How Can I Get My Three Year Old Son Interested in Sitting on the Toilet?

You can't. He has to get interested himself. Wait. Some boys just aren't ready until a bit older (I had one in diapers till he was 4!) I know it's a drag to have 2 kids in diapers, but you can't force him to go potty and making it a battle will just backfire.

I know this was said previously but with my kids the summer nakedness was fun for them. Leave a potty as an alternative but don't draw attention and when they do wander over to it, have a party and praise them like there's no tomorrow! They love the attention and what little kid doesn't like to run around naked?

Well my daughter didn't put up a fight to potty train but I have heard of some tricks that might help. My sister did a big Potty training party for her little boy. She made a really bit deal out of it to get him excited. She just got some potty training video for him to watch, bought him this book about potty training and rapped it like a present. Then she gave him a stuffed animal that was the "potty bear" she also got him a potty chair too. He was so excited for all this new stuff so he was willing to try it all out. I guess it helped alot. For me the potty chair was good at first because i could move i to whatever room we were in and then my daughter didn't feel like she was missing out on anything when she had to go. So maybe he needs a potty party to get him excited.

You might like the book "Toilet Train Your Child in Just One Day." The author's name is Azrin. It's dated but gentle, positive and effective. He talks a lot about praising your child for being "clean and dry," as opposed to sitting on a toilet arbitrarily.
All the "I can't" talk might be some learned helplessness, as a way of standing out from siblings. Don't bother to argue with him (you'll probably just be wrong to him), just let it go and point out something he CAN do later. Consider praising his efforts ("you worked really h*** o* your tower!" "You're learning to share!" "You know just how to make the baby smile!") and then applying that same type of encouragement to toileting "you're getting so big--you know how to stay clean and dry!"
My first son used the toilet reliably before he turned three. My second son didn't even show interest until he was 3 1/2, but once he decided to do it, he was reliable in less than a week. Readiness counts for a lot.
Best wishes!

Some boys take a bit longer to potty train. That being said, it sounds like a power struggle right now. Try letting it go for a good 2 months and see if he shows any interest without your suggestions. Some kids need it to be all their idea. If after that time, see if a small encouragement gets better results. Let it be his idea. Also, if he does show any improvement, talk about how proud of him you are in front of others (while he is in ear shot). Good luck! This method was the only thing that worked with one of my daughters going #2.(The struggle went on for a full year until I just let it go...)

Put his big boy undies in plain sight. Let him see you looking at them. Ask if he wants to wear them today in a calm voice. When he pitches his fit, say calmly, yep, I see you're not ready for BIG boy underwear, because big boys don't act like that! If you still want to be a baby like your little brother, I will treat you like one. Then change his diaper, or let him wear it wet for hours. Don't let him change himself. Babies can't do that. This won't last long.
Also, he may be acting out at NOT being the baby anymore, with a 10-month old in the house. Give him a little more baby time, all the while pointing out what he CAN do and the baby can't. Do all the baby things for him; feeding, changing, going down for a nap when baby does. He will get tired of being a baby really fast! AND he may just not be ready and need more time.

After our second was born, my 2 1/2 year old who was potty trained regressed and decided she wanted nothing of it- at the same time her 4 year old cousin(boy) was also doing the same things your son is. Eventually I just let our daughter wait it out. My SIL, well she told her kid that if he wasnt potty trained he just wasnt going to be able to go trick or treating because only big boys do that. One day, he just stood up and started going by himself. Just wait it out and have patience. It sucks, but it seems thats the only thing that works sometimes!

Britta is right!
Give it up. All you are doing is creating a power struggle & you won't win. You'll just make you both crazy.
He will go when he's ready.
Don't worry, he won't go into college in diapers..LOL!

My daughter was similar, except she liked wearing panties. If your son likes TV this might work for him. I put the little potty in front of the TV and if my daughter sat on it, I had the TV on and she could watch what she wanted. If she wasn't on the potty I turned it off. I'm not the type that likes my kids watching a lot of TV, but after she got the hang of it (it took about a week), then I moved the potty back into the bathroom and she had no problem with that. I realize I'm not an expert; I've only been through it once, but I thought I'd let you know what worked for me.

My daughter was about 3 1/2 when she finally decided she wanted to use the potty. We used a dvd called Potty Power as motivation. ( really dumb, but she loved it) It used a little girl in the main story so I dont know if that makes a difference, because my friend with boys said they loved it. We also told her that we had no more pull ups and were not going to get anymore. Also we started to point out all her big girl privileges and said that big girls used potties and if she couldn't try to use the potty then her big girl privileges would have to be taken away. She also had issues about being afraid to grow up. So we talked a lot. You say you have a little boy 10 months, could your son being having issues with no longer being the "baby". Perhaps he is needing more time or less choices. I had read that when they rebel sometimes its because they need you to control more because even choosing their own cloths can be overwhelming. So perhaps see if any new privileges ( if any) may be causing stress too. ( If you threaten he looses big boy privileges and he doesn't care, this might be an indicator)
Ultimately you cant force this issue too much. This is one of the things they get to control with their bodies. If he isn't ready, drop it for a few weeks and read potty books or watch movies about the potty occasionally. Take hope that we dont see high schoolers wearing diapers at graduation. I have yet to see any kindergardener wearing diapers too. Good luck.

My middle son was the very same way. I thought that it would be a miracle if he didn't go to kindergarten in diapers. lol I sent him to my parent's house one summer and he came back potty trained. Sometimes kids do better when they are being taught by someone else. I know that this is next to impossible most of the time but you do have an older son to show him "the ropes." This may help. If he still shows no interest then I would say that he is not ready. Just let things ride and don't give him more stress. He will let you know when the time is right.

With my daughter, I used the potty from as soon as she could sit ~ at night when I went to bed, sat her on it for a few minutes & generally got results & kept her dry over night by 1 she was in training panties & soon fully diaper free. My son was another matter-whole different scenario at home-he would stay dry over night, but didn't like the whole potty routine, at all. However he liked getting into 'big people' things, so we focused on a lot of activities which would underline his growing up & made a point of our trips to the "pottie". Then I needed to put him in part time day-care which he really loved, but they wouldn't accept him in diapers - so a few visits soon had him co-operating & out of diapers. I realized that he understood a lot more simple conversation & reasoning than we had given him credit for. A gentle " I wonder if we could ...." approach seemed to bypass some of his resistance.

You also mention having a 10 month old babe and I wonder if his resistance is related to feeling left out or pineing for the time when he was 'in your arms' & not seeing or feeling the advantage of more age appropriate behavior?

Let it go for now. Strip every "big boy" priviledge from him, put up a chart with the things he deems as big boy, like certain toys, etc. Have him earn them. If there is some big boy toy he is wanting that has to be the ultimate of when he goes for a solid month without any issue. For my son it was a Transformer.
Put him in pullups, firmly but matter of fact like say well I guess you aren't ready to be a big boy, let me know when you are ready.

Then leave it alone. When he wants to do something his older brother does, you need to remind him he has chosen not to be a big boy yet, that big boys go on the potty and leave it alone.

He will do it when he is ready and motivated enough.
For my daughter a call from Santa is all it took, for my son wanting a Transformer was it. He wanted one and I told him they were for big boys and he had to go on the potty every single time by himself and be in underwear. It took two weeks, no joke.
He had to decide when he was ready.
If he has a favorite character think about someone from outside your house to call him and talk to him about how proud they would be (acting as the character), otherwise, cut short his bedtime maybe by 15 minutes saying he has to earn his big boy bedtime back.
Just let him decide when he is ready as you cannot force him.
Good luck, don't make it a power struggle, just put him back in pullups to lessen the stress and let it go for a while, he will come around, promise.

Two things work for us because my son does the same thing. Although the potty training we had to make him clean up his own messes (with minimal help). If he doesn't do something like get dressed or won't go potty when I ask him to like before a long car ride I either try a "race" because he's big on the winning thing right now. I tell him I'm going to finish first and be the winner or I'm going to make more pee pee than him and I'm going to win. If that fails I just tell him we are going to sit right there until he does it and turn off the tv and put the toys out of reach and we do until he's ready to get dressed or go potty. Usually we will eventually be headed someplace he wants to go like the park so it doesn't take too long to convince him it's worth it. If he doesn't do it, well we just don't have enough time to do the fun things today because he took too long arguing with mommy.

Let it go and wait until it is HIS idea. As long as it is YOUR idea, it is just going to be a power struggle. Just don't even mention it to him ( I know this is hard when you are changing his poopy diapers and you are frustrated).
Also, when you do it. Just DO IT! Don't go back and forth between diapers/pull-ups/underwear. Put him in underwear and leave him in underwear. I promise that it will only take 2 or 3 days! Honestly. I have 4 kids, the youngest being an infant. My 3 older kids, I waited until they were ready (they were all a little over 3 yrs) and each of them were lterally potty-trained in 2 days. I see these moms that are trying for weeks and months to potty-train their 2 year olds, and I just want to say "wait until they are ready!!!!!

I know this is frustrating, but the bald fact is that this little boy, today, is NOT ready for potty training. It's a complicated mind & body process, and both parts need to be 100% ready. It is impossible for a parent to make that happen. It will happen naturally, but it will be delayed if the kid's feeling pressured.

Your very best course of action is to completely stop discussing potty training. He will naturally come back to it, and he will come back quicker if he's not contstantly on guard against everybody's efforts.

Now that it's warm, have you tried letting him run around naked in the back yard? Put a potty seat out there, too, but don't make him use it. My boys first "got it" when they suddenly started streaming pee in the back yard. "Whoa!" they'd say.
They also got to go on "field trips" to watch daddy go. My older one likes to run a commentary for his little brother while he's sitting on the potty, too.

I think these things would foster some self-motivation instead of his trying to resist YOU. If he is learning from his big brother or dad, instead of having to do something because you told him to (as much as we would like them to just take our word for it) he might not resist so much.

It's worth a shot, anyway!

He's NOT READY.
Don't push it.
I've got 3 boys.

I tried to potty train my 3 yr old boy multiple times without success. Finally when he was months away from being 4, I took him to Target and let him pick out any toy. He was quite amazed he could have anything in the store. Before we picked it out I told him it was his reward toy for going on the potty for 2 days. He would not get to open it play with it until he had meet the goal. Then when we got home I put it in plain sight, up on top of the refridgerator. There was some whinning, but I reminded him, on potty for 2 days and you get to play with it. He was potty trained that day! I had tried bribery before, but I think actually seeing the toy was better motivation. I hate to resort to bribery, but I knew he was ready, he just needed some motivation. He was dry most mornings when he woke up, and dry for hours during the day. He could care less if he was wet, would sit in a wet diaper for hours if I let him. He also didn't care if offered treats, called a big boy, etc. Getting any toy in a store he wants, then seeing it and wanting to play with it was great motiviation for him, Hope this helps