Almost 3yo and not toilet trained

[marveljane]

My sisters DS is going to be 3yo in August and is not potty trained yet. Everyone is making a huge deal out of it from his DF to our mother and the staff at his nursery.
My DS has tried her best with toilet training but DN just cannot understand 'needing to go'. He can tell you when he's in the process of filling his nappy but not when he feels the need to. He also cannot understand the difference between a wee and poo. She tried putting him in pants a few weeks ago hoping that actually wetting himself would help him but he didn't seem to be affected by being in wet pants and having to change. I assumed he just wasn't ready and told her to put it on hold for a while.
He's slightly behind with his speech but has come on in leaps and bounds recently and is really catching up.
Aibu to think that it's really not totally worrying for children not to be ready for potty training at this age or does DS need to start worrying like everyone says?

My DD has been pushed into toilet training her three year old, by the (afternoon) Nursery. She isn't ready and it has just resulted in us being handed a bag of four pairs of soiled knickers, every day.

The Nursery had the cheek to speak to the continence team. How that would have been effective, I don't know, my GD had been in Nursery two days, when they did that. They took her knowing she wasn't TT. She has a bowel condition and is due a hospital appointment in August. Which was when my DD was going to possibly start, after speaking to people who know my GD and are medically trained.

Mine were all trained by two and a half, including my delayed DD, so this isn't just a whim that she's wearing nappies.

They seem to be hitting back on the Parents that are reportedly "not bothering", but everyone is getting caught in the cross fire, as they are by the sugar tax.

Rules for potty training a child under 3:
Rule 1: wait until child is 3.
The end.

I only potty trained dd at 3.2. I am so glad I waited until she literally told me she wanted to wear pants.

I had a fair bit of criticism from dm and dh and a few people very surprised when i said she's in nappies, including nursery which she started at age 3. I don't care, I ignored them. It's my choice when I potty train and as long as she's done by the time she starts school I wasn't bothered.

I am so glad I didn't listen to people and get stressed about it, I did ds at 2. 3 and he wasn't ready and it was one big stress. Dd was incredibly easy.

"Studies in the US show that early potty training (pre age 3) has been linked to an increase in children having a big problem with long term constipation. "

That makes zero sense. The average age of potty training has been getting later not earlier. If there is an increase in constipation issues, it will be coming from other causes.

I got regular comments from my DS nursery about him not being toilet trained when he was 2yrs 8mths. He had to be trained before he moved into the older group so I was advised we had around 4 mths to ‘sort it out’. My DS wasn’t interested but he suddenly started being dry at night. After a week of being dry I decided during a week off to introduce the potty. The first day he wasn’t interested and had lots of accidents. I would follow him around with the potty and every time we managed to have a success it was a lot of clapping and excitement. He was toilet trained within 4 days. Once there ready they just get it.

YANBU

DS1 is now 3y 4m and we cracked toilet training about 6 weeks ago on our second attempt, that being said he does still have regular accidents (every 1-2 days). The third time it was easy and I knew he was ready because after a week he’d definitely got the hang of it. The first time we tried, after a week I just felt that we weren’t getting anywhere. He's mostly dry at night now too except I'm not brave enough to try him without pull-ups. I’ll wait until DS2 is the same age probably.

As long as they are toilet trained by the time they start school I really don’t see the issue. There’s no medal for being toilet trained “early”.

I’m glad you’ve had supportive comments here. I posted 3 months ago with a similar question, I’d just had another baby (literally - DS2 was less than a week old) and nursery were advising to toilet train. A few people told me I should have got him out of nappies before the new baby arrived!

^ That should say "The second time it was easy@

kokeshi that is my point- people are potty training too early, but it is leading to an increase in constipation.

My DD is also 3 in August and has only been toilet trained for about 3 weeks. She simply had no interest until then. What did spark her interest was her best friend (a boy, exactly the same age) toilet training at the CM's house. As soon as she was interested she cracked it straight away. Your nephew will do it when he is ready. You sound like a really good support to her, just what she needs to drown out the busybodies.

My daughter got the hang of things when she was around 2 but I think the fact that she had old-fashioned terry nappies helped.

Not making the issue a battleground or being competitive when children vary developmentally dies makes sense. But the expense of disposable nappies and the fact they are filling landfill sites do seem to me to be arguments in favour of encouraging children out of disposable nappies earlier.

See - www.telegraph.co.uk/women/family/why-do-todays-parents-find-potty-training-so-tough/

My daughter was 2 last October (so is 32 months) and doesn't get it at - I've tried and tried - over the last 6 months, but she becomes stressed and last time physically vomited and was shaken and hysterical when she wet herself.

I've enlisted the health visitor and she's coming this week to see if she can help me but my mother is quick to put me down "oh you were dry by 2" and comments like "it was expected in my day" - not helpful!!

My daughter was potty trained at 2.5. In our NCT group of 7, there were 5 who were (considerably) later than her. I think they were all past their third birthday. Among other friends, I think most were closer to 3 than 2 with boys definitely tending to be later.

Someone upthread asked about being dry overnight. This is entirely down to hormones I believe. My daughter has onky been dry overnight for a few months, probably about 8 months after daytime potty training. And most of her friends and cousins of a similar age still have a nappy overnight.

My DS was just over three and it took about 4 weeks, mainly due to him being at nursery, with us, and with my mum and dad. It took a while and there were a few accidents, he wasn't dry until about 4 and a half.

The "Oh crap" book is really helpful.

My daughter turns 4 in August and is just about dry now. She has been dry at home for a long while but has had issues at preschool but we are down to about 1-2 accidents a week now. It's been a long slog but think we're there now.

I've just seen a urinal for children for sale. Is that be a better option than the potty for teaching ds to wee standing up? My boy is 2.3 so I'm just starting to think about the logistics of it all! Aargh!!

Sorry, just realised there's a whole potty training section dedicated to this. Will go there 👍

so glad this post is here!! dd is 3.5 and i was quite worried as my dn is 2 month younger and trained a while now and ds keeps saying she should well be out of nappies now! i have tried 3 times once last summer and twice this year, she just doesnt know untill its happening. ahe knows she 'had an accident' but its to late by then

Nearly 3? Totally normal.
Eldest was completely out of nappies 2 and a half years, youngest was nearer 3 and a half.
Every child's different.

Each child is different.
Ds1 was dry during the day at 2 and a half and took another year to be dry at night.
Ds2 was almost 4 he would wee in the toilet but wouldn't poo unless he was put in a nappy also took another year to be dry at night.
Ds3 was 3 and a half and also took about a year to be dry at night.
Ds4 was dry at 2 and a half and dry at night a couple of months later.
Dd was 3 in Feb and has been dry day and night for about a month.
I think a child will be ready when there ready.
With Dd I tried a couple of times to see if she was ready and when she kept wetting herself I just put her back in nappies and waited a couple of months until she was.

Every child is different. They learn to walk at different ages, some will read earlier than others and knowing when you need the loo is the same. A friend of mine had similar experiences with her DS-he was around 3 and a half when he got it but he got there.

My DS turned 3 in March. In May he turned around & said no more nappies day & night.
Very rarely has an accident.

We had tried since he was 2.5 to get him on potty but I’m glad we left it as he’s just done it himself.

One child was 4 and 3/4 the other 2 1/4 - parented the same and both have no other issues. Sometimes they just aren’t ready and at not quite 3, really not worth making a stress about!

Wait for summer and let him run around in just pants, get him to have plenty of drinks and just take him to the toilet every 30 to 40 mins or get him to use the potty. If he doesn't do anything give it 15 and try again - its a pain in the but but after a week he will mostly be there, especially if there is a treat day out at the end (not too long so don't go backwards and again make sure loo on hand and take him every 30 mins etc) I don't see the need to be so abhorrent about the fact he isn't ready yet - you rarely see anyone over age of 5 or 6 who is NT not potty trained. There are rare occurences that there is something not right an it takes longer but if you take the stress out of the situation it eventually resolves.

My youngest boy was right up to when he was going to start school and the week before totally trained. I was worried for a while as I didn't want the school to deal with it . He went through his first year at school ( he started age 3) with only 2 accidents and was great. It is so easy to worry about but they will do it when they are ready. I do think those pull-ups are the culprit as they make it too comfortable when they have a pee. Years ago there was no pull-ups and children were trained easily as wet pant are totally uncomfortable