potty training going very badly...

[peggyfromwastate]

So Luke is training now, and I'm just going to jump in there after not posting so long, but y'all are medical spouses and so you understand. But Luke is 3 plus 2 months, and he has *excellent* control (dry diapers in morning, regular peeing and pooping, etc.) But I started him training and he just will hold it for hours to the point of just crying in agony. This is not fun or rewarding for him! Certainly not for me either.

For now, I am going to wait until we are back from a trip home and then try again. I am looking for any good tips to think of to get him over this? My other kids didn't really worry about going into the potty- there was no fear and after peeing into the toilet once or twice, they just sort of sat on the potty and did their thing. 3 days and we were all done. Luke has gone into the potty, but by that time he is happy that it's over with, and really really happy if I give him a pull-up or a diaper so that he knows he doesn't have to sit on the potty again.

Bribery is also hard for him, because he doesn't like candy, or chocolate. He's really sensitive about everything it seems... He makes me feel like the most incompetent mom!

Oh, that is tough!

I'm sure you are ready to be done with diapers but maybe he just isn't ready yet? I agree that it makes sense to wait until after your trip.

Poor little guy and poor you! In my experience, we've had more fear stuff crop up around 3 years old and it is sometimes hard for them to express or explain. Maybe there is some part about it that is scary for him?

[peggyfromwastate]

That's good to know- His response is so different from my other kids that I just wanted some other advice! I think when he is all the way ready he'll probably be able to do it pretty much by himself, since his awareness is so developed!

If I didn't have to worry about potty training I would probably have like 3 more kids...

If I didn't have to worry about potty training I would probably have like 3 more kids...

I hear you. Potty training was the most painful part of child-raising so far for me. HATED IT!

Good luck. I wish I had more advice. :huh:

[peggyfromwastate]

So he's figured out a very clever way to get out of nap time. Even though he's in a diaper again (he giggled when I put a diaper on him after 2 days of underwear ), after about 25 minutes of "nap", he called hysterically to go to the potty, so I let him out, and he promptly sat on the toilet, peed, and demanded his diaper be put back on...

I feel like I'm being played here, but I still don't think he's all the way ready yet, so...

I really feel like a newbie with this kid... I'm so inadequate!

[GrayMatterWife]

My DS turned 3 last week and potty training has been nothing but a total nightmare. He has great control and simply refuses to get out of a diaper. Nothing works: there is no amount of coaxing, bribing, underwearing-wearing, threatening, gameplaying, example-setting, or begging that gets him interested. I can't stand it anymore. I am so ready for this nonsense to be over. I am so irritated that I make him wipe his bottom (after I've already cleaned off all the poop) and carry his poop-filled diaper (in a ZipLock baggie) to the garbage can and throw it away. I am now at the point where I feel like if I am going to suffer, so is he... Pitch in and help, my little poop factory!

And, of course, the whole situation is once again causing me to be win the "Marginal Mother of the Year" award. He can tell that I am tired of this, and I don't have the wherewithall to hide it. When I was changing him tonight, he looked up at said, "Mom is sick and tired of cleanin' my poop..." (Gee, wonder where he'd heard THAT before...). I am near my wit's end. I think this kid is going to go to his prom in Depends.

Someone asked me how I was handling the potty training thing. I said that it's just like being at work: I clean up all the sh*t there, too. **I need a vacation...**

[DCJenn]

Maybe the 3yo boys had a conference the rest of us weren't invited to.

Mine said tonight, "mommy I pooped in my underwear." (this- after I said OK- you're home from school, you're going to poop in your underwear let's put on a pull-up"...and he got all righteous on me- "No I NOT, Mommy.")

So, we have been doing the "it's your poop, you clean it" routine and the little sh*t said, "no mommy, YOU do it. You're the mommy."

To which I replied, "but it's not my poop." and he said, "yes it is". To which I thought to myself, "look, you little Tzar, I didn't even give birth to you- there is NO WAY I'm even remotely related to that poop."

You can't really ignore it for both smell reasons and there's that whole skin thing...but MAN. IT. IS. ANNOYING.

Maybe we should meet in the middle somewhere- like a pig farm, and let them wallow in filth to their hearts' content.

Feeling everyone's pain.

Jenn

you guys are making me rethink this 3rd kid thing ... a little late.

I swear that pull-ups are the devil. My next kid will wear a diaper until he or she is so sick of it that they switch to underwear on their own. All of this hoop-jumping is just so painful.

Nikolai is good .... "no - you're the mommy." Nice one kid.

I swear that pull-ups are the devil.

[peggyfromwastate]

Maybe we should meet in the middle somewhere- like a pig farm, and let them wallow in filth to their hearts' content.

Feeling everyone's pain.

Jenn

I think they would think this was the most fantabulous field trip ever...

[DCJenn]

I completely agree that pull-ups are the devil but we were kinda forced into the issue back a few months ago by the day care ladies because "they don't change diapers."

what....ever. That's just one of many reasons why we're switching schools.

I did use diapers on him while we were in California. It makes no difference to him- it's all the same- underwear/diapers/pull-up. I've even tried the nekked all day thing. He just held it until approximately 30 seconds after I put a pull-up on him.

I swear, there is no adult more stubborn than a 3yo boy. There's nothing to use as bribery! He'll flat out tell me what the offers have been to poop in the potty and I guess they're not good enough.

Jenn

He'll flat out tell me what the offers have been to poop in the potty and I guess they're not good enough.

Jenn

My friend and her husband were offering a kitty as a reward for using the potty (husband's idea). Several weeks into it in a moment of frustration the mom said "Savannah! Don't you want a kitty?" Savannah said "No. I like kitties, but not in my house."

Way to check that out, Dad.

He'll flat out tell me what the offers have been to poop in the potty and I guess they're not good enough.

Jenn

My friend and her husband were offering a kitty as a reward for using the potty (husband's idea). Several weeks into it in a moment of frustration the mom said "Savannah! Don't you want a kitty?" Savannah said "No. I like kitties, but not in my house."

Way to check that out, Dad.

[diggitydot]

Our third child, DS, was EXACTLY the same way with his potty training. I'm not above bribery, but I don't like doing it with food...that, and we usually don't have any treat type stuff on hand, anyway.

Out of sheer desperation we resorted to bribing him with bubbles. So long as he'd sit on the toilet, we'd sit on the side of the tub with him and blow bubbles. If he got up, we quit. This worked to keep him on the pot long enough for him to have an "accident". Once he did that, we praised the heck out of him and something must have just clicked because he's been trained since. That was also about the time when I refused to buy anymore pull-ups and made him wear "big boy panties", as he called them. (What do you expect? The poor kid has two older sisters.)

It only took a couple days to get him to finally do it, but it took forever for him to have any interest in potty-training, at all. But once we got the idea through to him, he totally went to town and hasn't even had those common nighttime accidents. (Which still surprises the crap out of me.)

Every kid is a little different. Our two older stooges were done with their potty training by the time they were 2. DS didn't even start the process until he was almost 3 1/2. But where the girls took several weeks to train, he took only 2 or 3 days.

Every mom experiences those wonderful little "oh-crap-I-suck-at-this" types of moments. If the nastiest that it hits you is during potty-training, you're doing all right.

[Gwendolyn]

Out of sheer desperation we resorted to bribing him with bubbles. So long as he'd sit on the toilet, we'd sit on the side of the tub with him and blow bubbles. If he got up, we quit. This worked to keep him on the pot long enough for him to have an "accident". Once he did that, we praised the heck out of him and something must have just clicked because he's been trained since.

DS was 3.5 and we are now about two months into a minimal accident lifestyle the above worked for us too. I would carry him half awake to the toilet in the morning and have him sit knowing he would wake up having to pee. For a couple of weeks he would go to school and pee so much that he would soak through his diaper and pants...school thought I was sending him with a wet diaper even thought I assured them he was just holding it. Then I realized he liked playing with my make up while I put it on, si we would sit for nearly 25 min in the morning putting on makeup and then one morning he let go and peed and we danced and sang so much you would have thought heaven had blosomed in our bathroom. The next morning it was only about 15 min...then we added wearing underwear all the time and brought lots of clothes with us where ever we went. I took about 2 weeks of making him sit every hour or so and praising him as if he were turning the potties into gold.

I feel the need to tell the story because this was at the end of several months of doing everything unsuccessfully including doing all the things you are not supposed to do, like yell or cry

After working in the daycare for a while and having the real deal parent experience I now know...all kids are different, they will do it when they are ready, not a moment earlier, all you can do is sit them on the pot when they are cumfortable with it and remind yourself over and over that you are a good parent and it will happen...eventually

Hang in there! Nobody went to the prom in depends