Potty training is a nightmare

Taytee · January 2012

We've in no way shape or form pushed Emily to potty train. Abby was potty trained 2 weeks before her 3rd birthday and I couldn't care less about changing diapers for another year with Em.

She has taken it upon herself to try and use the potty. This is creating a lot of behavioral issues around pottying and everywhere else too. She's going through one of those learning curve "wonder weeks" stormy periods now where she's not sleeping well, not eating, throwing and hitting etc. It's really frustrating and it's getting worse. Yesterday she wouldn't sit on the potty but then was all frustrated and tearful as she pooped in her diaper. What gives kid??

I've been trying to get her to bed for over 2 hours now. She just keeps crying that she wants to go poo-poo potty (which she uses to say #1 and #2). I got her out of her jammies and let her sit on the potty 3 times before I said enough is enough. The next 2 times I went in there she had stripped and I had to re-diaper and re-dress her. She's not constipated or anything, she's just using it to game the system.

I don't want to put her in a toddler bed yet. I don't want to have to remove the dresser from her room etc etc. But now we're at the point where I think we just have to move forward to full on panties because there's no going back to full time diapers. And since she's already stressing about using a diaper at night, I don't think we can do panties during the day and diapers at night.

Anyone elses LO train this early? Got any hints, tips, advice???

ec3under4 · January 2012

Both of my older two were trained by that age. My daughter was very similar in that she was ready for it but couldn't quite put two and two together. For her, she REALLY wanted a big girl bed so out of desperation I said, if you go in the potty and we get rid of diapers then you can get a big girl bed. That was all she needed and I had to go buy a mattress that night because she went all day and has been going strong since. My oldest was a little tougher but that's probably my fault for training him before he was "ready". Anyways, for him, he was scared to go in the potty so we literally spent three days sitting on the little potty while watching tv and drinking a ton of water. Finally, he gave in and figured it out. With him, it was a lot of bribing for treats, etc and a good week at home. For each, I told them we were getting rid if diapers and made a big deal about throwing them all away and, I did. Once I said the diapers were gone, they were gone for good. No looking back. I did however introduce the pull up and/ or cloth training pant that I called "big girl/boy nighttime underwear". Since we had never used "pullups", it was a new concept and my daughter especially liked that Dora was on them and since we used cloth diapers, she hadnt really seen that before. It worked for a little while until she decided she was ready for big girl underwear at night. At that point, I would put underwear on first and then a pullup over it and told her that when she woke up with her underwear dry then she didn't have to use the pullup. It took her a week or so and then we were down to just underwear at night. Just imagine how nice it will be to not have to buy diapers!!!

atlantic · January 2012

V is struggling with this. She needs to poop. She doesn't want to go in her diaper...but...she's not really comfortable going in the potty yet- I think especially because she is used to standing, not sitting. It's actually really sad.,,she held her poop for three days an then I hurt to go! What about a pull up at night? We call them fairy pants so she doesn't totally consider it the same as dipe. cloth training pants? Let me know when you've got this all figured out and can share your secrets!

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