Why is it that I only get frequent bladder urges at night?!

Why is it that I only get frequent bladder urges at night?

I spend the day working in retail - standing and such. I rarely ever get bladder urges. However, when I lie down at night to go to sleep, my bladder gets ridiculous. It's CONSTANT! Up and down, up and down... And it's never more than a few drops.

What IS this?

1 month ago
I don't wet the bed, by the way. I just spend too much time hopping up and running to the bathroom.

A couple of possibilities...

While working in retail during the day, do you frequently hold your bladder for a long period of time after you feel the need to go, as part of your job? It's possible that the urges may be there during the day, but they just get "drowned out" by the busy-ness of your job and everything, and after you ignore them for a few minutes, they go away. If that's the case, maybe the "quietness" of lying in bed at night with nothing else to do or think about makes the same urges you feel at that time seem stronger than they really are.

Or, it's possible you could actually be straining your bladder muscles by how long you hold it in at work during the day, and the urges at night are the equivalent of the pain or soreness you would feel if you had over-exerted any other body muscle during the daytime. If you notice that the night urges are worse on nights after you work (or hold it a long time for any other reason), this may very well be it. In that case, making a point to make more frequent bathroom trips during the day, so your bladder doesn't get stretched as much, might actually help your night problem.

Or... it may be at least partially psychological (or "in your head"). Or one of the above two things could be happening to a small degree, and your head makes it bigger. If you get in the habit of getting up to pee several times a night, it can become a self-fulfilling prophecy -- you go to sleep thinking about it, or dreading it, and then sure enough, it happens. In that case, maybe just thinking positively ("I don't really have to go, I just went, I'm not going to wet the bed, I'm going to be fine...") might help you to relax and get to sleep. Tell yourself that if you actually do wet the bed, you'll worry about it then, but until that happens, you're not going to let your mind (or bladder) play tricks on you like that.

If all else fails, you could ask your doc for one of those "overactive bladder" medications... but this sounds like something that could be handled without medicine. With just a few drops, your bladder obviously is not full and is capable of waiting longer (compare that to how much you can hold during the day!), so if you can get your mind and bladder on the same wavelength at night, you'll probably be fine.

Good luck!