To ask how to potty train a resistant 3 year old?

[MissScarletInTheBallroom]

Yes I know there is a topic for this but there's next to no traffic and people who have already cracked this and moved on probably aren't looking at it.

My DS turned three a couple of months ago. We have tried potty training several times with no luck so far.

He is starting school in September and HAS to be trained by then. There is no other option. I have taken tomorrow and Tuesday off work so we are on day 2 of a four day window dedicated to cracking this and it's getting worse, not better. I don't have any other holiday other than the last two weeks of August which we have booked off to go on an actual holiday and will be completely ruined if we have to spend it hanging around the holiday accommodation doing potty training.

I'm at my wits' end.

He doesn't want to sit on the potty.

He withholds for hours on end.

He gets increasingly angry and fed up and wants to go outside and play. Eventually I give in and we go outside and it's only a matter of time before he pees or poos in his pants.

Please help.

You say he doesn’t like having accidents - that’s GREAT as you can build on it.

It is useful as one of mine just didn't care.

Try putting it potty/toilet with help and get them to flush (if not bothered by noise) and just say next time try for here - no blame.

Some kids are just harder.

Oh Crap method all the way. I don't care what people say, it works. Barring developmental issues, any 3yr old can learn to potty train.

Ah so you did read oh crap but sounds like you never really committed to trying,

and I can assure you I am a full time working parent and also had another child at home, in winter, with no garden. I had planned for the other child to be in nursery for the first couple days so I could have all my focus on the one potty training but they got sick so I ended up with both at home and decided just to crack on on my own. It was MUCH harder than doing it with one child, but I did it solo, so sorry but they sound like excuses for not trying hard enough.

I feel for you as it’s such unhelpful advice when people say to wait until they’re ready; that’s literally the opposite of what all the guidance says. And please don’t do what others have suggested and send your child to school in nappies. How horrible for his self esteem to be a kid in nappies and this is not the job of teachers to change nappies, they do not have the resources for this.

also the oh crap book does not suggest forcing them to sit on a potty every few minutes, so perhaps read it again?

Also I’ve only just realised you’re literally potty training him now- if that’s the case, why are you on mumsnet!?! Get off your phone: and focus! You’re supposed to be watching for signs he needs to go and then responding at that point. Not forcing him to produce offerings on demand! No wonder he’s holding it in then having accidents. Poor lad. Spend the evening reading oh crap properly, because what you’re currently doing is indicative of why your poor son is struggling.

I've read Oh Crap.

How does it work if you are a working parent who needs to book annual leave well in advance at a time which is sanctioned by your employer, you don't know how long you will need, and you have no outside space for a child to run around?

Honestly, Oh Crap was the first thing I tried. And I tried it again a second time. Yesterday I ended up shouting at my husband because the last time I tried to crack this (before he was 3) we made good progress on the first day and then my husband insisted that we needed to go out on the second day.

It's so hard when nobody in your actual real life thinks the Oh Crap method is necessary, they're all telling you that if it doesn't happen naturally you try again when they're ready, and that it will all just miraculously happen right when you need it to? It'll be my problem if that doesn't turn out to be true, not theirs.

Today is day 4 of a 6 day planned stretch at home. I've already devoted 10 days of annual leave to this. I cannot take any more time off. My husband also cannot take any time off because next week is his last week in his current job (and I will be away for four nights for work) and the following week is his first week in his new job.

The family holiday is non refundable at this point and involves other members of the extended family, not just us.

All these people telling me it's my fault for being too stressed can do one, frankly. Yes I'm stressed. I'm stressed because I fucking listened to the "it'll happen when he's ready" camp and they were wrong. And now I'm getting it in the neck from the "you've left it too late and you should have stayed at home for a month and not let him wear clothes or go outside until he was potty trained and your full time job and lack of outside spaces are just excuses because you're not commited enough" camp. It's pretty disheartening really.

I feel like I haven't had enough support in real life. Believe it or not I'm the only person who has been motivated to get this done but I've been up against it. And now everything is all my fault according to randoms on the internet.

Could you please just not comment unless you have something kind or helpful to say?

@Muthaofcats

Not very helpful. You're making the mistake that thinking just because your kids trained in 3 days, every child can and if they don't it's their parents fault.

Children are all different, what works for some doesn't work for all.

Same here @MissScarletInTheBallroom . People insistent Oh Crap works mean it worked for them and maybe a handful of other children they know. In RL, no one used it and their children trained easily. For those who struggle, it’s just perseverance. We’re seven months in and still struggling (not trying to dishearten you sorry) but I just repeat: positive, calm, encouraging.

OP just ignore the stupid poster. Obviously don't cancel your holiday. Progress has been made today. It's an emotional rollercoaster. You are doing fine.

Respectfully, people are trying to be helpful and you are being super resistant. I get why, it’s stressful at this point and not worth feeling crap about yourself. It sounds like you haven’t had much support from your husband, who is an idiot for making you go out on the second day when you were supposed to be potty training. Unless there are issues with domestic abuse, I don’t understand why you couldn’t have told him, no, we are potty training. I didn’t have any support either, it was me on my own with 2 kids and it was hard but I did it.

But you are where you are now.

it isn’t unkind to suggest the reasons your son may be struggling, you don’t seem to be reflecting or taking any of what people are saying on board. You seem to think only stay at home parents with gardens have potty trained children. What did you think the rest of the working population with kids did ? Also, what is this focus on a garden? The toilet is in the house, not a garden. It’s irrelevant to potty training.

It isn’t helpful to keep insisting one book and one method work. They don’t: not universally.

Is that why everyone says do it in the summer when they can run around the garden with no pants on then?

If the Op had done exactly what is advised then I’d be more amenable to this suggestion; but she hasn’t even attempted the basics so you can’t just say oh children are all different because she hasn’t even really tried to follow a consistent approach.

it is fairly obvious most of the time that children who struggle with potty training usually have a parent who was not really committed, had their own issues around wee and poo which they projected onto their kids, being super stressy about it etc.

The oh crap book is pretty rubbish tbh, there are lots of books - I read several - and they all pretty much same exactly the same thing. It really isn’t rocket science. So unless your child has special needs, I’m thinking something else is going on here.

Incidentally my friend who has a child exactly the same age did Oh Crap last summer because her second baby was due in September and she wanted to get it done before then. It took months, not days, but she is self employed and works from home. So I don't buy the "Oh Crap" is a miracle method thing either. If it were a miracle method it would have worked when I tried it on my son.

Do you think people who live in flats or potty trained in winter are all incontinent ?

they say do it in summer as it’s warmer so easier to be naked. Central heating is however, available.

I didn't do anything different with my youngest she was just a different child.

Also went though bulk of their schooling being told older two weren't ND and didn't have any SEN - so I was supposed to realise at 3 when professionals were saying no till late teen is beyond me.

I've also met parents adamant their system for some childhood thing worked till they finally had a child who it just didn't work for at all. I think smaller families are making some parents more dogmatic in their philosophies and judgmental of others as they lack wider range of experiences with different kids.

Perseverance - agree with PP - just keep at it - and even after the idea is there they may still have many accidents.

I have attempted. I followed that bloody Oh Crap method to the letter the second time I tried. Eventually I had to go back to work and he'd made no discernable progress.

I don't believe they keep their children inside for weeks on end until they're potty trained whatever season it is.

If she was working from home then she wasn’t following the oh crap method because the oh crap method is all about doing nothing else but observing your kid. No phones, no distractions. Just being with them and watching them play so you can work out signs of when they’re needing to go. The fact you’re looking for reasons I’m wrong and staring at a forum rather than your kid is perhaps a starting point?

This is the problem with potty training threads on here. You get a poster or a handful of posters who just will not accept ‘thanks but we’ve tried that and it didn’t work.’

They just won’t. They are like moths banging against the window over and over and it means the thread just descends into bickering as they get huffy their helpful advice is ignored and then personal comments come in ‘lazy / rude / combative.’

Just accept your advice isn’t helpful FGS!

i would suggest the Op is the moth banging against the window. Her approach isn’t working for her or her kid and yet it’s all the other peoples fault for being ‘rude’.

I suggest this child is going to be starting school in nappies given the absolute reluctance to reflect or take on board any guidance from people for whom it worked.

The OP says she followed Oh Crap but clearly never actually has. Her son’s stubbornness and refusal to engage with this sounds exactly like what his mummy is exhibiting here ! Our children are mirrors to us.

It says everything that it’s easier to dismiss those for whom it worked as smug and unhelpful in favour of reinforcement for an approach that’s clearly not working for you. No wonder so many kids start school in nappies. I never understood this until reading this thread.

My kid is starting school at the age of three and a half. I'm sure he'll have got it by the time he's the age that parents in the UK need to send their children to school.

But sure, keep kicking me while I'm down, why don't you?

What is wrong with some people?

I meant that she actually has the ability to decide when she's taking time off and to take as much time off as it takes. Because she's self employed. I'm not. I have a finite amount of holiday and it has to be booked in advance.

On the withholding:

Mine both did this, for hours. Basically they were conditioned to “let go” in nappies and they just didn’t understand how to “let go” in a potty or toilet. It’s a very weird sensory thing and they simply didn’t know how to relax the right muscles. They weren’t being stubborn, difficult, they weren’t too young, too old…. It’s uncomfortable and they were learning something that is actually quite hard. I think of it as akin to being an adult but being expected to use a toilet in the middle of the street - you’d probably struggle to release too!

One of mine just got it after a few days of hanging out with an iPad on the potty. With one of mine who had major hang ups about using a toilet or potty we had success with wearing pants but putting a nappy on when he actually needed to go. Then he’d use the nappy in the bathroom. Then with the nappy on but sitting on the toilet. Then with the tabs undone sitting on the toilet. Etc etc. Gradual steps and a lot of rewards! It was not a week long process, but end of the day out of all the supposedly inflexible barriers (we all have them - work, school, holidays, medical stuff) I decided my child’s sanity wasn’t going to be the thing that had to flex. He was a young child figuring stuff out, he was doing his best and I wasn’t giving him a lifelong hang up just because of holidays or an inflexible preschool.

We are in a similar boat

Two things:
Don't sweat the afternoons. They will be a lot worse than the morning because your toddler is tired and it is all too much. There will be accidents that doesn't mean he isn't learning

Send him to nursery without a nappy at the end of your time.
I would ask for more support from your nursery. With a resistant 3 uear old they should be invaluable not telling you to wait! That is so unhelpful of them.
They can normalise using a potty not nappies for your son. The other children us ethe toilet so they help his emotional side but highlighting this is normal and what he should be doing.
Our nursery were encouraging us to try.
I had a long weekend, 4 days , then the nursery took over on Monday and they took over on Monday. We have had days with bags and bags of wet cloths come back to us. More than the cloths we sent in. The nursery is always nice and keeps trying. They started reminding every 20 minutes which was quite annoying for him. Now he can self prompt occasionally
We still haven't had a week without dirty cloths back but it is getting better.
It will likely take time so don't sto trying. The three day children are few and far between

Really not intending to kick you whilst you’re down. I can see how stressful you are finding this, not trying to make it worse for you. Just observing you seem defensive and resistant at this point rather than focused on a solution. If that feeling is coming across to your son, no wonder he’s withholding and not finding it fun anymore.

Best thing to do if in a bad place with it is to take a breather and come back to it after taking some time to properly read the Best approach, make some time to commit to doing it properly - without stress or intensity.

If you really won’t make any more time for it then I guess only option is to keep him in pants (apart from sleep) and just let him keep having accidents until he learns to go to the toilet!?
Every time he does it, just reinforce, when you feel the need to wee or poo you run to the loo. Then positively reinforce when he does it properly, sweets or whatever works.

And re the school thing, more start school at only just turned 4 so for some summer borns they are really very young. But by 3.5-4 they should have been potty trained for at least a year - I do agree with you that the people constantly telling everyone to give up and try again later are super unhelpful.