Help!! I need some advice on potty training!!!

[fatbetty]

My ds will be 3 next week and we have been out of nappies during the day since October and in pull ups at night. While we do have the occasional good days of potty training, we have so many bad days. He doesn't seemed phased by when he has accidents and I'm so tired of cleaning poo out of his pants!!! Sometimes when I take him to the toilet he'll have a wee and then I have him sit there for a little bit longer and chat to him or read him a book so that he can have a poo. Then not 5 minutes later, he'll do a poo in his pants!

I know it can take several months - even a year - to get them succesfully potty trained but I'm really losing my patience with him and need advice on how to handle this so that I can crack this (if at all possible)!

I had the same problem with ds when he was just 3, initially I thought he simply wasn't ready i.e. didn't have the control. However in the end I resorted to outright bribery (with star chart) and it worked immediately !

I bought a new small but highly prized toy, showed it to him them placed it on display a high shelf. We then put a sticker chart on the loo wall, I think he had to do 10 successful poos, to get the toy. We did have a relapse when we went away for a long weekend and messed up his routine, we then repeated the star chart process and seem to have cracked it.

I'm not saying it will work for all, indeed you may not approve of the bribery approach, I prefer to think of it as motivation!

At this point, I'll do anything. We've done the bribery thing when we started - by giving him jelly beans and stickers. Maybe we need to do that again. I don't want to make this into a negative thing with me getting so upset.

Thanks for that advice! I will try it and see how that works. It's nice to know that other people have had similar problems

I really feel for you. I, also have been through this - It could be a boy thing!!! My ds was happy to go to toilet for wee from age 2.5. However, all poos would be done in the pants. I tried everything, and am ashamed to say lost my patience on numerous occasions. He finally stopped two weeks before he was due to start school (Thank goodness!!) Looking back I wonder if he was afraid of the big toilet, as we cracked it whilst on holiday camping. He just decided to use the small porta-potti, and then went to big toilet when we got home. Simple as that!! Who knows what goes on in their little minds - Your ds will get there too. I know it's not much consolation but it just takes time.

He doesn't seem to be afraid of the "big" toilet and will happily go anywhere. At home though he prefers his little toilet which we keep out still. I'm going to make up a chart tonight and just really stick to it and praise him loads when he does use the potty. Poopy pants are such a pain!!!

I started with stickers & wine gums etc, it wasn't until I uppped the stakes to a toy that I got any real result!

...& yes I will admit I also lost my patience on more than a few ocassions.

my ds is 2.4yrs,I want to train him, but he does'nt seem to understand yet,he sits on the pot but does nothing and just wants to put tissue and flush,he copies his older sis. My dd also finally got rid of diapers at 3+. Is there any thing wrong if they start late?