Made a bad mistake with potty training - any advice??

[NellyTheElephant]

DD2 is still really little (22 months), but she has good speech and for ages has told me when pooing / weeing and asked to have her nappy changed, she regularly and happily sat on potty - usually with no results, but had done a few wees and a few poos (luck rather than good management) so I thought - well, why not give it a go, what's the harm in trying....... I was also influenced by the fact that I have a new baby due in April and I thought if she DID pick it up it would have been lovely to have a few months off from nappies, but I honestly wasn't stressed or bothered and was v relaxed about accidents etc.

Anyway, last Monday I put her into pants. No accidents. She holds on (and on, and on), she did a couple of wees and poos in the potty over the course of the 4 days I tried. Mainly she just held it all in, then started getting distressed and jumping around like she's on hot coals when she can't hold it in any longer towards end of afternoon and crying piteously until she finaly lets go (can take half an hour or so of jumping around and crying before she lets it go). It really is VERY distressing.

She has been back in nappies for the last 4 days but this has not helped one jot. Her nappy will remain dry all day and then we get same thing as if she were in pants - she'll start jumping around and crying and getting distressed until she finally lets go. It's the wees that are the real problem, if she needs a poo she'll just come up to me and say 'poo poo mummy', then do it in her nappy and ask me to change her (in fact she was quite happy doing the poos in the potty too, but I've ditched the whole potty thing at the moment because of the wee issue).

I don't know what to do. I'm worried she's going to get a urine infection or something. I also just can't bear to see her so sad and upset.

HELP!!!!

Have you tried sitting her on your lap when she is in a nappy and telling her it is ok to wee during the day and making a big thing of the resulting wee?

If she is still happy to poo on the potty i would ask if she wants to use the potty or her nappy and again make much of the result.

I would take her to the dr sooner rather than later to check she has not got an UTI.

Yes rewards and star charts etc - if she's holding it in, take her for a wee regularly, and she gets a sticker, or star on a chart, or even a chocolate button, when she does the wee in the potty or toilet and make a big fuss of how great it is. (You can still do this while using nappies or pull-ups, if a wee goes in them, no problem.)

Don't blame yourself for it going wrong btw - she could have an infection, or she could just have got the wrong end of the stick. It's an inexact science. Took us a year from first wees in potty to fully trained!

We've just started potty training dd this week (25 months). She's picked it up really quickly but for the first couple of days she would get quite distressed when she was ready for a wee. She would sit on the potty quite happily and have a go but when she was really ready to wee she would cry and try to get off. I would just cuddle her (gently but enough to hold her on the potty - hope that doesn't sound too awful!) and talk quietly in her ear saying it's alright and generally reassuring. The look on her little face when she did wee was sooooo delighted!! I think it took about 3 days of that before she wasn't panicking and was just able to wee at will.

Sorry I've probably waffled a bit - it's late. But hope that helps a bit

I would go back to the potty training -- clearly she's ready as she has bladder control and is choosing not to wee herself and is uncomfortable with poo in a nappy too. IMO if you keep her in nappies you will get past this window of opportunity and she'll become used to the sensation of being wet/dirty and potty training could become a nightmare. All you need to address here is her apprehension for weeing. Talk to her, reassure her, and maybe have her make her doll/teddy/etc. 'wee' on the potty. It's perfectly normal for it to take her a while to get good at letting go of the wee, so just be patient and make the time on the potty fun and comfortable with books, toys, etc.

Oh, and yes, DS's first wee on the toilet he said "uh-oh" (his only word at the time) and said it every time he made a wee - toilet or nappy - for the next week. We started just putting him on the loo first thing in the morning, and the first one was purely a timing thing rather than a deliberate wee on his part.

Thanks for your replies, which were really helpful. Just to let you know that I kept her back in nappies for the week (although still putting her on the potty regularly without results) until she was weeing again in the nappy without crying, then we tried again, back into pants and (please don't let me be jinxing it!!) she seemed to pick it up almost immediately this time, although I discovered she loaths the potty and won't countenance sitting on it any more at all - only wants to go on the loo, which is fine by me. It's been a week now and she's doing really well so fingers crossed.......