DH wears Depends because he "leaks" almost constantly. He gets out of bed to go to the bathroom and on the way pushes down his pants. So before he gets to the bathroom he starts peeing. The carpet is virtually ruined between the bed and the bathroom. Suggesting that he wait till he is in the bathroom to push down his pants of course does no good. I am considering having the carpet removed but it seems wet hardwood or wet vinyl flooring would be slippery. I don't want to risk a fall. Is there anything I can lay over the carpet that is safe, wouldn't cause him to trip? I guess I can buy a carpet shampooer but I have tooooo much to do already!
I am NOT comparing our AD spouses to dogs, but having raised 4 dogs in my lifetime, I can tell you without a doubt, that pee is pee, and no matter how much you clean the carpet, the pee stays in and goes through to the pad, and to the floor beneath. I would definitely go with removing the carpet and replacing it with inexpensive vinyl flooring. It's nowhere close to as expensive as tile, and not as slippery. You can't get pee out of hardwood floors without sanding them down. As I said, I've raised dogs - I've had carpet, hardwood floors, tile, and vinyl flooring. Vinyl is the way to go - besides being the least expensive, and easy to clean up, it also takes a fall better. Falling on tile is an automatic bone breaker.
Guess there was a reason in the old days they had vinyl flooring. We never had carpet when I was growing up except for area rug. I still prefer vinyl over wall to wall carpet.
You can always get rug runners to put on the vinyl if you want carpet for him to walk on. Just get a type that will lay flat and not rub the finish off the vinyl underneath.
Vinyl is much easier to clean up and is not slippery. Just don't get a pattern that has any grooves in it - that can be a pain to clean. A flat surface is much easier.
I know very little about this problem. However, when the hospice nurse was here and we were talking about this problem being one of the next steps I probably will face, she said that if and when it happens, a urinal by the bed is a great help in avoiding accidents on the way to the bathroom. And, try and train them during the day to use a urinal so they get us to it instead of using the bathroom...because many times they won't use the bathroom anyway.
I recommend vinyl, mostly from negative experience. My experience is that the grout between tiles won't stay clean, even if sealed, and laminate gets damaged by standing liquid. Padded vinyl is really comfortable to walk on and warm. When I renovated the one place I insisted on vinyl was in the kitchen--I knew I didn't want to stand on tile while cooking.
JudyTBT, finally something I know about! Vinyl it is. We had carpeting in bedrooms and laminate in hall when we moved in here 7 years ago ... I guess that is about when he started to "leak" actually it was like a waterfall all the way from the bed to the toilet. The laminate in the hall right by the bathroom door is damaged from sitting urine. I tried to mop it up immediately but of course at 2 a.m. I missed sometimes. His carpet was being cleaned by me every month until I wore it out and the smell was still underneath. I tore out the carpeting and the pad was disgusting. So decided Nothing With any Cracks .... the new vinyls are textured a bit and not slippery when wet, easy to mop every day.
Also about the urinal...if it works would be good. I tried it with dh and he missed it also and knocked it over when he didn't miss. He was also catheterized for a while due to other health problems but that was also bad as he slept on it wrong and it kept leaking.
Every day I get up and change his whole bed, I tried the draw sheets but it seems like he peed right around them also. Next I am trying a double bed waterproof mattress pad as a draw sheet but am not too hopeful.
No problems with human incontinence but lots with cats (having almost daily issues now). Fortunately it happens in our basement which has nice stone tile and grouting. The enzyme cleaner does a great job, though sometimes takes more than one application in the grout. I also have a black light so I can see if there is any evidence of urine (I guess this would work for human urine).
Any favorite pet odor products or suggestions for getting urine odor out of laminate? I went downstairs this morning to a horrible odor of urine. My husband used a condom catheter and leg bag last night so he wouldn't have to rush to the bathroom during his birthday party. We had a good party, which means that two serious drinkers and two very light drinkers finished probably 2 1/2 bottles of wine (he won't give up his wine collection). He says what happened is that he emptied the urine bag before going to sleep in his recliner and he thought he had closed it properly but he hadn't. So it ran out onto the footrest of his recliner and the floor all night and when he stood up in the morning and peed. The bag probably was none too clean to start with; he wore it Friday too.
I've damp mopped the floor with a cloth dipped in diluted floor cleaner and wrung out then sprayed with a pet odor product. The footrest of his recliner was very wet so I saturated that with the pet odor product as best I could. It still smells pretty badly down there but I didn't want to open the windows for very long because it is warm and very humid here and I want the floor to dry before he gets out of the shower. Suggestions?
Pam, I just googled it and read that the real problem is when the urine gets in the cracks between the planks. I'd suggest you call in a professional floor and carpet cleaner, such as Chem Dry asap. They saved a very expensive mattress for us, completely removed the stain and odor from it.
Any pet product that has enzymes - those are the buggers that eat up the ammonia which is what causes the smell. Problem is they work best when allowed to sit on the area. I put a plastic bag on top of the rug for 24 hours to give the buggers time to do their work. That would not work with a laminate floor.
When you figure it out, let us know cause someone down the road will need the info.
I had laminate floors in the house I use to live in. The floors were very expensive and I had the dishwasher run over and one of the toilets. Never had any problem with warping, etc....I got the water up right away.
If it were me, I would get one of those plastic bottles you put mustard, ketcup, etc. in and put vingear in it so I could control where I squirt the vinegar and put it on the seams of the planks at night and do that for several nights. I think vingear is the best to get out the urine smell out or do it during the day and just do a small amount and do it several times.
Sometime ago there was a discussion thread regarding using vinegar to get urnine smell out of cars, etc I didn't look it up, but there might be some good ideas on that old thread.
My dh can no longer hit the toilet bowl if he pees in the bathroom and I use vinegar to get the urine smell out of the tile and grout. But, I am now putting down the pads like Coco suggested and it is a real big help.
Judith, I put the pad around the toilet bottom, and now, instead of cutting a shape to fit, I let it bunch up against the toilet, it offers extra protection from it getting in the grout. And, as the thing can be slippery, I take tape and tape around it. Each morning it is ripped up and a new one put down. I had no idea how much he peed on the floor until I started doing this.
Glad you dh is ok...though...you know they cannot tell all kinds of urinary infections without many tests. After months and months of negatives with Dado, they are now giving him an antibiotic for prostatitis. One month supply and he is 3 weeks in.
Does not really seem to change anything, except striking one more possibility off the list of maybes. He still thinks he has to pee constantly, at certain times of day. It is better at night, likely only because we have upped his dose of seroquel.