AIBU to think it's cruel to force a toddler to sit on the loo

[Sheesh89]

I have posted before about my DS1 possibly having ASD and the difficulty I have with my DH not engaging/being difficult/awful.

My DS is 3 (only just) he going to pre school in Sep and its expected before he starts that he's toilet trained. We started yesterday, bye to the nappies, hello cool duggee pants.

He absolutely hates it. Literally hitting us every time we take him to the loo when he starts weeing. He has done it a few times in the loo but while sobbing. DH is sitting on the floor of the loo refusing to let DS off until he wees. So he is complying but it's so bloody traumatising.

Anyway I've said we are going too hard-core and it's awful. DH is now refusing to engage and saying "you bloody do it then" and basically saying I'm too soft and he won't be able to go to pre school because we are bringing up some "backwards, spoilt, kid"

I get that if we don't push DS he won't do anything ever. He refuses to do so much tidy toys, pick up clothes but also he was sobbing and totally out of control. Begging for his nappies. I think having the toilet brush thrown at me was a particular low point

Am I being soft? Does it need to be this drastic? Or is DH being awful? I feel so bloody confused. I just want to do the right thing by my DS but I feel like I'm not protecting him but then if neither of pushed DS he would just eat crisps and live in nappies until he was 8

I feel absolutely done in.

My DP used to force my DS to sit in the toilet. He just wasn't ready. We argued about it a lot - it was very domineering and a case of him trying to tell my son who is boss. Eventually he said fine forget it do what you want... Now DS is 4.5 and still has anxiety around using the toilet and has accidents most days. I think he'd be completely trained by now if he hadn't had such a traumatic start.

I really think the school will work with you on this. I also think it's very likely he'll suddenly get interested in using the toilet when he's around peers who are trained or learning. My DS made big improvements in preschool!

If you look to the experts on this type of thing anything from 2-7 is 'normal' for training, so I'd be surprised if the school is really that strict.

My ASD child was reliably day trained at about 18 months. Just in case it cheers up any ASD mothers. We used a doll that you fed and it used the potty as a teaching aid. My youngest though who is not ASD was really resistant and just lifted the doll and squirted the doll feeding bottle straight into the potty. One day at a bit over 3 he walked into tbe bathroom used the facilities, wiped, flushed and washed and dried his hands while I stood gaping. He was day trained ftom that moment onwards. Night training took ages as they were both heavy sleepers. Does your child feel safe on the toilet? Are you dressing him in easy to pull down pants? My husband and I clapped and acted enthusiastic about any progress and were very keen on rewarding good behaviour with treats.

Both my DS have hated potty training. Oldest especially but I learnt a lot from first

Second is just turned 3. We have big boy pants in the house and pull ups for out at the moment. He has a potty and a mini 'toilet' potty which he finds more comfortable to use.

We initially tried before Christmas and he hated the idea. Bought the books for him, stickers etc etc

Started again recently. He's gradually using his 'toilet' more so. I say a few times a day 'jump on your toilet for a wee' before we do x, y, z. Building it up, he watches three quick 'duggee top of the pops' then if he hasnt been comes off.

I give him a drink then 30 min later he tries going.

To be honest if I forced it he was hysterical so now I think any step forwards is a win to be honest.

We didn't do anything special, dd also didn't like the toilet to start with because of the loud flush. We had a potty in the room with us, she wore normal knickers but every now and again we popped her on the potty for a 'try', if she sat for a minute or so we would give her a chocolate button. Probably goes against all recommendations, but it worked as she loves buttons too much to miss out. I would have it ready so she could see what she was about to get.

Honestly I sit on my hands almost all the time at these threads but I just can't tonight.

Disclaimer: not a parent. Animal behaviourist.

A 2/3 whatever year old who has only ever toileted in their living memory, against the absorbent fabric of a nappy, is conditioned to toilet in a nappy.

They have not experienced ANYTHING else. In fact sometimes, the feel of that fabric against their bums/bits actually tells them 'it's safe to let go now'.

And then you take that off, sit them on a precarious, too high up seat with a fucking big hole in it into cold cold water that disappears off who only knows where...

Yeah, I'd tense up and not let go too.

Imagine for a second that I ask you to ignore all your conditioning to going on a nice comfy toilet seat in a private little room.

Lets say I've asked you to piss your pants in the middle of the pub, or drop your trousers and do a poo in the middle of Kings Cross station, at rush hour.

Seriously, how many could actually do it and do it quickly, and happily, without a moments anxiety?

I would bet almost none of you. Because you've had decades of conditioning to ONLY toilet in VERY specific contexts.

Just look at the number of threads posted about not being able to pee outdoors, or not being able to do a poo at work or in a public toilet etc etc. That conditioning is SO strong, it's incredible.

Now think again about the small child who is being asked to do something completely new, and absolutely does not have the communication skills to explain the above to you, about why it feels SO wrong, and SO alien and SO scary.

OP - you aren't soft, you are thoughtful and kind. Do not let others bully you into ignoring your instincts.

Break the job down into stages - get a potty, make it familiar and generally nice, if you really need to, start some games of things go in the potty, doesn't at this stage matter what the things are, just the notion that 'something goes in there and then gets tipped out'. Water will do. Water and bits of tissue even?

So now there is no mystery about that - make it fun, make it rewarding and take off the pressure.

Then build the 'sitting on the potty' idea, build it into a game, 'can you stand on this, sit on that, lie down on that, stand on one leg, sit on the floor, sit on the potty, sit on a chair..'

Whilst this is going on, talk to him about the whole going to the toilet thing, about knowing when you need to go, what that feels like, how do you know, etc. Reward him for telling you he is peeing or pooing in his nappy, reward even better if he can tell you BEFORE he has to go (but still don't pressure him to go anywhere else).

I'd also give him some general discussion on where the toilet stuff goes - show him any pipework, tell him (in as simple terms as necessary obviously, he doesn't need a degree in plumbing) where the water from the loo goes, where the water down the sink goes. Make it normal and not scary.

Get him thinking about his body and how that feels - up until now, he has not HAD to be aware of it, it just ... comes out, so thats new.

Then when he is telling you about it, when the potty is familiar, and safe, you can start to offer him the CHOICE... to go on the potty with a bare bum for a bit, or stay in his nappy and sit on it...

Keep going like that, the more you can give him choices (they're not really FREE choice, they're choices between 'this and that' not 'do as you like', its more an illusion of choice!) and stack the odds in favour of him going for option you want, the better.

All this force and shouting and making it a huge deal is just going to build a horribly negative association not just with the toilet, but with his parents teaching him ANYTHING at all. Regardless of whether he has SEN, the force and the aggro will only make matters worse.

Ok, burn me with fire, I'm out.

I just have to say my DS, now an adult, who has ASD toilet trained himself at the age of 2. He saw his dad in the loo, standing to wee, and thought he would try it. Nappy off, he weed saw that he wasn't wet and then decided it was proper pants from then. He actually wore pull-ups, but there was no stopping him from there. If he hasn't seen his dad in the loo, that might be the way forward, in that he can see that weeing standing up = no wet feeling on the skin. I think mine just hated feeling wet, and that got him started.

If your DH is a member of teaching staff at this school and refers to a child as "backward" a) he really needs to rethink his career choice and b) that school isn't so great

I’m not sure the pre school sounds like the best fit for your son. What about the preschool room of a 0-4 nursery instead? They would be less likely to require toilet training or things like uniform which I don’t really like on toddlers.

Your child sounds totally normal and you just need to get clued up on age appropriate potty training methods. The Oh Crap book is meant to be great.

Your much bigger problem though is a father who is referring to your child as backwards and is potentially going to make life much more difficult for you by traumatising your son. Is he like this in other areas too?

NAILED IT!

Op please don't do the oh crap method. We did with our daughter before we knew about the autism and it was as traumatic as you say. I regret it as she was close to being dry naturally but I think that was then delayed and she started'stool witholding'.
You need to let him be and go at his own pace. It may be nearer to 4 or 5 or later til he manages it. I'm not saying this for all ASD kids but it's definitely not unusual. Look up interoception. There's a disconnect with the signals of needing the toilet actually getting to the brain so until this happens he won't understand why he's sitting there.
I'd leave him in pull ups and keep offering for him to sit on the toilet with a full 3 step and handle seat but don't force and plenty of praise for even just sitting. Leave a potty around too.
We were under a continence nurse for a while and yes some kids not toilet trained fully til 7 or 8 does happen. You really need to reframe this as an incremental learning and not a priority for a time line.
And you need husband on the same page or get him to back off.
Let it take time.

My child with autism had quite a few sensory issues when potty training, and was in nappies longer than I expected.

• not recognising the physical sensations of needing to wee/ poo, I talked them through this "can you feel something in your tummy, you are moving around a lot which you do when you need a wee"

• sitting on toilet with legs dangling was scary to them - they preferred a potty with feet firmly on the floor

• I think the environment of the room with toilet was quite overwhelming too, bright lights, soap which they found upsetting due to the texture, it wasn't a calm place for them. Potty in living room easier for them

• they found the physical sensations of weeing/ pooing really overwhelming. When wearing nappy I think they were often engrossed in playing and could zone out from the sensations. They liked to watch a cartoon on iPad on potty to zone out from.the physical sensations, or have a cuddle or a toy

• after weeing they hated the feel of a drop of wee on them - in nappy would be absorbed so no drops left - but they couldn't articulate this in words, just screamed. They needed a careful wipe afterwards to ensure no drops left. As they held on to last moment and did huge urgent wees, the wee could spray on their legs and leave drops

• they got anxious being told to do something, e.g. being told to use potty or taken to potty caused anxiety. This was very difficult to deal with as we got stressed when they obviously needed a wee and were refusing, and our stress just made them more anxious. Somehow you need to keep your cool and accept that it may take longer than you expect, and there will be accidents.

Our child did potty train, but 6 months later regressed and actually went back into nappies for a few months before training again. Now they are fine, and use the toilet. Just to say it may be a long haul!

DH is a secondary school teacher. He has a chip on his shoulder about parents not pushing their kids "my son can't do maths" "my kid is being naughty because of SEN" "it's the teacher who's the problem". He is worried about DS being behind and DS resists almost anything - holding hands, eating his veg, toddler classes - and we have followed my softly softly compassionate approach for 3 years and DS regularly still hits me and throws stuff and hits our DS2 so I think he was like "right, we are just gonna get on with it this time" approach. Simialr to sleep training...an awful couple of days and then cracked it...not that we sleep trained DS1. Anyway I can see I've really fucked up letting it happen that way.

Thanks for all the helpful advice.

I honestly think the first attempt you described is very common so don’t be too harsh on yourself and your DH and follow your child’s lead of not going straight to the loo or requiring that they cannot get off until they have wee’d. Thats obviously a method that simply doesn’t work with your child. No one is a dragon for having tried it and neither of you could have predicted how your DC would react.

In my experience with an autistic child, it needs to be gradual and with no pressure. I too have a DC with autism and they were also terrified of the toilet as it was a giant whirlpool. This DC was also terrified of the plug hole in the bath and could not even shower until age 8 due to a real fear of being sucked down the plug hole. We could not pull the plug with them in the bath either.

So sitting on the loo is out for now. However what we did was gradually introduce potty training. My autistic DC went from nappies to pull ups. The first step was to teach them to recognise when they had weed or pooped in their pull up. We worked on them listening to their body and giving us real time update “I’m weeing now” to “I need a poo”. If we thought they were (and oblivious) we’d just say “DC are you having a wee?” And they’d pause, assess and either nod or shake their heads. We’d then “have a peek” by having them pull down the pull up and seeing if wee or poo had come out or not. This gentle focussing of their attention on their body activates the mind body link so they can start to recognise toileting both as it happens but then, over the weeks, also what the urges feel like. Of course lots of praise “you’re right, what a poo let’s go change your pull up.” Or “oh, guess the poo is being shy, no poo yet. Up with the pull up and let’s keep playing”

Then after about a couple months of the above we introduced a daily 10minutes potty session based on their natural cycle to increase chances of success. For example, my DC would almost always have a poo after their evening bath. So after bath time, in their bedroom we did a sit on the potty for the time it takes to read two books (at that age it’s just looking at pictures and being relaxed) and “see” what comes out. All completely relaxed. At first, they’d sit, “read” and then after dressed and back in a pull up, poo then. But after a few weeks, they did poo on the potty. Lots of praise. DC kind of amazed and baffled that the poo came out in a potty as they were animate they had “shy poo”. After that the successes got gradually more often than not. And we encouraged them to use the potty for all their poos if they wanted to. This DC even started to just go by themselves to the potty, pick up a book, poo in privacy and then yell across the house “mum I’ve pottied”

Then, when vast majority of poos were in the potty, we tackled the weeing and put the potty in the bathroom. (We did poo before wee because in the first step they could identify the urge to poo better than the urge to week your child may be the opposite, so that’s also child led in a way) Asked them, can you tell when you need a wee? Since we had by then done months of working on the whole tell me when you are weeing or have just wee’d, they were able to say “maybe”. So we said, if you think you need a wee, try and do it on your potty. So then it was a partnership they’d tell us or we’d notice the signs and offer “do you want to try the potty?” Again this was aiming towards perhaps one wee in ten being on the potty. It’s a gradual thing. At first I did all the wiping, and then we gradually introduced how to wipe yourself. By saying “would you like to try?” And they might swipe once and we’d do the rest. But over time they’d do it and be happy as it meant they didn’t have to be touched by another person (my DCs autism means they don’t like being touched very often).

Id say it took almost a year of gradual building up before they were using the potty for every poo and wee. Only from there did we introduce the toilet as my DC was genuinely terrified of it and did as pp had mentioned, played with the toilet flushing paper down. Flushing my poo down to see it go. Sitting a stuffed Teddy on the toddler seat and watching to show how safe it was. So it wasn’t so frightening. Then gently encouraged them to try the toilet now and then, but still had the potty there too and they always had the choice of old familiar potty or try toilet. They’d actually take a stuffed Teddy in and put Teddy on the loo and they’d sit on the potty and they’d both “go potty together”. When they tried the toilet, the Teddy would sit on the potty. I think they had a sense of safety having their Teddy in there with them.

This whole time, we did not even try to use public toilets when outside the home. That’s too much stress for an autistic child. All we did was the same, tell me when you need a new pull up. Only once they were fully toilet trained at home and confident, did we start saying ok you need to start using toilets in cafes and suchlike. This phase was quite quick. But I think it was right to leave it out while focussing on at home because my DC would have been too stressed and overwhelmed otherwise.

My big lad (now 22) has ASD and was about 4 before he'd use the loo for a wee and would hold out until we put a pull up for a poo (he was about 6 when he said it felt like his 'body fell out' if he did it on the loo) he was very traumatised by the whole thing so I let him go at his own pace. It's super hard going but he'll get there .. you'll gradually learn to pick your 'fights' and I think this one is worth leaving for now and then coming back too x
You're doing a fab job and doing your best. . please be kind to yourself x

Also just to clarify DS definitely knows when he needs to go as he asks for his nappy so he can go. He doesn't want to go on the floor.

The analogy about it being like asking a grown up to wee standing in the middle of a train station is really helpful to me understanding the stress though. Back to cuddles and pulls ups today and I'll just get the potty back out.

Toilet training is hard!! Go easy on yourself (and him). A child with ASD will often take longer to get used to the new process and it will take more patience than usual. His anger and lashing out is a sign of distress and we all find it harder to learn and transition to new things when we are distressed.

Two of my children were very quick to get it and were out of nappies within a few days at just turned two. My third was 3.5 and took a few weeks.

Each time there were a few days of many many accidents and none of them managed to wee in the potty for the first couple of days. We just ignored the accidents and celebrated any success.

If your DD has already done wees in the loo then he's actually doing brilliantly. It's just a painful process that requires patience and positivity even if it takes several weeks or months.

Sorry I meant your DS not DD.

Hope some of the advice here is helpful OP and good luck. It sounds to me like your expectations are unrealistic - one day of wearing pants and expecting him to confidently or compliantly go on a toilet? NT or ND that is very unlikely.

I havent understood your potty vs toilet strategy - you say you have a potty and in last post say “you’ll just get the potty back out” - why did the potty get put away? Did he go in the potty at all?

I also think that while you favour what you call “compassionate” parenting it feels to me like you’re not actually thinking about or empathising with what it must be like for him - so scary and weird to have to go into a big hole and not straight into a nappy!
Thats not meant to be cruel at all it just really strikes me that you’re doing lots of cuddling without really thinking about why he is upset.

Frankly your husband sounds like a bully and his approach as a teacher - even of older children - is unpleasant.

We went for steps/toddler seat on the loo as opposed to the potty as he has no interest in the potty and we did persuade him to sit on it once but he looked super uncomfortable. And he actually loves being in the loo with me, flushes the chain, washing his hands so I thought wasn't too scary. Also he hates to poo in front of anyone, shouts "go away" so thought he'd like the privacy. I thought he would be resistant of course but you're right hadn't put in enough thought about how scary the loo must feel. I thought he'd resist change but not that he'd be scared

There does appear to be a lot of cuddling. It may be backfiring. Cuddling usually means something is going to be traumatic enough that it requires comforting for it and that can actually add stress to a situation. Sometimes it’s better to be neutral about things. So yes, bring the potty out, but perhaps rethink the cuddles. It should be use mistakes to encourage “too bad, maybe next time” and celebrate the successes. Cuddles shouldn’t be needed when potty training if you are taking a no pressure child led approach as it won’t be traumatic to them.

Like, I agree the time out and cuddling when he’s thrown his dinner at the wall is off. It should be consequences as in help tidy up the mess and no cuddles. Although with my ASD DC, we never forced them to the eat it this or go hungry and would always have to be short order cooks to feed them food they would actually eat. There’s so many sensory issues with an ASD child that their being a “fussy eater” is honestly something they cannot help.

I should say I don't know if he's ASD. Appointment to see GP this week but may go private but have read the NHS sometimes don't accept private diagnosis?

He just hates pressure. So for example he went to toddler football club every Satueday and loved playing, kicking, running up and down and playing with me but as soon as they asked them to do something more structured he ran into the disabled loo and refused to come out until the end. So we stopped going

Nursery say nothing to worry about. Health visitor who witnessed a meltdown said to see a GP. His meltdowns are extreme. Like he's not there anymore...no distracting him or getting near to him to be honest...had lots of gasps and pointing.

Please buy the 'oh crap' potty training book that others on this thread have recommended You really need a better strategy.
Not only will it give you a method to follow but will also have you think about potty training from your sons perspective. Imagine having only ever known weeing & pooing in a nappy and that is suddenly taken away from you. Potty training is a learned skill that takes a bit of time.
If you continue the way you're going, you are creating a lot of anxiety around using the potty & toilet. It will take longer. Get the book.

You don't necessarily need to go back to pull ups today OP - that's just giving up, pull-ups are just nappies by another name. Just get the potty out, leave bottoms off and hang out with your son with the potty nearby, ideally in a room with non-carpeted flooring so it's easy to clean up accidents! I really think you need to find a middle ground - it does sound like you don't really impose natural consequences with your son, just send him to timeout, and perhaps your husband feels he has to be more strict to compensate for you being a bit permissive. Even aged 3 I'd expect a child to 'help tidy' with a clear simple instruction such as 'put the cars in the tub' or 'put the blocks in the box'.
But please don't just give up and stick him in pull-ups as that just teaches your son that if he refuses /screams / tantrums he doesn't have to do it anymore. Just scale it back a bit today and go for a slower approach, small potty, rewards, lots of drinks so that he feels the need to go plenty, pop teddy on the potty etc.

I don’t know somethings not sitting right with me here. Maybe I’m reading it wrong, but with each post you seem to be practically villainizing your very young, possibly autistic child a bit more. Why? To excuse your husband’s draconian methods of ‘teaching’. Please stop doing that, and ‘listen’ to your DS. He needs an understanding parent, and one who will stick up for him against bullies.