toilet training

[phlebas]

I hate it. It isn't going well.

Sob.

3rd major go at it (in a year) each of the previous times we've been almost there & then it has all fallen apart for some unknown reason.

Last time (July) he'd got to the point where - if he was naked - he would ask for toilet & was weeing/pooing on it with pretty much 100% success. Fabulous - but as soon as we put clothes/pants on him he stopped asking to go & we had wetting/soiling every time. He got increasingly hysterical about the whole thing & after a couple of really nasty poo episodes he ended up back in pull-ups.

This time we're keeping him in pants & prompting him to ask for the toilet when we think he needs it (he will not ask independently). Taking him up, asking him to take his pants down & sit on loo. If he does anything he gets a chocolate fish (massively strong reinforcer - we never use edibles & he doesn't get chocolate usually), if not we say 'okay no wee, no poo, maybe next time!'.

We've had 12 toilet trips so far - tantrums on 5 of them (NO TOILET), 5 wees, no poos (worried about withholding), 2 wee accidents where we knew he wanted to go but didn't get to him fast enough. He was doing much better yesterday than today.

Feel for you phlbas, you don't say how old your ds is, My Dd2 [nt] had soiling accidents until she was about 6, difficult to deal with especially when out or on holiday etc, It also led to constipation. She did get past it but thats no help to you at the moment.
My experience at preschool has convinced me that some chldren especially boys are much later to be ready and even then can only be succesfully trained by taking them to the toilet every half hour or so for a few weeks/months until they eventually get the hang of it. They simply don't seem to get the message that they need to go soon enough.
Hope you have some success over the next few weeks but please try not to let it get you down.

Thanks Ineed I really appreciate the sympathy!

ds is 4 in a couple of weeks, we're only really just starting with self help skills - this week he's learnt to put his shoes on & pull his trousers up - but he's been so close before that it is really depressing. We're stuck at home & dh & I are constantly butting heads which doesn't help. I'm trying to stay calm.

I never thought ds would toilet train - he was totally non verbal with little joint attention and I hadn't a clue how to motivate him (like you we used chocolate buttons). For ds toilet training, like many other issues in his life, just seemed to happen. He would never use a potty because the mess bothered him too much.

We did leave his nappy off and that worked for us but I can remember dreading taking him out expecting accidents as he couldn't ask. He actually had less accidents overall than his NT sister and only a couple ever at night (he had a breakdown and regressed for a while through school pressure).

In hindsight (a wonderful thing) I would have used symbols and social stories a lot more. Ds actually takes in more information than I realised for a long while.

We had more success when we had a sort of half way house with a, what we called, 'thunder box'. It was a large potty that looked like a toilet but wasn't half as scary. We also used the Bear in the Big Blue House DVD called 'Potty Time' (happily, he still loves pre-school stuff - we still sing the 'Mystic Order of the Toileteers' song).

Once he mastered that then the actual loo was a, erm, piece of pi$$.

Hoping things get easier for you.

Sounds to me that he is doing great, he is very young and toilet training is a massive thing.

My youngest 4.6 has only just about got there, still has accidents but now in pants all the time, only in the last week have i taken him out without a pull up on. we use a combination of me telling him/ reminding him to go and him asking. He only started asking couple of weeks ago and if I left it all to him he would have loads of accidents.

We also reinforce with sweets. It has taken a full three months to get to this point. He has ggd.

Good luck, don't despair, third time lucky, dryness may be round the next corner.

Phlebas - empathy all the way. DS1 - SN was a doddle (3.7) in comparison to my DS2 and 3!The 2 little ones have medical issues that give them permanent diarrhoea. They never get the build up feeling to let them know that they need to go - so they leak.
My advice - patience of a saint, nose pegs, a look at the thread about silly songs - then make some up yourself, the hourly trip to the toilet - including at school/nursery.
In our borough, you can get help with pull-ups after the age of 4 - either through HV or School nurse.

We are still not quite there with dd2, she's dry at home (most of the time) and doing well at school but as soon as we take her out anywhere she's wet. So she wears a nappy when i take her out in the car (as i'm fed up of having to wash the car seat) and at school she is in pants.

baby steps has been really important for us. Spending time really diagnosing exactly where your child is at the moment. Do they know when they are going to pee/poo? Are they able and ready to communicate that to you? Without you nagging?

It may be that (using pull-ups) the first thing is to celebrate wildly whenever your child manages to tell you they are about to go.

And then offer them a potty/loo with no stress if they'd rather go in the nappy. potty chairs can be a good stepping stone.

And then drop the poo out of the nappy into the loo, so the idea of flushing gets introduced.

Baby baby baby steps. If there's any resistance, back off and find a smaller step to offer in a week. Separate out the whole thing into tiny tiny moves. Doing the whole shift at once can be really traumatic for children. A small shift might even be at the level of walking a few steps towards the bathroom before going in the nappy, yk? It just depends what your child is ready and comfortable with. I really believe that potty training can be done without trauma for the most resistant child, it can just take a long time. If you mentally budget for a couple of years to the end of the process, you'll probably be pleasantly surprised. You will also find pausing points on the way that everyone is comfortable with for a few weeks or months.

THere are an awful lot of different aspects for your child to get control of. Knowing when they are about to go. telling someone. Going to the bathroom. Sitting on the loo while peeing. Having the nappy off while peeing. Flushing. Wiping themselves. Sitting down to poo. Having the nappy off to

Curses. Just pressed the wrong button.

Having the nappy off to poo. Flushing the poo. Wearing pants.

Well, you get my drift.

Personally, I'd want to have the telling someone and getting to the right place to pee and poo FIRMLY in place before working on getting the nappy off for actually doing the deed, or wearing underpants in between times.

Ah, tibni, I'm liking the sound of the pictures or social stories idea - anybody got any liks to any, or know where to get some from?!

Our dd2 is 3 and 3 months, so still early I guess for toilet training with asd... but our major issue is persuading her to go to the toilet at all. She's not scared of it, and she knows what it's for (has an elder sister and she's actually very bright herself anyway) but the issue is control - she's just refusing to go because we want her to. Managed it for 2 days with a new basket of 'toilet toys' and sticker chart, but the novelty quickly wore off and even though we've replaced the sticker idea with chocolate reward, she has no interest and we would literally have to drag her in screaming and thrashing, which I'm sure is not the way to do it.

Anyone got any new ideas?!!

i got a really pretty box and wrapped up "mystery" presents. cheap as chips crap from primark etc, a hair slide, a sticker (not really worth the wrapping paper", a pair of knickers, a new toothbrush that she needed anyway etc etc. And then we moved the goal posts for when she was allowed to pick a present and open it. At first it was sitting on a potty or a loo, then it was doing something on it, then it was doing something without prompting until finally it was, if you are still wearing the same knic knics at bath time as you were in the morning (cue photo on phone), you can open a present...
it worked for us... (she's non verbal btw- but now dry by day and night!)

Hi everyone
I have just found this thread and wondered if this might be of use to anyone:
www.sensetoys.com/toysproduct_detail.php?productid=OF53CN850621&fld_search=toilet%20time

I have 2 potty trained and 1 just starting so plan to give it a try.