Bloody bloody potty-training... 2.7 yo DD3

[duchesse]

Been at it since mid February, and still getting 10-12 wet pants a day. She seems to need to pee every 20 mn, wants to use the potty/loo, can stop herself peeing, can hold on for a few seconds, if put in a nappy will take herself to the potty and insist on being undressed to pee on the potty. Just starts weeing in her pants every.single.damn.time.

It's like deja vu all over again. On past performance based on her siblings I've got another 4 years of this.

I would LOVE for those people so willing to tell everybody that people who hadn't potty trained their children by 2.5 yo were nothing short of abusive to come and share their fount of wisdom about where we're going wrong.

Nursery (daycare, not session nursery, so fully set up for babies in nappies) now want to discuss how to proceed wrt to potty-training. I'm thinking, just wait till she's 6, she'll probably be dry then.

Seriously though, help, please. Please don't suggest start charts or any crap like that, been there, done it, got the shirt. We are doing everything by the flipping book. And looking at doing a LOT of washing for the next few years. Also I really don't need anybody telling me I'm a slack/abusive/crap parent because my child is nowhere near dry at 2y 7 m. We have tried everything over 4 children and the result has always been the same: dry reliably at about 6 yo.

Tee - is it really allowed for pre-schools to refuse to take kids if they're not trained at 3? That's outrageous, its like discriminating against a disability. DS's pre-school takes kids from 2 so they expect nappies etc - we'd be screwed if they said he couldn't come back in Sept now he's three cos he's training but we're not there yet. Can you challenge them on it?

No advice Duchesse (sorry) but plenty of sympathy - I started toilet training DD1 at 2.3 partly because I thought she must be ready and partly because most of her friends were either trained or getting the hang of it - what a mistake.

My other mistake was to read/follow Gina Ford's toilet training book... After three days of endless accidents and DD1 crying frantically for a nappy (which I initially refused as Gina Ford is so militant about never going back to nappies ) she was thoroughly put off the whole idea and clearly anxious about it. She is extremely bright and a very sensitive little girl, and became very upset every time we mentioned trying the potty/toilet/big girl pants etc. We tried again (very gently, absolutely no pressure) at 2.9 - no good. And again at 3.2, still no progress.

She finally got into weeing on the toilet at 3.7yrs, and it was brilliant - she suddenly decided one morning that she wanted to wear her big girl pants and do all her wees on the toilet, and that was that - she's had two accidents in the past two months but that's all! Amazing!

She still doesn't want to do her poos on the toilet, so she asks for a nappy to be put on, goes off to do her poo and then asks to be changed. We are happy for her to do this for a little while - I'm hoping that one day she will accidentally do a poo on the toilet when she goes for a wee, discovers that it's not a scary thing and will be happy to continue...

DD2 has just turned 2 and loves sitting on the potty while DD1 is on the toilet, so she may be ready sooner than DD2, but I'm definitely going to go along with what she wants rather than what I feel under pressure socially to do. I've learnt the hard way that it's your DC's choice and it's no-one else's business!

Sorry for the long post but I wanted to say - there are plenty of people in a very similar boat, I don't think that most mums/dads judge if you have a 3+yo in nappies, and if you have the misfortune to come across a sneering parent then pay absolutely no notice. Karma'll get 'em in the end