Why oh Why...

...is my four and a half year old peeing the bed almost every night? We did not go through this with our oldest. When he was four I took him for his annual physical and when the nurse asked if he was potty-trained I proudly said yes. Through the night? she queried. Well, no he still wears a pull-up. Not fully potty-trained she logged into the laptop. Ugh. We went home and created a sticker calendar to keep track of dry days. If he could make it to ten days in a row I would buy him the pack of water guns he so desperately coveted. It was a painful few months of near accomplishment (seven days! eight days!! nine days!!! oops), but by early summer he was fully trained. And has not had an accident since. We tried a similar approach with John when he turned four. His reward of choice was a new Spiderman bike helmet. It took a bit longer, but he was finally able to make it ten days in a row and was rewarded with his new helmet. And then, the setbacks began. He would be dry for a few nights, then wake up completely drenched in pee. I was up changing his pajamas and sheets at all hours of the night, wondering how one little body could produce so much waste. We tried limiting his fluids after school - half glass of milk with dinner and only a mouthful of water with teeth brushing. That has reduced the quantity a little but hasn't stopped the bed wetting. We tried waking him up before we went to sleep and bringing him into the bathroom for a sleep-walking toilet visit. That also helped a little, but sometimes he would pee before we got there, especially if we were up late. The weird thing about all of this is that he gets out of bed during the night - sometimes two to three times - to use the bathroom by himself. I know this because he turns on the light, which shines through our bedroom door directly into my face. At 2 am. And then neglects to turn it off. (We have to keep the door open for the cat who will scratch relentlessly if she cannot go in and out freely.) The worst part of the whole bed-wetting process is that his laundry consistently smells like pee. He pulls off the wet pajamas and stuffs them inside out into his laundry basket. In the morning he proudly announces that he is dry and little do I know he has only been dry since 4 am when he changed his clothes. When I go to do laundry I find wet underwear balled up inside wet pajamas, and EVERYTHING STINKS! When I try to talk to him about it, he grins at me and laughs. LAUGHS! Huh?? Is that some sort of defense mechanism? Why do you think this is funny? I ask. Do you like the smell of pee? No. Do you want to go back to wearing diapers at night? No. Then please please stop peeing the bed. Help!