night urination?

[AngieW in Texas]

My middle dd (16yo) gets up multiple times during the night to urinate (typically 2-3 times, but very occasionally she'll get up more than this). This has actually been going on for years.

 

She doesn't do any soft drinks at all and actually has the healthiest diet of anybody in our house. She MUST have a solid serving of protein every few hours or she will wig out.

 

She has occasionally had to fix herself a meal around 3am because she woke up starving (despite eating a solid amount before going to bed).

 

She has had vasovagal syncope in the past. She saw a neurologist because this happened twice in one week when she was 13yo. I saw one of the episodes and it looked like a seizure to me. The other one happened upstairs when everybody else was downstairs and we heard her rip the towel rack off the wall in the bathroom as she crashed to the floor. The neurologist said that she just needs to be very careful to eat a protein every couple of hours during the day and to make sure that she eats a protein within 2-3 hours of bed and soon after waking up. She did have an EEG, but it didn't show any problems.

 

She has Asperger's, so sensory issues could be at play here as well.

 

For her a typical day of food is

1 cup of frozen peas straight from the bag

ants on a log (celery stick stuffed with peanut butter, but with chocolate chips on top instead of raisins)

1/2-1 can of Bush's barbecue baked beans

2-4 boneless skinless chicken breasts (spiced and baked in the oven)

2-4 flat iron steaks (about 1/3 pound each, spiced and baked in the oven)

1/4 head of iceberg lettuce

1-2 pieces of fruit from: apple or plum or orange or nectarine or bunch of grapes or slices of watermelon/canteloupe/honeydew melon

1-2 cups bowtie pasta or 1-2 slices garlic Texas toast or 1 cup white rice

1 cup of grape juice (first thing in the morning)

1.5 cups of fruit smoothie (frozen banana, raspberries, cherries, blackberries, strawberries, and orange juice blended together)

handful of cashews or pecans or walnuts

 

She is 5'0.5" tall (wasn't expected to go beyond 4'11") and weighs 105 pounds. We have lots of 4'10" and 4'11" women on both sides of the family and I'm just 5'1.5".

 

Any ideas what might be causing the frequent urination? I've thought about hypoglycemia, especially because of her definite need to have protein throughout the day. She really isn't big on grains and rarely has more than 1 serving/day of grain and sometimes goes several days in a row without grains.

[Jean in Newcastle]

Has she been checked for diabetes?

[Shawna in Texas]

Has she been checked for diabetes?

 

First thought was this.

 

What are her urinary habits during the day? When she goes those times at night does she sit there for a bit or does she go right away? Does she sleep between going?

 

I'm not diabetic, but I do this. I've never brought it up to a Dr. I might be on the spectrum. I go first thing in the morning. I go once more around dinner time. I go before bed. So, pretty normal for waking hours. I go to bed. I may or may not doze for a bit, play on my phone, get up and go an hour and a half later so that I can be completely ready for bed. Sometimes I go quickly, sometimes I have to sit for a bit and get just trickle a bit. Go back to bed. Doze some more. Jerk myself awake sometime later and think to myself 'I'd better go try again so that I don't have to disturb myself from deeper sleep.' I go sit again. Sometimes it's right away, sometimes I have to wait a bit. Obviously this is all completely mental on my part. And to make it more mental, sometimes I feel the urge to wake my children up to see if they have to go, too. Maybe I should have posted this in the 'secret weirdness' thread.

Edited July 8, 2012 by Shawna in Texas