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Potty training

Is your child ready for potty training at nursery? Here's the place for all your toilet training questions.

Nearly 3 year old - Not ready for potty training?

1 reply

TheQuickHedgehog · 05/01/2025 18:02

I know this subject has been done to death but…
DD is 3 at the end of February and is mostly not interested in using her potty.
She is in pull ups and is capable of pulling her trousers and pull up down. We now do all of her pull up changes whilst she’s sat on the potty to try and get her to make a connection between the 2. She has no real problem with sitting on the potty unless I’m interrupting her play. On the very odd occasion she’s weed on the potty - but that was more us getting her to sit at the right time - rather than her exhibiting any sort of bladder control.
We attempted potty training at the start of the Christmas holidays as I had 2 solid weeks at home with her. We went cold turkey and took the pull-ups away. We had prepared her for this and told her it was going to happen.
We lasted 2 days and we didn’t have a single success. She actually seemed surprised when she was wet. On day 3 our heating stopped working and I don’t have a tumble dryer so couldn’t continue as we had no way to dry any wet washing (we were without heating for 4 days)
The last 2 days she has approached me to tell me she needs a poo and I have taken her to her potty and she has pooed both times with absolutely no accident in her nappy. Today she was at nanny’s house and pooed in her nappy but immediately told nanny she needed changing.
Any wees or poos in the potty have been followed by us all making a massive deal
about it, which she loves. She also insists on wiping herself and waving goodbye to her wee/poo when we flush it down the toilet. So when she gets it right - it’s all a very positive experience.

I’m thinking that she’s still not quite ready and to try again in the February half term when she’s at home all week and see how we go.
My eldest was potty trained before she was 3 and it was all “child led”, so I’m in unfamiliar territory.
Do I bite the bullet and try again now, or just leave it for now? I don’t want her to get upset with this and thus delay her even further. She’s a very headstrong little girl and if she feels she’s being pushed to do something - she will absolutely resist.
Please be kind

OP posts:
Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
ThelastRolo20 · 05/01/2025 18:18

It's so difficult as there's many thoughts on this. Do you wait until signs of readiness (child led) or decide they're ready and force it more (probably more the older school of thought).

I do think the longer you leave it the more stubborn children can become about it due to their cognitive ability! With my DD she wasn't showing signs of readiness but cracked it in about 3 weeks as she knew when she'd done a wee/ poo and that was good enough for me.

I didn't do bribery etc, she found being wet unpleasant enough of a motivator. That and being taken away from what she was playing with to sort it out! I always think with these things you need to fully commit for a few days to decide whether it's working or not x

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