimes we really do struggle when we have an interesting or positive story to tell but no one willing to be pictured.

That’s why we need children, young people and parents willing to include a photo with their story. But as I’ve said before, it really has to be their decision and we never want to make people feel vulnerable. Hannah is proud to have overcome her wetting problem, but she is starting Uni in September and was a little concerned that people might see anything she did in the media and recognise her. So we placed  Hannah’s story in That’s Life – a magazine with a huge readership of mums but unlikely to read by 18 year olds like Hannah. This meant that she helped us reach a large selection of our target audience, but it is quite unlikely that any young people that know her would have seen it. We also made sure that Hannah got a full read back from the journalist that wrote the story to check she was happy with the way it was presented.

For Hannah, it was a really positive experience – she knew that she would be helping people in the same situation as her who didn’t know where to turn for help and she was really pleased when the feature came out. We’ve already had a number of contacts to our services from the feature and we are so grateful for Hannah’s support.

We want to get to a point when childhood wetting and soiling problems are accepted and not seen as something to be ashamed of – and one way we can do this is by people stepping up like Hannah and saying ‘I’m normal and it happened to me ‘.  Could you help us too? Do get in touch if you want to talk through sharing your story. You can email me at Natasha@eric.org.uk

18 year old Hannah suffered well into her teens with continence problems but thankfully these are now resolved. Without the help and support from ERIC, she would have been very alone. That’s why Hannah is so keen to help us raise awareness of our work. She is the first young person to bravely be photographed to appear in an ERIC magazine feature.  Her feature is below – what do you think?

Natasha 

ERIC World Record attempt – STOP the Issue Ballooning!

Remember our World Record attempt last month? Well here is the video – I think it’s pretty funny, let me know what you think! And remember, if you fancy doing something fun or wacky to help raise awareness and funds for ERIC – just get in touch!

It really was a brilliant day and although we didn’t break the record, we had a hilarious time trying!

in June 2012, ERIC supporters Mark and Mark challenged the Guinness World Record for the fastest time for a team of two to pop 100 balloons. The challenge was t raise awareness and funds for ERIC’s STOP the Issue Ballooning campaign which encourages families to get help for childhood continence problems, sooner rather than later. The world’s largest E-balloon race was also launched to raise money for ERIC.

Natasha

One million UK children have continence problems…

The recent census figures for England and Wales tell us that there are now 13.4million children and teenagers under the age of 19yrs in England and Wales.  This is significant as ERIC knows that 1 in 12 children and young people suffer with continence issues. A quick calculation will tell you that in England and Wales there are now 1.1million children with continence issues.

What does 1.1million look like – approximately the whole population of the UK’s second biggest city, which is Birmingham. Hard to imagine that so many young people could be suffering at any one time and yet when you visualise how many people are in the city of Birmingham almost startling.

Yet at ERIC we still talk daily and communicate often with families and young people who think they are alone. My dream is that one day it will be okay for a child to say ‘hey I wet the bed’ and for their friends to think ‘so what!’. For a child to soil or wet themselves in class and for the school to react in a way it would if there was a fire alarm practise – just get on with the job in hand and don’t make a fuss.

1.1 million…….and yet still in the UK we don’t pay enough attention to these children and young people – one day we will, let’s hope it’s before the next census figures come out.

Jenny 

Not a real charity…

Today’s post comes from Crescent, ERIC’s longest serving volunteer. Crescent has been volunteering for ERIC for 6 years now and we are so grateful for her support.  

My Dad has been running races since the beginning of time and after many years I have finally worn him down into slipping on his familiar trainers for ERIC at the Bristol half marathon.  Some might say that’s great, another supporter.  Others might ask why’s it taken you so long?  There in lies my younger brother; I suppose you could call him my Dads’ running manager as he chooses which charity they’ll be fundraising for.

You see even though we knew someone who had continence issues, in his opinion ERIC isn’t a real charity and not a worthy cause!  Let’s just see who he’ll be calling when he starts potty training.  His children that is.

When it comes down to it continence problems are a subject which gets swept under the carpet.  Yet you can see an advert on the telly of four ladies that lunch talking about their constipation issues (http://tinyurl.com/64y5ck) but a child or a teenager? No. That’s far too embarrassing or awkward to see.

Anyhow I digress, as the 30^th of September approaches and bottles of cream to relieve muscle pain start appearing around the house, I’m sure that the donations will arrive.  And maybe that will convince my brother otherwise that people do believe childhood continence is an issue which needs to be confronted and taken more seriously.

Crescent 

Crescent’s Dad’s just giving page is here http://www.justgiving.com/mrowenruns/eurl.axd/0e886df4bcb4f34484f10377652759d7

School girl forced to drink urine as punishment for bedwetting

Today I heard in the news that a school warden in India forced a 10-year-old girl to drink her own urine after wetting the bed.

It is alleged that the warden squeezed the urine from the bed sheets into the girl’s mouth as a punishment and later explained to her parents that this was “treatment to stop a dirty habit”.

This is a shocking example of the humiliation, mistreatment and misunderstanding children can suffer as a result of wetting the bed. Although this is a very extreme case, all across the world and in the UK, children are still punished for wetting the bed – something they have no conscious control over. Bedwetting happens when a child is asleep so and punishment on any level is never the way to deal with it

Bedwetting affects half a million children and young people in the UK, but because it can be embarrassing or hard to talk about, most people think they are alone and don’t know where to get help.  If only they knew about ERIC.

ERIC is the only UK charity providing help and support on bedwetting and other continence problems to children, young people and their parents.

We all need to work together to raise awareness of bedwetting. Too often children and young people are mistreated, misunderstood and marginalised because of this medical condition they can’t help.

ERIC helps over 100,000 families each year but we want to reach more. Bedwetting affects 500,000 children and young people each year and for the majority of cases, a call to the ERIC Helpline or visiting www.eric.org.uk will overcome the problem.

If you or your family suffers with bedwetting, contact ERIC for help and support. You can help us raise awareness and help others by posting on ERIC’s message boards to help others in similar situations and share your story by providing a case study. Leave a comment if you can help or if you have suggestions of things we can do please let us know.

You can read more on this story here http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-18765286

Natasha