Anyone else about to embark on the longest week of their lives? (ie. potty training the reluctant)

[BettySpaghetti]

A while ago I decided half term was going to be potty/toilet training DS week. That way I don't have to worry about the school runs, activities we go to etc.

I had visions of sticking him in the garden in pants with a potty nearby and Hey Presto!

Slight problem (or two):

1. weather forecast looks as if its going to rain all week
2. DS (2.11) is reluctant (to put it mildy) to sit on the toilet or potty.
3. DS says it feels nice having a poo in your pants
4. at the end of day 1 I'm exhausted

Anyone out there going through the same this week?

Its going to be a long old week.........

Don't feel guilty, PizPizPiz. I gave up here too, but they will be much more prepared for what's expected next time we try this so don't feel it's for nothing. They will be much more aware of what they are doing now, and may well stay more aware even in nappies iyswim so when they are ready to try again, they may have a better idea of how to hold on etc.

Can i join in? we're on Day 1 of potty training, DD is 2yrs 5mos and has pooed only in her potty for months so i thought this would be a breeze but isn't! I've been putting her on the potty for 5-10 mins with 15-20 min gaps in between and nothing and then turn around and she's wet her pants and doesn't seem to care one bit.

She seems to get it that her potty's there to be peed in and doesn't mind sitting on it but it's not coming together at all. we've had 5 accidents in as many hours, does everyone start this way?

I feel guilty for saying its day 5 and we've had 2 dry days and dry so far today . We even went to visit friends a 25min car journey away.

It did start with constant accidents for 2 days though and previous to that when we'd tried nappy free times he'd had no interest in the potty at all. Also DS is 2.11 so, as I said before, is that bit older than most of your DC.

Every child is different. It will come in time

You wait.... look out for me posting about some other part of his development/behaviour going to pot. If one thing goes well something else probably will suffer eg. (god forbid his sleep!

Sorry forgot to say welcome to the new faces on here - keep ing

Thanks Betty, it gives me hope! I guess i should lighten up as it's early days, but the thing is that by the time you've got to about 2.6 it's so easy to forget how long things take them to learn as it's been ages since anything new was introduced into the routine. It took her ages to eat lumpy food and then she didn't walk til she was 19mos... althugh those life-lessons didn't end up with urine al over the floor of course....

It looks like your ds has cracked it betty, well done to you both! I know what you mean though about other things going wrong. My dd is such a lovely child, she's a very good nature, eats well, sleeps beautifully, smiles all the time, behaves when she has to, etc, that I can't hold it against her. We'll give it another try in a few months time. Now I need to focus on my new baby

Mum07 - our first try, about 2 months ago was a total disaster, she had 5 accidents in a single morning and I gave up straight away. It's been a lot better this time round but she's still not ready.

Oh I am so happy I'm not the only one out there obsessing about pee and poo.

I started training DS on Monday - we had a chushy couple of days and seemed to be cracking it until today. Nothing but accidents the lazy little bugger - he simply can't be bothered walking to the loo so he just wees everywhere.

Also he hasn't had a poop since Sunday so I've given him Califig junior and am waiting for the screams of pain when he starts to pass a stool the size of my arm. Oh the joys.

Hi, I have been potty training DD for a week now, she is only 23 months, but was showing signs. Mainly holding onto a bladder full and then when she went, her nappy couldn't take the strain and leaked.

I have stayed in all week, leaving her to run around in just a top. She tends to do a little dance when she needs to go, I ask if she needs a wee, she says yes and sits on the potty and off she goes. I have found she loves to empty the potty into the loo herself after each use, and flush the chain. We then wash our hands and clean the potty with anti bac wipes.

Don't get me wrong, we had quite a few accidents at the beggining, but she seems so proud when she actually goes now. Just waiting for her to go for her first poo, she leaves this until I put her nappy on for bed time!

All these messages made me laugh - we have been potty training this week too (just mistyped it as botty training but I guess that's fairly accurate! ;)

Initially daughter was dead keen to wear her new Dora knickers - but quickly got traumatised after weeing through every single pair. So we are still on pull-ups and potty, whenever I mention going back in knickers she gets worried. Still, a huge poo in the potty yesterday which was a result...

It's good to have a place to share such thrilling news, isn't it?!
Hope we are blessed with dry days for the rest of halfterm - in more ways than one...

Just a word of encouragement from me too. DS 2.3, has been dry for about 3 weeks now. We didn't go out for the first 2days (thank god it rained) and we never went back into nappies except at night and nap time. I just let him run around in his big boy pants with reminders to go about every 30 mins. He now goes all on his own and is soo proud of himself for it. We also had a sticker chart with the promise of going to see the helicopters when he got 4 stickers in a day. He did try it on tho, sitting on the potty, doing nothing then askingfor a sticker. lol.

Hi there

don't all scream at me at once, but I'm just wondering about the age of the babies. I've been putting my daughter on the potty since she was six months old, and I'd like her to be out of nappies by 18 months, just like I was and my brothers, and my husband and his sisters. Is there a reason I should be waiting? Don't all shout...

This thread has made me smile!
My DS is 2.4 and seems to have been potty training since before Christmas.
He initiated it when he would come to tell me he had filled his nappy, so we have not had dirty nappies for some time now. It is the weeing that seems the hardest to crack.
I have RA, which makes it a little trickier, particularly on those "have-a-go" days, when he is in his Noddy pants. I struggle to keep up with clearing up wee and changing DS's pants.
This week, he has insisted on sitting on the loo, so we are going with that. He knows to point things downwards, and is quite obsessive with that! I am just going at his speed. We will give it another good go in the summer.

Oh you guys I have just chilled out so much after reading your replies. I think I totally need to relax and think "hey, we don't need to do it in a week" no matter what the books (cough) might say.

We'll just keep plugging away and if I have to clean up pee - so be it. I'll just have to "do the shake n vac and put the freshness back" into my carpet.

Only been posting here today but I love you all already!

I'm with you there Fluffster!

if anyone's interested in a pee/poo update from our house (and you all sound as obsessed as me so why not!?)... after our 5 accidents this morning, my DD did three (count 'em) pees in her potty this afternoon and we even dared to go out for 5 minutes to post a letter so I am feeling a lot more positive about the whole thing.

It gives me real comfort to use Mumsnet and find others going through the exact experiences, thanks everyone!

BTW Mex, this really early potty training has me getting all suspicious I must admit. My step-mother claims her son was potty trained by the age of one. Now I'm the first to think my daughter's cerebrally gifted but there's no way a 12 month-old is capable of being potty trained and I'm thinking it's the Mum's who are being trained and are basically just catching pee in a potty when it comes. This is something I totally agree with Gina Ford on....

The thing is you hear stories from our mothers, MIL and Grandmothers of babies being potty trained by an early age but in those days all babies were in terries, washing machines weren't what they are now, there were no tumble driers and so on, so it was bloody hard work to have a child in nappies. I'm not surprised they came out of nappies earlier than our children!

I'm glad we can all smile about our varying degrees of success this week, even when mopping up pee and catching poo.

PS - I noticed from the MN news email our thread is one of the "Hot threads"

totally agree mum07 and bettyspaghetti.

I used to say when DS was first out of nappies that he wasn't toilet trained but that i was . I just remembered to ask him about every 30 mins for the first goodness knows how long.
I think i've been different with DD and although i still remind her if she's caught up playing with friends in ball parks etc I dont worry anywhere near as much and I think in the long run that has paid off.

Get us, hot threaders!!!!!

Can I add a new idea here? We used a sticker chart with HUGE success with DS (2.5) - he was happy to sit on the potty, but same as a few of you... would wander off, then promptly pee on the floor.
One morning he sat an did a wee on the potty, and we gave him a sticker for a chart.... he has been on a great roll since then.
We had had several aborted starts over a couple of months, and I was quite stressed, but when he was really ready, it went fine and the stickers have really helped.

He goes and helps himself now...."I did wee on big boy toilet".

I still get stressed taking him out, and he has a mortal fear of falling down public toilets... but we're getting there!!

Good luck!

I think the sticker chart has really encouraged DS too.

Its really sweet because DD(7) helps him choose his stickers and shows him where to put them on the chart.

We use little plain shape stickers for when he sits on the potty/toilet but doesn't do anything , and then a character/picture sticker when he does a wee or poo (it just so happened that we had these different ones lying around).

Before we started he was really reluctant to go anywhere near the potty or toilet let alone sit on it so the "reward" stickers for just sitting on there worked well.

Hes also got lots of praise from everyone (grandparents on the phone, neighbours, friends...he even told the postman he had done a wee on the potty Luckily postman has children of his own so wasn't too phased)

But seriously, why wouldn't you want your baby out of nappies? It just seems odd to me that a child of two or three years old would still be in them. I don't know any other mothers, and I haven't met any other babies, so I'm just going by what my parents and in laws did, but is there some reason to leave a child that long before he or she starts potty training?

Hey Mex

Apparently there are certain signs that they display when they are ready to be potty trained. I've heard if you start them before they are ready they can get quite traumatised and it can take forever. Good luck

P.s if you're wondering how come it's Friday already, I'm writing from New Zealand.

Oh, I'm sort of starting to feel better but also starting to remember that I have to have another go... We have had 2 attempts so far after DS (who is 2.8) started exhibiting a lot of interest in toilets, following everyone into the loo, climbing up on it, sitting on his potty, pulling down his trousers to sit on potty etc. But he hadn't got the main idea and, after about a day or so of trying, with nothing done in potty and him starting to get distressed at being asked, I went back to pull-up nappies - no progress and shat pull-up nappies kind of recreate the dirty protests of the 70s, back into normal nappies. Felt like horrible bad lazy useless mother until I a) posted on here and b) asked HV and got the same response - he's not ready, leave it a month or so.
Well, when the weather warms up properly we'll be trying again. But our house is a rented house with wall to wall fitted carpets...

It's a physical thing too - the nerve signals have got to get back to the brain and the muscles and connect for the child to go "oh - that feeling means wee wee's", and to actually be able to control the muscles to relax them. Our DS knew he needed a wee, but couldn't quite do the whole relaxing thing - hence the puddles on the floor.
My Mother always says that we sat on the potty from earlier and were dry earlier - but i think it was mroe luck than good management -it doens't mean kids today are anyless able - it's just we are encouraged to wait until a child is physically ready!
On the opposite thread, my mum always says I taught DS to feed himself TOO EARLY !! and that in "her day" kids weren't taught to feed themselves until they could do it tidily.....

It's a bit like the walking thing - some kids do i really early, others wait a while - potty training is the same -its a combination of physical and emotional development and no 2 kids are the same