To disagree with nursery potty training ds

[Soubriquet]

Ds was 3 at the beginning of march and has been attending this nursery since he was 2.

It's a fantastic nursery and I've never had any problems with it.

However yesterday, they sent home a note asking for pants and spare trousers as they were going to start potty training Ds.

I don't want them to potty train him. I was waiting until the summer holidays like I did dd as it was so much easier when she could walk around with no clothes on, she understood better and was trained in 3 days. She was 3.4 years when I did it with her

I suspect they want him to move up to the next group and they require them to be potty trained in that group. Something that was never mentioned when I joined him there.

Would you speak to the nursery and request they don't do it?

My biggest problem is that Ds seems to be immature for 3. He has only recently started to speak in full sentences and even the struggle to understand him is difficult. I honestly don't believe he will understand it just yet.

DS2 is 4 next week, his nursery were totally supportive of me not pushing potty training because I was waiting for him to be ready. Apart from one woman who did my box in going on and on and on. Eventually I had to resort to “reasonable adjustments” based on his ASD diagnosis. DS1 was 3.5, DD was just turned 3. DS2 has been potty trained for 2 weeks because he realised he needed the loo and started asking. Funnily enough whenever I tried before he was ready he was hugely distressed and it resulted in meltdowns (NOT tantrums). But since he’s been ready it’s a different ball game.

Stick to your guns Sou, they should have spoken to you first.

The only way you will know if he is ready is to try though surely? Unless it’s tried you can’t say he isn’t ready.

Let them give it a go. See what happens and take it from there.

I think that sounds like an excellent plan, Soubriquet

Go with your gut. There’s nothing worse than starting it ‘too early’ and finding that months and months down the line you’re still dealing with accidents. The summer is only a couple of months off. What’s the hurry.

BTW your comment on teeth brushing also betrays massive ignorance as the advice from the NHS is that parents should be involved in that until age 8-10, so well past school starting age.
Maybe in future you could avoid spouting your misinformed drivel all over the place

'Involved' !! That doesn't mean always doing it for them!
I also know very well that children potty train at different ages depending on the child's confidence or ability but this does seem to be getting later...as is dressing!

If you doubt for one moment that there are parents who delay their child's development by insisting on doing it for them longer than needed, you are naive....and talking drivel yourself!

It's actually quite funny that some posters think it's ok and developmental for kids not speaking till later (which it obviously is or could be other causes), but something like PT has to be parental laziness or incomprehensible? Surely with both some kids develop later/earlier parents have some effect but genes and personality may make more difference.
i had a 3.4yo in nappies. Like another poster she was ahead in other areas, reading cvc at 3.6yo.
Reasons were being pg with dc2 and then newborn. Not wanting to lift her onto toilets etc. But the main issue was behaviour. She was hyper, a bit defiant, and controlling so something like this which puts the control with the child is a nightmare.
She however trained in less than a week despite having a few month old dsis. But we did have a few 'accidents'
Dc2 now a few months off 3, behaves very similarly. I did try at 20m and several times since. The issue is not the going on potty, she can but i gave up each time when some (very soft and not log-like) poo got on the carpet and then she would tread in it. Also as she is still napping or getting tired, behaviour deteriorates so more likely to do something silly.
Pt is mostly behaviour. (Compliance) As another poster said some kids are immune to peer pressure.
Also the whole - your kid should do xyz by starting school attitude is really annoying re summer born kids. Why are we sending them so younginto classes of 1:30 when some cant reliably wipe/zip up coats etc. Wont drink water all day.
A lot of people understandably are embarrassed of kids having wee accidents when out, not to mention there is no loo at our park (and i dont do weeing behind bushes), the library is closing permanently etc. So literally for a lot of the day there is no toilets unless you go home or bring a potty (though im not to comfy with mine wee/pooping on potty in the park either).
There is also the challenge of public toilets where they cant reach the sinks and try to touch everything (including nappy bins or sanitary bins) then theres no hot water or soap. Or they often fall asleep in pushchair or car.

No it isn't Fosters, that is an old fashioned Freudian idea

Well it isn't actually - my nephew has had long term constipation issues due to my sister enforcing potty training at 18 months. My DH also had poo issues as a kid due to enforced early potty training.

It would be interesting to know if there are many/any children in washable nappies that aren't potty-trained by 3. I wonder whether the magical properties of disposables as lauded in all the adverts (where your precious baby's skin is still dry after a full 12-hours of unbroken sleep) are to blame.

We use reusables and my DS is 2.1

My mother used reusables on all four of us. I was potty trained at 18 months, my sister was 2.5, my other sister was 3.5 and my brother was 3.

There's no harm in potty training as early as you want provided your child is ready.

gotta if I had said any of the things you suggest that then I would indeed also be talking drivel...but I didn't...not at all...even slightly.

What you did was indicate that children not brushing their own teeth at school age was a negative issue. It isn't because the advice is that children should not be brushing their own teeth at age 5. Hence you are spouting drivel.

Maybe potty training is getting later because more parents are opting to wait for their children to be physically ready? That would be a good thing no?

Here is a quote about what people did back in the 1930s when the average age for potty training was 18 months. "Often, to avoid extra work, parents would resort to dramatic measures to train their children: Enemas, suppositories, and physical force were enlisted in an effort to teach children to use the restroom at younger ages." Sounds fab doesn't it?

before that babies were routinely given laxatives to cause regular predictable poo...even better.

Christ I never heard of babies being given laxatives except syrup of figs. I suspect that is what you are referring to. And children of all ages and many adults took them. Just as today many take a multi vitamin.

I don't really care when anyone toilet trains their kids. But it does seem to be true that most children can be toilet trained earlier than is now usual in Britain. There has been some research that this is linked to disposables as it makes it harder for babies to learn when they are wet and link that to the sensation of weeing. But I would not use washable nappies myself.

It really is not 'normal' for a 3yr old to not be potty trained. Common these days yes, but not 'normal'.

It's a social side effect of disposable nappies being so effective.

Cloth nappied kids are potty trained earlier, because they hate feeling wet. (I use disposables by the way so I'm not part of the cloth brigade).

If you're late 20's- early 30's and older... you would not have been 3 and in nappies when you were a kid!! Most of us were potty trained BEFORE we turned 2yrs or just after.

No kids in Montessory wore nappies when I was a kid. Neither did I. We were TWO.

My Ds is 3 and his speech is delayed and he speech and language therapy. But when he was 2.3 years old my mum was visiting and she is a bit old school and one morning after breakfast she sat him on the potty and he did his first poo on the potty and we just went with it. He couldn't even speak but he managed to potty train within a week. I sometimes think it was better to do it when he was younger and he just went with it. I have some friends who have quite clever 3 year olds who have been speaking for ages and now they are trying to potty train them, i isn't going well as they are almost too clever and understand too much.

It's a social side effect of disposable nappies being so effective.

If you're late 20's- early 30's and older... you would not have been 3 and in nappies when you were a kid

Utter bollocks. My sister is 26 btw and didn't potty train til she was 3.5. AND she was in reusables, as were all 4 of us.

Children still in nappies probably wouldn't have been allowed to go to nursery when I was a child. Thankfully things have changed.

It's a social side effect of disposable nappies being so effective.

Indeed! And how fortunate for the manufacturers that children are in them for so much longer.

There were some reports when my children were small that disposable nappies might also increase the risk of male infertility. Not sure whether that's still considered an issue or not but it might be a reason to try potty training sooner rather than later.

I agree with the posters saying it’s very late to TT. My oldest was 2yrs 8mths iirc and he has asd and speech wasn’t great at the time. Another dd with asd was TT by 2.5 yrs as were my other kids. My youngest is nearly 12. I find people just keep saying they’ll wIt till their kids are ‘ready’ instead of just staying home for a week and getting on with it. My eldest told me she was ready at 22 mths by taking her nappy off everyday when I came home from work, trained in two days. If the nursery is happy to train I’d let them. Personally I found winter best to TT as I’d be in the house more and heating was on.

I started training my daughter at 2.5 and although she was brilliant with poos straight away she wasn’t there with wees. She’d just sit in wet trousers, she wasn’t bothered and would have many accidents a day. We stopped and put her in pull ups and she did it herself by 3.5. The health visitor told us that she is on the late side of normal.

We tried everything, reward charts, consequences, prompting her regularly (she’d sit on the toilet, not wee and have an accident 10 minutes later). We had to wait for her and it worked. I hope my son will be earlier but know he’ll get there in the end.

I find people just keep saying they’ll wIt till their kids are ‘ready’ instead of just staying home for a week and getting on with it

How other people raise their children isn’t really any of your concern though is it? Attitudes like this are unhelpful, hurtful and fucking judgy. Especially if there are ASN involved.

As an EYP, I always encouraged parents to start it at home and we would support at Nursery. We had parents who asked us to start training and the children were great at Nursery but refused to use the toilet at home.

I'd speak to Nursery. I know we can't refuse a child who isn't toilet trained. So they shouldn't try to use that as an excuse.

In my daughter’s preschool there’s another child who is 4 in August and has just started potty training. I thought that it was illegal for a childcare setting/ school to exclude a child based on their continence?

My son's old nursery used to call me in to change him every time he did a poo. Despite him having AN. It was farcical.

Yes staying home is so easier when you have an older child.

It would be cruel dragging Ds on the school run and having him wet himself because we didn't get home in time

Yanbu, it's your decision and trying to potty train a child who isn't ready is a nightmare.

My son was in nappies for the first 2 terms of reception. School were fine with it, one of the class ta's changed his happy when he needed it. They had a big changing bed thing that went up and down so the ta could lower it so ds could climb on and then raise it to a comfortable height for her to change him. I thought that was the norm tbh. My son's school use most of their pupil premium money for extra staff so there are always 3 or 4 staff members in the reception class and 25 children when they are all there. So they can have staff changing nappies without it affecting ratios. Pp have said about children who are still in nappies should have 1 to 1 or be in special needs school. I don't know if this is the same everywhere but where I live it's really hard to get that. My son is nearly 5 with a development age of about 3. He wasn't severe enough to get a place at special needs school so he goes to our local mainstream school.

Who knew posters on MN know more about other posters' children than the parents do themselves??

You can't enforce continence or none of us would ever accidentally wet or poo ourselves. So if even sentient adults can't control their bladders and bowels how is a child who has never been expected to supposed to pick it up in a week?

What is this mythical week or 2 weeks all about? Posters have expressed the range of timings from 1 day to 18 months+ As PPs have said all children are different and ready at their own rate. I know 5 year olds not dry at night. Are their parents lazy? No, the child just does not sense the urgency when s/he is asleep. Some children just don't recognise that sensation until much later. My bloody DH waits till he's dancing like a 5 year old before going for a wee. Drives me nuts but I bet his DM was eternally frustrated trying to potty train him!

You can lead a child to the toilet but you can't make him piss.