Is it OK to keep a bedtime bottle at age four?

[DearDog96]

In a recent post about my MIL’s comment towards DD it was highlighted that I needed to get her out of nappies, off the dummy and going to bed without her bottle. The dummy I took away straight away and we’ve been doing well since, and nappies we’re going to try this weekend. With a baby on the way in a few months time I’m inclined to leave the bottle for now as it’s only once a day and it’s her comfort before bed, plus I feel like I’ve rocked the boat enough already! What’s everyone’s thoughts? Did any of your kids keep the night bottle at 4+?

It means rather than you taking charge and leading your dd you are letting her make the decisions 🤷‍♀️

Your dd needs you to be in charge, ‘okay dd you need to sit on the loo and do a wee now, once you’ve done a wee you can play.’

Not ‘sweetie do you think you should maybe do a wee now’ and then wonder why she wets herself.

Some progress is better than none.

Stop asking and tell her every 45 mins that "it's time to try the toilet now". Asking won't work until she knows the sensation. Try and get loads of fluid into her to help her bladder feel full.

Putting her on and asking are not the same thing.

I'd call HV tomorrow. It might well be into next week before she's able to come out.
But you need to keep going with this.

It would be a confusing backwards step to go back to nappies of any description inc pull ups.

I'd think one trip to the toilet an hour is plenty. She 4 can probably hold for 2/3 hours so you don't want to take her too often.

I would say she's actually probably holding it too much. She'll be ignoring the sensations because she doesn't want to stop playing etc. It would be very unusual if she was having trouble holding her wee in at all.

Are you averse to food bribes? One of my kids was stubborn to toilet training. I ended up using Smarties; 1 Smartie for wees, 2 Smarties for poos. It was more effective than a star chart because the reward was instant. It took 2 days to toilet train him!

I see. And no food bribes could work, good idea thank you!

There’s something so odd about this thread and your other threads. How could you be so unaware of typical development? You’ve been a parent for more than 4 years, surely you know that most children aren’t in nappies at 4, don’t drink from bottles or use dummies.

TBH in your shoes I would just go cold turkey on everything at once. There’s no developmental reason or benefit to continue any of that. I would emphasise that she’s a big girl now, keep up with the sticker chart, and praise her to the skies for every tiny achievement.

Agree. It’s mystifying. Bottle should have gone 3 years ago and def no day time nappies at 4.

Omg seriously. She doesn’t need to watch TV while on a potty!! She needs to be taken to the toilet - she’s 4!!

I also strongly recommend bribery too. The instant reward of chocolate was a huge motivator for one of mine.

I must say @DearDog96 you have been a pretty good sport about this, given how many posters seem to think it’s their job to give you a long lecture on parenting. Lots of parents make decisions that aren’t typical, or in fact in line with the best available evidence.

Great work being “on it” now. Stick to your plan of a couple of days a week of nursery, to get her used to it, and also they will be able to help with the potty training. I don’t think there’s any literature to support the suggestion that potty training a 4yo is easier than a 2yo, nor do I think that after just a couple of days it would be wildly unusual to not be there yet, or indicative of something wrong. Just stick to your guns and crack on with it. Good luck.

Great advice. I’d also give her some water rich foods. So maybe cereal with lots of milk for breakfast, soup for lunch, broccoli and cauliflower are water rich and maybe some snacks if berries or melon? You could even involve her in making some homemade lollies.

But do agree with the PPs. You need to take charge, it’s not “fo you need a wee?” it’s “come on it’s time for the toilet now then we can do…”.

Thank you so much, really appreciate it! Will start on the bribes today.

and I’m trying my best to take it all on board. Yes we’ve made some decisions that aren’t typical but what’s done is done and now is about trying to rectify it and get DD ready for school in September!

Fair point about you taking it all on board.

I really wouldn't worry about getting her into nursery, I think thats a stepping stone that you could skip.
A bit like skipping the potty.

There is definitely evidence that training an older child is harder than a younger child.
I think there is a sweet spot between about 2 to 2.5 when kids are old enough to get it, and young enough not to be stuck in the habit.

But you are were your at and you need to keep going. I'd definitely get some professional advice. They will have seen older kids getting trained before. I think lots of advice suits 2 year olds might not work for a 4 yo.

But its decent weather this weekend. Get out in the garden, go to the park, stay outside. Accident on grass is less stressful than carpet or floors.

Watch her. Keep a close on her after she’s had a big drink. After 30-60 minutes she should start feeling the urge to wee and start wriggling or doing “the wee dance” that parents become very familiar with. Ask her if her vulva/genitals feel different. Help her to identify the physical feeling. Explain that’s her body telling her that it needs to wee and it’s her job to get her body to a toilet so it can wee. Then quickly get her onto the toilet! Watch her like a hawk, and once you see the wee dance starting get her to the toilet. Do it for a few days and she should start to identify the sensation for herself.

My DD needed the physical sensation identified and explained. She did much better after that. Even now at 16yo sometimes she’ll start wriggling while engrossed in something on the iPad/her phone and I’ll ask if she needs to wee. She’ll look surprised, ask why, I tell her that she’s doing the wee wriggle and to listen to her body. She’ll then race off to the toilet.

And this is the problem I feel with a lot of parents that they want to make their child without considering consequences. As parents it’s our job to help them develop appropriately not baby them to ensure they’re always happy. These children grow up to be teenagers who get a shock when they realise life isn’t perfect and it’s not possible to be happy all the time.

Yes, I did with my eldest son, he was a problematic sleeper, slept with us until age 7. But it did him no harm, perfect teeth, never needed braces and at 40 he has never needed a filling.

@DearDog96 is the toilet training starting to click?
Did you give the HV a call?

I was out with some friends this evening. Three of them were ex primary school teachers, and they are horrified at the number of reception aged children these days who aren't toilet trained and who don't know how to use cutlery.

I wonder if it is due to cuts to SureStart and lack of involvement with health visitors?

What baffles me is how the OP thought it was quite normal for an NT 4 year old to still be in nappies and drinking from a baby bottle. Surely she would have noticed that most 4 year olds *aren't in nappies?

I think attitudes to parenting have really changed. My mum said that 40 years ago you would be judged by other mums if your child was late to toilet train. Now parents are more understanding (great) but it also means that children who could train or give up a bottle aren’t being encouraged to do so. I come across a lot of parents who don’t want to upset their child so don’t want to say no to them or risk upsetting them.

There might be something in that.

If you went back 50 years to mid 70s people were still using terry squares and twin tubs. Disposables were available, but expensive and not very reliable (source my mum who used disposables for holidays). The twin tub was a top load machine with one side with a big agitator in the middle, where you washed, then you had to physically move stuff to the spinner side.

There was a massive incentive to get kids out of nappies. Put them on the potty as soon as they could sit up, see if you could catch a wee, save washing a nappy.

By mid 80s automatic washing machines were a thing, Disposables nappies were more reliable and more mums were returning to work after having kids. Maternity leave was only about 6 weeks!
They didn't have time to be standing faffing with a twin tub washing loads of nappies. Or plonking kids on potties.

Pampers also paid a pediatrician to spout nonsense about readiness for potty training.
Much of which still gets repeated.

Between both the return to work thing and disposables being more reliable and the Pampers pediatrician lots of potty training techniques have gone out of fashion.

Schools are reporting more kids turning up in nappies I think the HV and nurseries need to be putting out more information on potty training younger. Including getting them use to the potty when they are babies, 6mths sit them on it while you run a bath, and the sweet spot for training between 20 and 30 month's.

I did the potty thing with my oldest, mainly because he liked to poo 💩 in a clean nappy. It definitely makes a difference.
When I went to train my youngest he'd arch his back and refuse to sit on the potty. But battle of wills I still had him trained in 3 days.

I grew up in a different country where disposable nappies didn't exist in the 80s, and automatic washing machines were very much a rarety. Kids were potty trained by age 1.

I remember a neighbour who managed to go to Western Europe, came back and told us all about nappies you can just throw away, but that this meant there were much older kids using them, even 3-year olds! I was a young child and still remember thinking that no way would a 3yo still be in nappies, come on!

I agree the 'you must wait til they are ready' is Pampers marketing campaign. My own DC showed no signs of wanting to potty train, we just did it, took a few days.

Have you managed to speak to the HV yet and ask for some support with the potty training and a referral to SaLT and a hearing test? If not, I’d try and make that a priority.

I used cloth nappies with mine. They did seem to want to be out of them. I think disposable nappies and pull ups can be confusing as they just don’t feel the need to be putt of them.

I second or third the whole disposable nappies thing. There are 16 years between my sister and I, my stepmother bought disposable nappies once as they were having to travel a fair distance in the car. The nappy was basically wet paper by the end! Nowadays nappies stay dry, the child doesn't recognize that wet is unpleasant and consequently doesn't get the link. What I also find is that society does seem to think that the baby leads on development, not that the parents teach the baby/child. I find that odd.

*out of them