3 year old not potty trained

[goldenorbspider]

He's just not interested. Turned 3 just before January. Nursery also try. He'll bring me his mat and nappy and tell me to change him. Wasn't happy about being put in pulls ups. Sticker charts and bribery doesn't seem to be working. We read potty training books and watch cartoons on youtube. He'll move into the preschool room in April. Hoping if he sees none of the older kids using a nappy might encourage him. Any other late developers?

My son is 3 in May. We were doing really well with it before Christmas, he was telling me when he needed to go and happy to go in the potty.

Then he got chicken pox followed by a horrendous cold and now he refuses point blank to use the potty or loo! 🤷🏻‍♀️

I'm just going to keep offering the potty frequently and hope he goes for it at some point... 🙄

Just put him in pants. Stick a potty downstairs and upstairs and go cold turkey on nappies. Unless he has sen he is more than capable of training. Might have a few accidents for a few days but I'd be surprised if it takes more than a week.

Read Oh Crap Potty Training. It’s really good.

My biggest takeaway from it is that it’s just that, training. Of course kids aren’t going to be overly interested when they are busy & can wee & poo whenever they fancy in their nappy. By 3, they are easily ready to be trained in most cases. It’s you as a parent who has to bite the bullet, chuck the nappies (and pull ups) & spend a week training. Yep, you’ll get wees everywhere. And poos. But once they realise the nappies aren’t coming back, they’ll get the message.

We didn’t wait until our DD was showing signs. We just picked an arbitrary date & booked some time off work & kept her off nursery. We gave ourselves 7 days of being at home. Day 1, no clue, she did wee’s everywhere but we grabbed her & plonked her on the potty. I cried, she cried. I drank wine. But she got it after a few solid days of hard work on all our parts! We still had a few weeks of accidents when out & about or very distracted but that’s OK, you swiftly deal with the situation & move on.

Potty training is tough but once it’s done, it’s such a relief. A year on almost & it’s a distant memory!

Good luck OP!

My son was nearly 3 and a half, I’d listened to well meaning advice about waiting for him to be ‘ready’ but he just never showed any interest or willingness. Read the Oh Crap book and then just went for it, cold turkey on nappies, 3 days bottomless and then gradually introducing pants and trousers. It was really hard, to be honest I think it was harder because he was older and so more stubborn and set in his ways. Wees were probably cracked in a week or so but poos took a good 6 months. I would say just go for it, don’t use pull ups, go straight to the toilet if he won’t use a potty and say goodbye to nappies. It’ll be hard but you’ll get there. Good luck!

Mine was 3 in November and also struggling and I have the issue of a younger child in nappies so I can't get rid of then unfortunately. She also suffers with constipation and every time I think we're doing well we go backwards again!

My three year old cracked it last month.

Get two potties. One upstairs bathroom, one downstairs.

Take his bottoms off and let him get on with it.

There will be a few accidents but he will get there.

Lots of praise (not bribes) when he does it. We sing a song 😜

I would stick him in pants at home regular trips to toilet/potty stop giving it huge attention and he will get there.

Yes after he goes give it woop woops. Is what I meant not before

I am a big believer in waiting until the child is ready - but there's also a point at which you have to force the issue. Once the child is physically ready, if they're not emotionally ready quite yet then sure, build in some time for them to come round. But eventually you need to do it because there's also the problem of waiting too long and then breaking the habit is HARD.

Whether the child wants to learn or not, you also have to accept that potty training is not great fun for anyone. We were lucky with both of ours in that we hit the sweet spot in terms of timing etc so after 2-3 days we were pretty much done. But those 2-3 days were awful. Especially the first one. It is what it is.

I’d also recommend the Oh Crap book- as someone else has said upthread, or course most children want to carry on in nappies- it’s easy for them. Most of them have been in a nappy constantly since minutes after birth, so it’s also familiar and ‘safe’.

I’d pick a weekend, clear the diaries, and crack on.

We tried DS just before he was 3. It was a disaster - both of us in tears, him with no clue what was going on. We have up. We tried again at 3.5, and he had it mastered in 3 days over a half term. I think it really is worth waiting until they are ready.

This is against all advice but worked for us - DS was 3.1 and we'd had a number of attempts which he resisted. One day he weed against a wall on purpose during potty training - he had a bare bum at the time. He smiled at DH and said 'look Daddy you're not proud now are you?'

DH gave him an absolutely massive bollocking, told him it was really naughty to wee and poo everywhere when he knew what the potty and toilet were for, he trained INSTANTLY. Since then, not a single accident and he's nearly 5!

Oh Crap Potty Training!!!!

Its a god send. I doubt many preschoolers choose to start potty training. As a parent you need to just move on from nappies and pull ups. Yes there will be accidents but its the only way they learn. After having wee trickling down his leg he will soon show interest in the potty im sure.

I wouldn't recommend 'absolutely bollocking' a three year old.

Jesus, that is the worst potty advice I have ever read.

Can see where he learned to say a nasty, manipulative thing like "you're not proud now"

Why do some people have kids?

Oh crap seems a popular choice!

You say it’s the worst advice but it worked instantly. Pretty much the only telling off he’s ever had!

Well, I'm not sure about the massive blocking, but I do think that a three year old who knows perfectly well how to use the potty and is making a conscious decision not to requires more than just warm fuzzies to make it happen. And a telling off or whatever consequences are in place in your house in this instance seems reasonable. That's entirely different to a child who just doesn't have a clue and is shouted at nonetheless.

There's a book called Potty Training in A Week (or something along those lines, maybe it's a day, not a week) by authors Fox and Azrin iirc. I recommend you read it and follow their steps. It requires a solid block of time devoted solely to training your child but it's a great method, we thought out, and if you do it it will start you off on a new and positive way of parenting all round, not just in this one area.

@hollyhead I think your DH did the right thing.

Everyone always recommends Oh Crap but there's a whole section on night training which goes against everything I've ever seen on MN about night training! (I.e. MN generally says you don't do it, just wait til they're dry at night). I always wonder if people recommending Oh Crap mean this part too?
Oh Crap is also quite 'strict' about training between certain ages (can't remember what now but 3 is 'too late' iirc!). Whereas loads of people on here seem to say 'wait until they're ready'.

In my experience waiting til he was ready would've meant it never would have happened as he never showed any interest, so just bit the bullet one day. It took ages to properly feel comfortable that he wouldn't have accidents but he got the gist fairly quickly.

Both of my dc were 3 before they were potty trained. With both of them we waited until they were really ready and did it in a day. Dd only had one accident, d's had a couple but by day 2 they used the potty or toilet at home very well. We used pull up when we went out for a couoke of weeks just in case but they were more of an insurance than anything else (I don't drive so use buses a lot, can't just stop at the side of a road). We found waiting worked well, I would have struggled staying in for a full week and really didn't want to lug a potty about with me wherever we went.

Think I followed the NHS advice which is breathtakingly simple, free and works for most kids.

No night training (cruel unless under medical advice) and no bollocking.

Everyone always recommends Oh Crap but there's a whole section on night training which goes against everything I've ever seen on MN about night training! yeh I totally ignored that section. Common sense told me it wouldn’t be beneficial for me to wake my 2 yr old through the night to wee. Being dry in the night is down to a hormone anyway!

I agree at 3 it shouldn’t be negotiable. Get rid of all nappies, get rid of the mat, and put him in pants. Do it over half-term so you have time