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AgrippaRidesAgain
member
s/o Pull ups--when would you force PTing?
AgrippaRidesAgain
member
Last July, we tried 3 day PTing and it went horribly. DS got extremely stressed about even the possibility of having an accident. Although the first two days were good, on the third day, he was scared of using the potty, scared of having an accident, and basically melting down and acting out any time that he wasn't using the potty. By day 5, we had zero successes (as compared with only two accidents on day 1) and we were all completely miserable. So, we quit completely and didn't even mention the potty for months.
So, here we are and DS is 3 now. He semi-regularly pees on the potty when he has a bath, so that would be every other day. He refuses to go any other times. He says, "I only pee when it's bath night". He still remembers the horror of last summer. The kid has the memory of an elephant. He's more interested in playing than pottying or even having his diaper changed at this point. He says that he can't feel his pee when he has a diaper on, which makes me think that he needs to do the naked thing again. That's why he pees on bath night too, I suppose. He completely freaks out if I suggest that he stay naked for a little while.
He has summer camp at the end of June, the end of July, and the first week of August. He can wear pull ups for camp, but needs to be potty trained for preschool in September. At some point, we're going to need to push a little harder. When would you do it?
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Re: s/o Pull ups--when would you force PTing?
i was lucky that ds was ready to PT but i really think if you have a week where they can run around naked it really helps. the other thing i swear by with boys is that we have a baby urinal. it's just so much easier for him. it takes less effort for him and that is key. the other thing we had was a potty/seat in every bathroom so there was no excuse.
i think i would start now so that by september there are no accidents. you can start when you are home and move on to other times.
why don't you put just underwear on him, instead of letting him go naked? and then when he has an accident, he has to help you clean it up. Can you put DD on the potty and maybe when he sees that a baby is sitting (w/ your help of course), he'll want to go, too?
What about putting the thicker underwear on him? Then he could feel it is wet but it doesn't necessarily go all over the floor (Maggie would often then slip on our hardwoods making the accident more scary for her). Do you offer any rewards for going on the potty? For pee with Maggie I put out playdough on the kitchen table, she could have it when she went pee in the potty all day. For poop we went big and promised her a trike (we were going to get it anyway so it was perfect), she surprised me by pooping in the potty a week later and then promptly asking where her trike was - we had to go out and get it that night since I had no idea she would do it that quickly.
I will say that Maggie was super scared of going potty too. She started out on the small portable potty in the living room and then moved on to the big potty. it sounds like he CAN do it at bathtime so he is probably ready but it may take some heavy bribery and a lot of reassurance if he is scared. Also I never try and make a big deal out of accidents, just lots of comforting and quick clean up (maggie was scared too). Maggie was only PT'ed a few months before she was 3 so I don't think he is all that far behind and she was very fearful of the whole thing as well.
I forgot to include that he does the same freak out if I suggest underwear. :-( Heck, switching him to pull ups a few weeks ago was a major battle. He wouldn't be swayed by seeing M on the potty. Peer pressure from seeing a friend use the potty might work, but his best friend is younger and not interested at all yet.
He gets two M&Ms for pee and three for poop. He will willingly say, "No, that's ok. I don't want M&Ms/stickers/etc." though. He's not really swayed by bribery. Even if there's something he really wants, if he has to do something he doesn't want to do, he won't go for it. Grr.
I don't know if I'd use the word "force" but I would start now in hopes to be done by September.
The year we PT'd DD #1 we started in May for her to start at her preschool by September, and we've started this month as well with DD #2 in hopes to start her at the same preschool in September. For this preschool the kids have to not only be potty trained, but they have to be able to go on a normal sized potty (with no potty seat), wipe themselves, pull up their pants, wash their hands etc. That's a lot of skills to learn besides literally just putting the pee in the potty. That's why we started months ahead of time.
There are so many ways to potty train. I think you just keep trying different things until something works. And to complicate things, some "tricks" could work one day but not the next, or one week and not the next. I think the hardest part, at least for us, is for mommy and daddy to keep their cool and stay patient and keep trying different things and not get so frustrated we give up. It's a lesson in "slow and steady wins the race" for me - because I would love for the kids to learn it instantly!
Another challenge for us is our DCP highly doubts kids are ready to even start trying until they're "two and a half or closer to three." It's a major philosophical difference we had with her with DD #1 (because she had to be DONE by the time she was 2.5, not starting...) and we've already started Round 2 with her about DD #2 (again, she has to be done by the time she's 2.5 to enter the preschool). But that's a whole 'nother post!
You asked when you should push harder. I say now, because for us, it was such a long process, even after I was fully committed to it. Something might click, and your DS could suddenly be totally open to training in six weeks. But you probably won't be so lucky, and then you'll have lost six weeks of time you could be working on it.
To introduce another daily "scheduled potty time," can you now tell him that every time he gets naked (like he does just before bath time), it's time to sit on the potty? Like when he's changing out of his pajamas in the morning or getting into them at night.
I know you're only supposed to reward, not punish (and the parent is also not supposed to ever lose their patience, but...oops...). But one of the things that sometimes worked for DD was to tell her we were going to go to the playground (or something else she liked) after lunch but ONLY if she stayed dry all morning. If she didn't, I'd be all, "Oh, too bad...it would've been so much fun...but you didn't use the potty, so..." Maybe that's mean, but she was smart enough to understand basic cause-and-effect and how she didn't keep up her end of the bargain. Since she was past her third birthday and still being stubborn about it (because there were no fears involved; she just didn't want to do it), I tried to make her understand that it was her decision whether she used the potty or not and she had to accept the consequences. Sometimes that meant being bottomless in the house for the next two hours, which she didn't like, but I always related it back to, "You peed in your undies last time you had them on, so no more pants until you use the potty two more times."
DD did accept wearing just underwear around the house while training, but she had (and even still has) the same problem of not wanting to stop playtime. Setting a timer for every 20 minutes - and then gradually increasing the increments - worked pretty well, since it turned into the timer being the "bad guy," not me.
Could you take him on a special shopping trip to make him a more active participant in the process? He could pick out new underwear of his choice, maybe a new potty, some new shorts or pants that will get set aside and used as "bait" (they're sitting in his drawer, and he can see them, but he can't use them yet). Talk them up, but he can't wear a pair until he fills up a row on a sticker chart or something? By the way, the sticker chart/M&M system was a joke for DD, because it'd take her forever to fill it up - for every sticker she got, she'd have had three accidents, so when she got her "reward" at the end she hadn't really earned it in my opinion.
Good luck!!! For us, it was an excruciatingly long, painful process, but I made it clear to her that we weren't going to revert back to diapers and the only way the ordeal was going to end was with her using the potty regularly. I have a friend who just made a big (happy) ceremony of throwing out (in reality, donating) all the diapers in the house so her kids saw that there really was no turning back and it was time to be "a big boy and big girl." I don't know if I could be that extreme, but we'll see when it comes time to start feeling things out with DS.
stubborn little guy:)
what about the pool? do you have a pool? or can you buy one of those inflatable ones and put it outside? it's similar enough to bath and he'd have to use the potty before going in and it's the perfect time weather-wise to do it! you could do it several times a day!
instead of asking "do you have to go?" tell him "don't forget to tell me when you have to go" - sometimes you have to say this every 10-20 mins!
I also think you need to start now since you have a deadline. At least it's summer time! good luck!
does he really love something? one of my friends had a "no more diapers" party for her son when he went completely diaper-free.
The idea of giving him a bath daily so he goes more often might help increase his confidence. Also, everything I've read has suggested that until they are ready, you can't make them do it (and once they're ready, it's much faster and easier to train them).
I haven't tired everything in this book yet, but I've read it and hope their method works for my son:
https://www.amazon.com/Potty-Training-Boys-Easy-Quickly--Even/dp/0738213306/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1305683800&sr=8-4
I have also been told that it's not unusual for at least one child in a class not to be completely potty trained, even if it's required. Is he currently in preschool in a 2s class and just needs to be trained to advance to the 3s? Can you visit the class he'd be in so he can see that the kids use the potty (and they have fun so he wants to be in the class)? I wouldn't make a big deal of it, but I've heard that the idea that all the other kids are doing it (aka peer pressure) works with a lot of kids.
FWIW, I think that some preschools require kids in the 3s class to be fully potty trained is BS. The average age for boys to be fully potty trained is 39 months, so there are plenty who train even older.