Toilet training before school

[jackass232]

I saw a piece on the news last night about how there's been a big rise in the number of children starting school not fully toilet trained. I think the figures were something like 13% of kids in any reception class are not fully trained and that teachers are on average spending 2.5 hours per day dealing with toileting accidents and issues.

Obviously this is quite shocking (I expected to see a MN post about it actually, sorry if I missed one) but I can sympathise as my ds started reception with issues surrounding pooing - mostly holding onto it, becoming constipated and having leaks. I remember always packing spare pants for him and I know the TA had to help him change a lot. This wasn't anything to do with laziness on my part. He was just hard to toilet train and continued with these issues for quite some years. The school was always lovey about it but I felt very embarrassed and upset on behalf of my son.

I feel the general narrative behind this story is that parents just can't be arsed to toilet train their kids and are happily sending them in and letting teachers deal with them. But that's not always the case. I know it's a big drain on schools but what's the answer? And why has there been such a rise?

As a TA in early years, I would say the current cohort are in general fine with weeing in the right place. Just a few who haven't made it to the toilet when they are focused on play, which is totally normal. The thing I do find interesting is that the highly processed crap many of them are eating means we have more than a quarter of the children who are extremely constipated. We have piles of government fruit and veg going to waste because a higher proportion than ever won't eat a single fruit or vegetable. Most will eat a banana, but some of them even don't eat apples because their teeth hurt from so many cavities (from sugar and juice). And their parents insist they have to have squash or juice because they won't even drink plain water to help the constipation. I have never seen so many children on disimpaction regimes that require days off school and a return to nappies. This does NOT include the delayed/neurodivergent ones.

I am from a very deprived area, but I would say it MUST be a perfect storm with parents who are overburdened with responsibility, diet and neurodivergence.

We haven't had any tests, got another appointment coming up so I will be pushing, and want to discuss her health generally, her weight and height is dropping off the centiles ( I don't know if there's a point where they stop worrying about centiles though) so I wonder if her bladder is too small.
She often says she didnt know the wee was coming. She also wees when she coughs, laughs or cries. But sometimes she says she's distracted. She will do a wee and less than 30 minutes later she'll have wet right through again, but drunk nothing. She only drinks water, if she drank diluted apple juice for example it runs though in minutes, literally.

This hormonal thing is a myth. Most children have the necessary hormone from birth and can be dry at night the same time as they are dry in the day. A small proportion don't have the hormone until they are older and therefore can't do it.
If you wait until they have a dry nappy inthe morning you can wait years - it doesn't mean they can't do it, just that they know they have a nappy on so will pee in it. The best evidence is on the ERIC website. They advise potty training before 26 months for the day and doing the nights as soon as having success in the day. Yes there will be a few wet beds before they remember they don't have a nappy on but most will get there in a few weeks.
Clearly it's not truly a hormonal thing for the majority as 4 5 6 year olds wearing nappies at night was not a thing before disposable nappies

It does sound like something, s going on ,have they tested for UTI,S etc ?
My son has other complex needs but at birth they found there was an issue with his urether,which can cause frequent UTI,s he was on long term antibiotics for it

Another person here finding the 'lazy parenting' narrative incredibly frustrating. DC3 is in nappies at school, and we are very very slowly working our way through the medical system as an underlying health condition is now suspected. I have put far far more effort into failing to potty train him over multiple years than I did in potty training DC1 and 2!

So much of the support there used to be even 4 years ago is gone now (friends of DC1 4 years older got loads of HV support for continence issues). You call the HV and they tell you to call a charity advice line, the HVs don't have capacity to provide that sort of support anymore. When we finally got a GP appointment, it's not something a lot of them even seem to be familiar with the NICE guidelines on and waiting lists for pediatrician referrals are well over 12 months here. Facebook support groups are full of similar stories. Like with so many issues, early intervention makes a massive difference for young children - as otherwise damage is done that means continence issues take years to fix. Early intervention just doesn't happen now, and parents and school are left picking up the pieces.

But you are not the parents being spoken about and surely you had conversations with your DS teacher along the way explaining the circumstances ??

Late potty training is also associated with chronic constipation. Interesting they won't eat the fruit!

Reading your posts are like reading about my DD 12 months ago. This type of dysfunction is unfortunately not taken seriously until the age of 5, and even then you have to lucky that your area have the right services available to help.

Reading? The other stuff fine but what's school for if not teaching them to read??

Rubbish. It is lazy parenting

My son will be 4 in August and is due to start reception in September.

We've been toilet training him for a while, but he still has loads of accidents.

It's not like we're not trying and the nursery supports us as well, it's just that it takes him a long time to figure it out.

Hopefully by September he'll be fine.

The nursery DD went to was accessible after age 3 but only if the child was dry in the day. She didn’t start until she was 3y5m. (Private day nursery, there is no school nursery in our village).

My daughter had exactly the same problems as you @jackass232 however I dealt with them earlier. She used to panic when a poo was coming. Hold it in terrible constipation, so much so that I had to use, and was prescribed by a GP the suppositories (bullet shaped, gel for) obviously smaller. It was horrible for her, but we got there.
The difference is my daughter started nursery at 2.5 fully toilet trained and no accidents.

The poor teachers these days. Probably more poor TA's having to clean grown kids shitty arses. Disgusting.

Back in the day 3 was considered really late, people would be shocked if you were still in nappies by then. If you start at 18 months then you have time to have a few set backs

I know several parents who have said they aren't bothering until the child is 3.5 because they think it will be easier or the child isn't ready. These aren't children with any problems, they are normal in speech, behaviour etc. the parents are work full time middle class types. I think it's a modern mindset.

Bloody hell. That's dismal. Would you say it's cost of living crisis meaning people go for junk food?

I dunno I think I’m going to trust the actual experts rather than mumsnet on this one

It's a gentle parenting thing, thinking you shouldn't impose anything on a child until they basically ask for it themselves.

Parents try, child say no or cries - parents say oh dear how distressing, he's not ready. They just don't persevere.

I think 3 days enough to make a good start, hopefully nursery will be supportive . Or do Easter weekend when there's 4 days, if you get them all off? 4 days should be fine as long as nursery are supportive which any decent nursery should be. Most kids get the hang within 2 or 3 days, if you can give them an extra day with you even better

As in, they weren’t bothering to read with or to their kids at all because that was a skill that was for someone else to sort.

Health visitors are full of shit in my opinion and I wouldn't listen to any advice from them whatsoever. Dd1 was started at 2 ( about a week after her birthday) all done by 2 and one month.

My eldest was potty trained at 3 not one wet night ever.
My youngest was potty trained the same age all day dry BUT not at night still had wet nights till he was almost 9.

Everyone keeps talking about 3 being too late....the problem isn't the 3 year olds it's the 4 and 5 year olds. It's not related to children just not being interested but to parents who have never tried and expect schools to do it in the same way they before COVID expected children to learn to dress in pe at school and now many schools find it easier to let children wear PE kit all day.
A child can be conditioned to wee on demand using EC but they still rarely take themselves before they are 24 to 30 months and often later. A child who is physically ready can be trained in a few days or you can start at their second birthday because somebody told you and still be doing it on their third. The people sending their kids to reception....Sen except....have never started.

Ofcourse it was a thing! My father wet his bed until he was 14 years old, driving my grandma mad with it. It existed, but wasn’t talked about as easily as it is nowadays.

Precisely!