3 year old daughter holding in pee been trying to train for over 7 months..Help!

[Joanne103]

Our daughter is 3 years and 3 months old now. We started to potty train about 7 months ago and have struggled ever since. We used to have some good days and then she'd go backwards and pee herself all the time. We then phoned health visitor who suggested baking off with regards to prompting her to go, this again worked for a short period of time but she went backwards again. She now will hold her wee as much as possible to a point we she shouts help all the time and asks for you to carry her to the potty. We have tried rewards and sticker charts and nothing seems to work for more than a day or 2. What should we do, we haven't put her back in nappies or pull ups for about 5 months now and not sure if its the right thing to do at this stage but equally need to find a solution as its affecting her when we go out as she wont attempt to go on the toilet or potty so often wets herself without saying anything. Everyone else says their child cracked it in a week, I don't know anyone that has taken 7 months. Any suggestions are gratefully received. Jo

Put a potty in every room....so she can't ask for a carry to it. Make sure she sees the potties and don't show any stress if she does have an accident.

Don't put her back in nappies at this stage...is she only wetting when she's away from home?

Agree with putting potties in every room, sounds like a really good idea. Perhaps you could get her to choose a couple too? Know its a bit if an odd question but does she love her pants? Perhaps you could take her pants shopping too[hsmile].

Although sticking her back in nappies might be a backward step, I did it at night with dd as I figured she was just being lazy, obviously all children are different though. Instead of using disposable or pull-ups I stuck her in cloth nappies and she was dry at night in 3 nights. Turned out she was being lazy and really didn't like a cold, wet bum!

Can't do links ATM but I read and used the nct potty training book which is all evidence based, not prescriptive and full of real experiences[hsmile]

I think nighttime nappies are fine too btw.

no real advice but wanted to say, I have met many who reckon it was cracked in a week too (my own sister being one and it was indeed so) however my daughter is onto month 5 with 2 previous attempts before this. She is 3 - today is in fact her birthday! We have finally had an accident free week but previously it was 1-3 accidents a day - and we are still crossing our fingers this is it! So you are not alone. I wondered about going back to nappies before this week but since poo was fine and many wees were good we didnt, glad now. Can I suggest though you look at how much she drinks, my dd drank lots and I have cut it in half so less pressure on bladder - and also cut out squash so only water as apparently it is less irritating to the bladder? Good luck...i feel your pain!

Oh yeah and people do lie, they may be keen to point out how they have cracked potty training but fail to mention the accidents.

I cracked it with ds in 2 days. He was 3.5 exactly. I tried a couple of times before that and got nowhere so I gave up. He let me know when he was ready and it was easy. I don't understand this pressure to potty train if dcs aren't ready. How many schoolchildren do you know in nappies?

That's really reasuring bisjo, we've just gone back to nappies for DD (just 3) as after a week of trying and initial success we've been having no wees in the potty and an increasingly anxious child, so figured we'd wait a bit longer.

There is lots of peer pressure from other mums going on about how easily their little darlings were potty trained. My ambition with ds was to get him potty trained before he started reception and if it was any earlier than the week before he started I'd be happy!

One I tried to keep up with other mums I got really stressed but when I gave up trying to compete it was a lot easier. I took my lead from ds and when he had been dry for 14 nights in a row I started potty training during the day. On quite a few occasions we got to 13 nights but that didn't count (and that was the right thing to do for him).