Why do I bother?

[Momrage]

Had eyes on 3yo DC like a hawk today. No accidents, even when leaving the house in pants, finally felt like progress. Left DC with DH for 30 minutes whilst I put the baby to bed. Came down to DH mindlessly scrolling, TV blaring and DC had soiled himself. FFS, DH said he'd asked DC, which is useless as DC will not say atm, especially when distracted.

3yo DC is reluctant to potty train, and in fairness we've left it fairly late after being sucked into the "wait until they're ready" rhetoric, aka we put it off as long as possible.

Its been almost 2 months and he can and does go fairly easily when prompted, but we have to look for signs otherwise he soils himself. Nursery are not on top of it and he wets himself 1-2 times a day and now DH is seemingly getting fucking complacent.

It's like everyone suddenly expects him to be able to do it after 2 months. But I really don't think that he understands when he feels the need to go, he very rarely initiates using the potty and has never told me needs to go - only after he's soiled.

If anyone has any tips for teaching how to understand feeling the need to wee/poo id welcome them. Otherwise just having a rant.

In my experience you're describing a child who is probably constipated (even if they go every day, they can be constipated). Very common to have a stretched bowel and lose feeling of needing to go and this affects bladder too.

I think you're harsh blaming nursery and dh. Your ds isnt potty trained, you have simply learnt to catch wees and this is unsustainable in a busy setting past those initial days when children are new to pants. He should have smelt the poo accident though!

my son was 3 yo and 3 months when he finally cracked it - and by that, I mean he seemed to start to understand what it meant to need to toilet for a wee.. he still had so many accidents. It's taken another 2-3 months on top of that for him to recognise a poo and start to communicate all of this. He now very rarely has an accident. But it felt like an uphill struggle and like it would never happen!

My advice would be just to keep doing what you're doing. It will eventually click and it will feel like a very sudden (and welcome!) shift.

Interesting. He has struggled with constipation in the past, but its improved with the introduction of the potty. This was actually his second one of the day, so caught us off guard.

I guess I'm most annoyed at DH dropping the ball as it was two nights in a row he's had a pre-bed accident whilst he was with him. And DHs "I asked" just shows he doesn't listen to me as we'd had a lengthy conversation about how DC not recognising the cues yet, and discussing how to approach this with nursery to avoid accidents

Helpful to hear, thanks @HallidayJones6779. I do wish the 3 day methods would get in the bin, they really do give unrealistic expectations and it's hard not to get frustrated when it doesn't magically click like you're told it will.

He did take himself to the potty for a wee this morning with his book. He is doing well. I just hate the thought of him soiling himself, must be miserable for him.

For my eldest, she was done in 3 days... but she was 3.5 when I started with her! Like a day, with my boy it's been a process. It's given me comfort to see another mum in school very similar - she's claimed her son has been potty trained for 8 months(his 3rd birthday was in March) but he's only just stopped pooping his pants too! Celebrate every success and be kind to yourself. You're doing great and he will get it xxx