Vent I suck at Potty Training

[rebcoola]

Seriously I am not good at potty training.  None have been done quickly or easily. 3 yr old just did her first poop in the potty unprompted after about a month of peeing in the potty. Yay, than she immediately had a poop accident at the gym nursery...she never poops twice a day but she did today she was there for 15 minutes and went to the potty right beforehand.  

I much prefer teaching the oldest to drive anyone want to trade potty training for driving lessons lol

 

[lauraw4321]

Oh, me too. I literally started a PT parent support group because it was so traumatic. My kids were having accidents in K. All 3 of them. My almost 9 year old just had an accident a month ago, not tied to illness. I’m sure I’ve done psychological damage to all of them over it. It is my parenting Achilles hill (so far). 

[lauraw4321]

10 minutes ago, rebcoola said:

Seriously I am not good at potty training.  None have been done quickly or easily. 3 yr old just did her first poop in the potty unprompted after about a month of peeing in the potty. Yay, than she immediately had a poop accident at the gym nursery...she never poops twice a day but she did today she was there for 15 minutes and went to the potty right beforehand.  

I much prefer teaching the oldest to drive anyone want to trade potty training for driving lessons lol

 

I also daydreamed if a PT camp where you could send your kids away to professionals who returned them PTed. 🙃

[Drama Llama]

Just now, lauraw4321 said:

I also daydreamed if a PT camp where you could send your kids away to professionals who returned them PTed. 🙃

I have a friend who runs a home daycare.  A former family flew her and her daughter out to the other coast so she could watch their kids while they went on vacation, and offered her a huge bonus if the youngest was potty trained when they got back.  

Friend took the kids to every sight seeing destination, stopping every hour or two to use the little potty in the back of the mini van.  She collected that bonus!

[KSera]

11 minutes ago, rebcoola said:

I much prefer teaching the oldest to drive anyone want to trade potty training for driving lessons lol

I’ll trade! (Although, we’ll have to start with your next kid, because I think starting with a three year old is much harder than starting earlier. Give me your next one between 18 months and two years old and you’ve got a deal.) You can teach my next one to drive. 

 

3 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

I also daydreamed if a PT camp where you could send your kids away to professionals who returned them PTed. 🙃

I’ve dreamed of the same thing for teaching kids to drive!

[rebcoola]

9 minutes ago, lauraw4321 said:

Oh, me too. I literally started a PT parent support group because it was so traumatic. My kids were having accidents in K. All 3 of them. My almost 9 year old just had an accident a month ago, not tied to illness. I’m sure I’ve done psychological damage to all of them over it. It is my parenting Achilles hill (so far). 

Oh yes my middle was like 7 ADHD and Sensory issues contributed but she is also gifted and definitely seemed like people were judging.  I had more than one melt down about it.  

[Amethyst]

Oh man. I had the books about “they’ll figure it out in their own good time” and “make it fun”, etc. Blah blah blah. Miserable. When the oldest was approaching 5 and my dh read about encopresis, we finally said the heck with their own good time nonsense! 
 

We had way too many battles over something that we never wanted to battle over. Ugh. 

[rebcoola]

5 minutes ago, KSera said:

I’ll trade! (Although, we’ll have to start with your next kid, because I think starting with a three year old is much harder than starting earlier. Give me your next one between 18 months and two years old and you’ve got a deal.) You can teach my next one to drive. 

 

I’ve dreamed of the same thing for teaching kids to drive!

I have done earlier and it didn't work well for me.  

This one every few months we would do a few days and not have any success and would put it away.  We are mostly getting it now.. except nursery,  and car rides for pee.  Poop has been an issue as in she is already pooping when she realizes what's going on.

[KSera]

1 minute ago, rebcoola said:

I have done earlier and it didn't work well for me.  

This one every few months we would do a few days and not have any success and would put it away.  We are mostly getting it now.. except nursery,  and car rides for pee.  Poop has been an issue as in she is already pooping when she realizes what's going on.

Sorry! Hopefully this stage is brief. I assume you keep a little potty in the car and don’t go back and forth to diapers or pull ups? Going places is definitely the hardest part of that stage. 

[rebcoola]

1 minute ago, KSera said:

Sorry! Hopefully this stage is brief. I assume you keep a little potty in the car and don’t go back and forth to diapers or pull ups? Going places is definitely the hardest part of that stage. 

Yep we have little potties and we don't use pull ups.  I know in a few months maybe even a few weeks it will be no big deal.  But it sucks while you're in it and have to be thinking about it constantly.

[Kassia]

8 minutes ago, Amethyst said:

Oh man. I had the books about “they’ll figure it out in their own good time” and “make it fun”, etc. Blah blah blah. Miserable. When the oldest was approaching 5 and my dh read about encopresis, we finally said the heck with their own good time nonsense! 
 

We had way too many battles over something that we never wanted to battle over. Ugh. 

We had this with my oldest.  It was an absolute nightmare.  

Ds1 was impossible.  Ds2 was super easy because he wanted to do it.  Ds3 had developmental delays so we waited until he was a bit older and he was easy.  Dd (my youngest) was also super easy.  I was SO relieved when we were done with potty training!  

[Katy]

21 minutes ago, Amethyst said:

Oh man. I had the books about “they’ll figure it out in their own good time” and “make it fun”, etc. Blah blah blah. Miserable. When the oldest was approaching 5 and my dh read about encopresis, we finally said the heck with their own good time nonsense! 
 

We had way too many battles over something that we never wanted to battle over. Ugh. 

I’m going through this right now with my almost 5 year old. Finally decided to stop with the pull ups and force underwear. He refuses to empty his bladder fully unless you basically block the door until he tries again. If you don’t force it he will definitely have an accident. I don’t understand the desire to stay a baby and have me do everything for him. 

[Clarita]

Well not only do I have trouble with potty training kids my cat won't even go in the litter box so... I would be happy to give someone money in exchange for doing the whole potty training thing. (Not tell me how to do it but just take my kids like potty training boot camp and teach them.)

[Jann in TX]

Potty training woes here too...

I'm grandson's (GS) primary care giver--he is 2.5 yrs old.  GS is also in day care MWF and sees his Dad/Stepmom most weekends...

Dad/Stepmom recently took him for a 10 day trip out of state to see family.  When he was there they transitioned him out of diapers... at their home he happily 'goes' for them and has even started pooping on potty.  At our house and daycare it is a different story!  He is in pullups at daycare as he is not verbal and will not sit on their potty.  At our house he will go potty if I take him-- but he is in TEARS and SCREAMING 'No, No' every single time until he goes then he smiles and finishes up just fine!  He will not go for DH or his mom.  For the 3-4 days  a week that we have him all day I try to start him off in undies-- but that usually ends by noon then back to pullups...

If it were up to me we would have waited a bit longer-- GS is basically non-verbal... I think 3-4 more months would have made this much easier...

Daycare said they will help with training-- but the GS would need to cooperate and he is not there yet!

[Terabith]

Yeah, I'd have a very hard time potty training a kid who screamed bloody murder every time I took them to the bathroom.  That's just a level of drama that I would struggle with.  My oldest kid was pretty easy to potty train, and honestly, I think if I'd done my younger one at the same time, that she would have been okay, but she was fifteen months old and had a bladder the size of a thimble, and we lived in San Antonio where if I was on the road, there wasn't anywhere I could pull off easily to use a little potty.  So I tried to wait till she was closer to two, but then we moved cross country, and she had a major regression.  I basically waited will she was 3.5, sent her to preschool in pull ups, and she decided that she'd use the potty on her own and pretty much never had an accident.  In between, I tried negotiating with her, but she was verbal enough to say, "I like m&ms, but not enough to use the potty.  There's nothing that I like enough to use the potty.  It's my body, and you can't make me," which was true enough.  

I'm not really a poster child for potty training either, but I also hate teaching teens to drive, although my youngest isn't as bad about driving as my oldest was.  Ugh.  Oldest's combination of anxiety and rigidity along with not wanting to take instructions like, "Slow down before this turn," made me throw up my hands and refuse to take them.  

[rebcoola]

1 hour ago, Jann in TX said:

Potty training woes here too...

I'm grandson's (GS) primary care giver--he is 2.5 yrs old.  GS is also in day care MWF and sees his Dad/Stepmom most weekends...

Dad/Stepmom recently took him for a 10 day trip out of state to see family.  When he was there they transitioned him out of diapers... at their home he happily 'goes' for them and has even started pooping on potty.  At our house and daycare it is a different story!  He is in pullups at daycare as he is not verbal and will not sit on their potty.  At our house he will go potty if I take him-- but he is in TEARS and SCREAMING 'No, No' every single time until he goes then he smiles and finishes up just fine!  He will not go for DH or his mom.  For the 3-4 days  a week that we have him all day I try to start him off in undies-- but that usually ends by noon then back to pullups...

If it were up to me we would have waited a bit longer-- GS is basically non-verbal... I think 3-4 more months would have made this much easier...

Daycare said they will help with training-- but the GS would need to cooperate and he is not there yet!

Oh that sounds rough.

[ktgrok]

1 hour ago, Katy said:

I’m going through this right now with my almost 5 year old. Finally decided to stop with the pull ups and force underwear. He refuses to empty his bladder fully unless you basically block the door until he tries again. If you don’t force it he will definitely have an accident. I don’t understand the desire to stay a baby and have me do everything for him. 

That was actually the "aha" moment with my youngest. I had no real issues with the other kids, but with her...ugh. Finally I realized that she didn't WANT to be a "big kid" and as soon as I made it clear that going on the potty didn't mean she had to be "big", that she could use the potty and still be the "baby" she was fine, and started using it regularly!

The other 3, being "big" was an incentive. To her, it was a disincentive. Once we realized that we were fine. 

[SKL]

I might take you up on that trade.  But I have 2 fifteen-year-olds learning to drive.  Will you take both of them?  Bonus if you can also train my dog not to lose his mind every time a delivery vehicle approaches our cul-de-sac!

(Actually I don't really mind either stage ... at least not the training parts ....)

[Katy]

16 minutes ago, ktgrok said:

That was actually the "aha" moment with my youngest. I had no real issues with the other kids, but with her...ugh. Finally I realized that she didn't WANT to be a "big kid" and as soon as I made it clear that going on the potty didn't mean she had to be "big", that she could use the potty and still be the "baby" she was fine, and started using it regularly!

The other 3, being "big" was an incentive. To her, it was a disincentive. Once we realized that we were fine. 

He’s not the baby, but he’s quite jealous of the actual baby…. Maybe that’s exactly what’s going on. 

[ktgrok]

Just now, Katy said:

He’s not the baby, but he’s quite jealous of the actual baby…. Maybe that’s exactly what’s going on. 

Oh, I bet so!

Maks sure he knows that he will ALWAYS be your baby, and can still snuggle or whatever things he associates with that, even if he uses the potty. 

[Ting Tang]

I have four children, and they all were potty trained at various ages.  I found it easiest to let it happen on their own due timing, and it definitely didn't happen overnight.  It's their milestone and their achievement.  And the bottom wiping stage after that lasts a while anyway, so don't be too hard on yourself.  It will happen.  Now driving...  I just dread.  Not the teaching part, but the allowing them to eventually drive on the road, without the experience we have to anticipate things.  😞  

[KatieJ]

On 7/8/2022 at 4:29 PM, rebcoola said:

Seriously I am not good at potty training.  None have been done quickly or easily. 3 yr old just did her first poop in the potty unprompted after about a month of peeing in the potty. Yay, than she immediately had a poop accident at the gym nursery...she never poops twice a day but she did today she was there for 15 minutes and went to the potty right beforehand.  

I much prefer teaching the oldest to drive anyone want to trade potty training for driving lessons lol

 

I did quite well  potty training 4 kids, no big deal.
However I was doing drivers training with our oldest while potty training the youngest. 
When the youngest was ready to learn to drive, I was just done and I told my husband, this one is all your’s! 

[Tree Frog]

On 7/8/2022 at 6:17 PM, Terabith said:

I like m&ms

Mine were all pretty easy to potty train. I attribute this to the kids, though, and not me.

I have to laugh, though. My kids (ages 26, 23, and 21) all remember I used M&M mini's to reward them each time they went: 1 mini for pee, 2 for poo. My oldest dd told me a couple of years ago that she'd just seen a M&M mini for the first time since we potty trained and she was amazed at how that teeny, tiny piece of candy was so motivating. It was a funny conversation to have. I was amazed she remembered them in connection with pt.

[rebcoola]

On 7/8/2022 at 5:00 PM, SKL said:

I might take you up on that trade.  But I have 2 fifteen-year-olds learning to drive.  Will you take both of them?  Bonus if you can also train my dog not to lose his mind every time a delivery vehicle approaches our cul-de-sac!

(Actually I don't really mind either stage ... at least not the training parts ....)

Absolutely I've enjoyed drivers training enough to actually look into becoming an instructor. 

Not much help on the dog.  I have one that goes nuts for the truck and the other goes nuts because of her sister going nuts. 

Edited July 12, 2022 by rebcoola

[sweet2ndchance]

I flat hate potty training.

My kids ran the gamut of easy and hard to potty train. My laid back kid was hard to train and my "spirited" child was easy. My girls were both pretty easy to day train but one of my girls and my second oldest boy wet the bed until their preteen years (family history on their dad's side of bed wetting into the teen years).

Youngest was going great with potty training, thought I was finally going to be done with it but the universe just laughed and said, "here have a child with encopresis" so we still deal with potty issues even though my youngest is 9yo. He's getting better about it slowly, slowly, slowly. I couldn't have even told you what encopresis was before this kid. Sigh.

I haven't had the joy of teaching one how to drive yet (long story) but I would love to be able to do laundry without wet sheets or dirty undies again!

[Tanaqui]

Since we're all telling our war stories, the oldest would pee on the toilet, but would not poop there. At all. I remember asking my mother, when they were 3, "When will this kid poop on the potty!?" and my mother said "February 17!" and we had a good laugh - but no, she was completely right. It was in mid-February. Coming *real* close up onto the kid's fourth birthday, too.

But then, the younger one, totally different. One day we woke up and realized that she was totally dry all day, and no poop accidents either. We hadn't even really *done* anything other than bring her into the bathroom when we had to go, and she was barely two. To this day, I have no idea what happened there. We didn't do a thing. It was all her. We certainly hadn't thought she was ready! Nobody believed it, either. We went to visit my grandmother and she was sure we were just completely crazy, that there was no way this child was potty trained, we MUST be trying to pull one over on her. She kept saying, in various ways, "But she's only two!" and "But really, don't you think she needs a diaper?" and so on.

[SKL]

As for me, I feel like getting to diaper-free might be the only thing I did do right as a mom.  😛  (Won't even say I did "potty training" right ... some of the details took years ... some are still not really done, and I don't understand why.)

[Idalou]

 I bought one of those tiny, about10 inch wide potties months before giving birth. I started my first child on it when they were nearly 5 months old, every time they awoke from a nap. Of course it didn't work all the time but they became familiar with it and were day-trained before a year, night times were dry anout 7 months later. My nephew refused to sit on a toilet until he was over two and then my sister read that blowing bubbles, or blowing through a straw, etc, relaxed the muscles needed to pee and poop. It was quite the event, with a beach towel on the floor to catch the soapy bubbles. She even sat in front of him and let him blow out a birthday candle through a straw. I asked why she went to so much trouble, and she said because the alternative of seeing a jar of sweets next to the toilet, as other moms recommended, made her gag.