Potty-training - Houston,TX

I trained my 3 year old boy in less than a day after trying many methods. My goal was to stop having 2 children in diapers (my daughter was 1 yr. at the time...sounds familiar). Answer: "Toilet Training in Less Than a Day", book by Arzan & Fox. Amazon has it. I followed it to a 'T' and it worked. In fact, so well that I trained my daughter at 23 months! But, you must do it exactly like the book advises. Basically, they have you use multiple motivational methods at the same time WHILE making staying in a messy diaper worse than going potty. If there is no discomfort (especialy with todays super absorbant diapers & pull ups), then why should a 3 year old boy be motivated to change? When my son made a 'mistake', I asked him why? Being he was articulate and smart, I know knew he was building up reasons to not change and manipulating me. His answer was "I didn't want to". The training from the book made him "want to". Good Luck!

Hi there,
I have been having the same problems with my son, maybe its a boy thing because my older daughter was real easy to potty train. My son is 4 years and 4 months old, he finally pooped in the potty for the first time yesterday!! YAY!! We have had him in underware during the day for a few months before he finally did this. The clean up was not fun, I had not thought of having him help with clean up, I think I will try that if he has an accident again.

He also did not want to sit on the potty, to get him to start sitting on the potty I did use some little hot wheel cars as incintive. I bought several at the store and he was with me, I told him when he sits on the potty he could have one. Then after sitting on the potty several times and earning cars, I said, ok your really good at that now, so now to earn a car you have to use the potty while sitting on it. Well, that didnt really work, he just started sitting while going pee instead of going poo like I was wanting! HAHA, kids are smart! I had given up on the car thing, and just kept having him sit there several times a day in hopes that he would finally go on the potty instead of in his underware, finally he did. I dont know if its going to ba a habit now, but I hope so.

Good luck, your not alone, and dont worry so much about him almost being 4, my son is almost 4 1/2 and we are still working on it. Just keep being patient and it will happen eventually. I do still use diapers when we go out if we are going to be gone long, and at night.

A., I have the EXACT same problem. My son will be 4 in April... He will only pee standing up and will not sit on the toilet. He was holding his poop for about 2 -3 days and would be in utter pain. We went to see Dr. Brown who has written several baby and toddler books and has been on several talk shows.. She suggested to put him back in pull ups or diapers and give him a laxative everyday until he is used to idea of pooping.. After a few weeks of getting him back on track have him go into the bathroom to poop even in the diaper and slowly transition him to the toilet. I am not sure if this is going to work.. I do have him on the laxative and he is pooping everyday now and it isn't as traumatic, but he still has NO interest in sitting on the potty. There is a woman who is supposed to be the be all of potty training but charges 120.00 for an hour session where you go to her office without your child and talk in detail about your sons potty issues. If you are interested, I can get you her info. Is your son holding his poop? Does he poop in a diaper? If you get any eye awakening advice, please let me know. Good luck, I am sorry I don't have any solid advice, but at least you know you aren't alone..
J.

Hi, my son is only fifteen months old, so I really don't know what you're going through, but I can tell you that I have known of several children who did not potty train until 3, 4, 5, or 6.
I'm not a professional, but I am a middle child of five kids, and I know what it feels like to have older and younger siblings who've accomplished something before me.
You need to get some input from your pediatrician, for one, but also remember that you and your husband know your son better than anyone else.
Before he goes number two in the potty again, it's important for him to be totally comfortable with that. You will not be able to force him to do anything on a potty chair. He needs to feel safe and loved.
Eventually, he's going to be potty-trained. That's a fact. So it's ok for him to take some time at it, just go through it with him and love him through it and pray him through it all the way.
Every child develops and grows in a different way. The pressure to perform is not always what stimulates a child to progress.

Please understand,once again, I am not a professional, I just felt compelled to respond since no one else has yet.

We were the same way. I didn't think we'd ever sit on the potty and go poo-poo. I always said I'd never use sugar to bribe or entice my child. That's gone out the window. It works like a charm. I started to promise him a candy if he would just sit on the potty. We'd start there. Then I'd show him how to grunt. I'd do it around the time he'd be having a bowel movement. Then one day, something came out and he was excited and he got a BIG candy. We've had a few accidents, but for the most part, it was overnight success after it happened for him. Now he wants that candy so bad, he goes in there and goes through the motions just to get his candy. That's the part that keeps us from having accidents is because he doesn't let very much time go by before going in there and draining it all. We are still in diapers at night, though. He's a ways away from being dry all night.

Good luck! Keep at it, be patient and it will happen.

Make sure he knows what to do and let him know clearly that you aren't going to change him anymore, then don't. Unless there is something wrong with him physically where he can't control his bowels, he's choosing to allow you to let him poop in his pull-up/diaper or underwear and clean up after the mess. Teach him how to empty the mess into the toilet, and make him clean his own pants, by swishing them in the toilet) Explain that its much cleaner to do the pooping into the toilet, (while he's having to do the cleanup) and he'll soon learn its much more comfortable than keeping it in his pants. I know this goes against all our sensibilities and may require staying home and dropping our schedule of outside activities, but he needs to know the natural consequences that are associated with his behavior. He can choose to keep doing it (he's old enough) but chances are when he knows that you are not going to rescue him it won't be long. He will be so proud of himself when he no longer has to deal with this. Keep being positive about knowing he can do it, teach him what to do, but leave the work to him. If he has an accident don't shame him, just reaffirm how proud you are he's trying, and again...let him clean up his own mess. (if a sibling or spouse think he smells disgusting don't be upset with them for telling him...negative feedback for negative behavior...you want him to desire the good thing...the negative behavior is its own punishment)
I've potty trained 5 of our 6 children and the most recent was actually ok with doing the cleanup part...but something about taking responsibility for his own stuff made this process very short (once we hit this lesson it was maybe a day or two and he was going number 2 in the toilet...go figure! It took us a lot longer to get to this point than the other children. He was about 3 1/2 by the time he was fully going on the potty...know each child is different...but if you think he's ready...you'd know.)

My son was 4 years almost 4 and a half before he was fully potty trained. The way I got him to sit on the potty was to make it fun. We went to the store and picked out potty toys and books. He got to pick out two books to read on the potty they were only for potty time. One was a book of stories and one was a music book with a cd so we put the cd player in the bathroom and for twenty minutes a day we sat on the potty. My son was really into hotwheels so we bought four little cars and one big one and I tacked them to the wall above the potty. When he went potty he got a car and on the fifth time he got the big one, Those cars sat there for like a month while he decided he really did want them and so he started to use the potty everytime.

Hi A., my daughter was almost 5 (yikes!) before she started pooping on the potty. My son who just turned 3 last weekend has been doing both for 2 months. Like you we tried everything to get our daughter to go on the potty and I firmly believe it was a control issue for her. I'm not sure what exactly changed her mind but I had started telling her that the kids at school would make fun of her (she is in Kindgergarten now) and I also told her that I would not have a 5th birthday party for her. Of course you will have to follow through. I also made her wear her underwear until she was getting into bed and then I put a pullup on for night time. I totally feel your pain but the harder you push, the harder he'll push back. He will decide when he wants to do it, all you can do is try to figure out what incentive or what to take away in order to help him make the right decision. Goodluck and have faith, he will do it eventually!

Give it up for a while. It's now a battle of wills- and he WILL win this one because he has the control. He's ALMOST 4 which means he is still three! LOTS of kids aren't fully potty trained until they are 4 or so. I promise he will get this before he starts Kindergarten. Give him a Pull Up whenever he needs to poop- can he tell you that he needs to go, at least? Or is it a complete surprise to him, also? If he can tell you then he is capable but not willing, and once it is no longer important to you - he'll make it important to himself. For my son, he did not care about staying dry at night at all until someone asked him to spend the night. He realized he would have to wear a Pull Up over at his friend's house and Voila! he suddenly became dry within the week. And if your son doesn't know when he needs to poop- maybe his muscles aren't ready yet. No point in comparing brother and sister- those are two COMPLETELY different animals. No point in comparing any 2 kids really- one will be magically advanced at some points while the other will be incredibly talented at something else- I have three (1 boy, 2 girls) and they are all fabulously, wonderfully different people.