Resisting/uninterested in potty training

[Ashley&Scott]

M is 3.5. He has been peeing on the potty on & off for the last year.  Overall he has very little interest in potty training. At DC he will pee when asked. At home he goes through periods of going pee when you ask him but then other times (like the past 2 weeks) he gets very upset when you suggest going potty. At home only time he will happily go is before a bath. 

In general he doesn't like change. He moved to a new room at DC last month & we went on a long weekend trip. Plus some teachers were on vacation, based on some comments they made I think the subs were pushing PTing harder. (I basically told them to chill out when they approached me about it)

I bought character underwear thinking he might get excited about them. Nope, doesn't care at all. He wears pull ups at DC & diapers at home. (Pull ups make him more prone to diaper rash so we still use diapers at home to keep the rash at bay)

Bribing doesn't work. I feel like maybe we should just let it be for a while longer, pushing/suggesting seems to make it worse. At his 3yr well check his pedi said not to push, he would do it when he was ready. I am happy to take a break & stop asking completely if that will help. 

Thoughts/suggestions?

[pugz]

The 3 day method worked for us, and it suggests you stop any kind of "training" you've been doing for at least a month prior so you can start fresh

[Ashley&Scott]

pugz did it work for poop too or just pee?

[Ashley&Scott]

Jul 10, 2015 13:54:07 GMT -5 @pnkybrwstr said:

No idea, but O is the same. I keep it super casual and will just ask him if he wants to try the potty. If he says no, I'm all "okie dokie!". I don't want to create a battle over this (we have enough troubles with our bedtime battle).

I do the same.

DH on the other hand asks more & tried bribing him with Hershey's kisses. That worked for 1 day then the novelty wore off.

[jenny1223]

DS was the same way. I decided to try the 3 day method again last month (it didn't work about 5 months ago when I tried). First day, I spent most of my time cleaning accidents and scrubbing out underwear. He didn't go on the potty once. Second day, same until about 5 PM. Then he totally got it! I was shocked. I say try total immersion with underwear. DS still has poop accidents, especially away from home.

We did bribe him with a power wheels too!

[Mushe]

My kiddo was SOOOOO resistant, but we followed the Oh Crap! Potty training book at just under 3.5, and it worked really well. We did do bribes/rewards, but the author actually doesn't encourage it, so if you don't need it, don't do it. My kid just got pissed off at me taking him to the potty, so it started with naked time and helping him learn the 'I'm about to go,' and then 'I need to go.' It only took 2 days for those two skills. The only thing lingering for us is nighttime, given MH's proclivity for filling DS with milk right before bed.

[blueberry10]

DD (3.5) was very resistant - we'd ask her if she had to go and she would always say no, and got really angry when we tried to put her on the potty. She was treating her pull-ups just like diapers, and couldn't be bothered to go in the bathroom. We finally just put her in underwear to see what happened, and played it cool, and after a few accidents it was like a light switch flipped. She mostly hasn't looked back. Might be worth a shot.

[Ashley&Scott]

Jul 10, 2015 14:25:00 GMT -5 blueberry10 said:

DD (3.5) was very resistant - we'd ask her if she had to go and she would always say no, and got really angry when we tried to put her on the potty. She was treating her pull-ups just like diapers, and couldn't be bothered to go in the bathroom. We finally just put her in underwear to see what happened, and played it cool, and after a few accidents it was like a light switch flipped. She mostly hasn't looked back. Might be worth a shot.

Did she freak out when you put her in underwear. I had M try on the underwear I bought to make sure they were the right size & you would have thought I was torturing him.

[scribellesam]

Ours is pretty uninterested too. We tried underwear last weekend and he peed and pooped in them all day just like diapers - yuck! He wouldn't even tell us when he had done it. So we moved back into pull ups. I ask him to sit on the potty throughout the day; sometimes he'll pee, sometimes he won't even sit down. He turned 3yo in May.

[pugz]

still working on #2. DD only goes a couple of times a week so it has been hard to catch her and get her to the potty.

[blueberry10]

Ashley&Scott, She was a little resistant at first, but I promised her that if she wore underwear that whole day, I would take her to the Target dollar spot and let her pick out whatever she wanted. That did the trick. Previous bribes (like stuff we already had chosen for her) didn't work at all, so I'm thinking giving her some control over choosing the prize made her a little more willing to go with it.

If he's angry about the underwear in the first place maybe he does need a little more time. PTing is just the worst.

[cleosprite]

DS was really resistant, so we did the three day method. Naked for the first few days until he was consistently peeing in the potty. Then commando for a couple of weeks. Then underwear. So far so good.

We're still working on poop, but he doesn't fight me about peeing in the potty anymore at all now.