To ask if anyone else had a 'late' toilet trainer? DC1 may be refused nursery entry as he isn't dry.

[HackerFucker22]

DC1 is almost 3 and in my non expert opinion is nowhere near ready to toilet train. We've tried on and off for a few months now and not once have we had a wee where it is supposed to go (we're leaving potty's down and offering toilet ... I have a seat to go over loo and a step). We have big boy pants and we've even tried some bribery. So far so bad.

DC1 is due to start nursery immediately after his 3rd Birthday and the policy is that they only accept dry children I am not sure on the flexibility of this nor the 'legalities' but to say I am stressed is an understatement. I don't want to pass this onto DC though.

I have a meeting with teacher tomorrow and will ask but I'm scared DC1 is going to lose his nursery place. Is this a possibility?

I completely understand why they have the 'must be dry' policy but surely my child isn't the only child to not be dry? Surely they must have some kind of workaround as obviously you cannot force them to toilet train to a schedule?

There are no SN involved. DC just isn't getting this at all bless him. We're on our 3rd pair of pants of the day already.

Any words of wisdom or advice appreciated.

We didn't need to stay in a whole week, I think we braved a trip to the local park on day 3. There was a lot of "we are going out so we go to the toilet first. We are in a cafe so let's use the loo while we are here. We're leaving this place so let's go to the loo before we go" in those first weeks.

And I am not claiming we are perfect. 4.5 and still not cracked overnight.

HackerFucker, the other thing I did was take the potty everywhere with me in a plastic bag. Was a bloody pain to be honest, especially as DD (she is now 17 I should add) would suddenly announce the need to pee in the middle of the town centre. However, it worked. Did the same with DS (he is now four) and same applied. It was just poo with him because it made him vomit hence having to keep it enclosed in a pull up. I wouldn't stop going out, just be prepared for a bit of inconvenience, which will hopefully be shortlived.

Yes, we weren't trapped at home for a whole week. The first couple of days we did stay at home, then we began to be able to go out for eg 30 mins to pop to the shops and build up from there. By the weekend in both cases they were reliably dry enough to do things like go to the park or around a supermarket and the following Monday went back to nursery wearing pants but with extra spare clothes just in case (though they weren't needed). But the first day I did a lot of mopping up, and it would have been easy to say "oh he's not ready yet, I'll just leave it". In part because I didn't have the luxury of taking another week off in a month or so, we just persevered and cracked it.

I truly regret potty training ds1 at the age I did - 2.5.

He was not ready. He got stressed. I got stressed. He became hideously constipated and was truly miserable for about a year.

He started preschool at 3 in nappies, following GP recommendation to totally knock training on the head until his constipation had improved. Fully out of nappies, easily and without accidents, at nearly 4. I should have waited rather than pushed when he wasn't ready.

He is my second child. Dd was dry night and day, and fully trained at 2.2. She was ready. Ds1 wasn't.

Ds2 fully trained at 3.9, when he was ready. No stress, no angst, no upset. Minimal accidents. Dry at night as soon as dry in the day.

All the preschools they attended were very relaxed about children arriving in pull ups. Thank goodness!

I have a ds(9) who still soils himself most days. He has ASD. The worse time for incontinence issues were reception and year 1 at school (private nursery was very good). This was because he had not been diagnosed and teacher had too much to deal with. Speak to the nursery to see what they recommend in terms of support. Your ds certainly won't be the only one. Hopefully peer pressure will help too.

I did the focusing on it for a week not going out thing. Dd1 took about 6 months until she was reliable-ish (still accidents once a week for a year), DD2 took about 2 months and DS (SEN) took about two years. It wasn't because they weren't 'ready' just that they all took ages to learn. Nor was it because of anything I did. My siblings reported similar struggles with their offspring. Some children will 'get it' in a week some won't and will struggle to learn.