So after most of a YEAR, I finally have my 3.5 year old twin boys day trained. They wear pull-ups at nap and bedtime. One of my sons stays dry all day and is consistently dry when he wakes up from nap, so I will transition him to underwear for naps soon. He also poops in the potty every time. My other son also stays dry all day, including at preschool. But he used to poop in the potty fairly consistently, until a few months ago when he started waiting until nap time every single day to poop in his pull-up. Very frustrating! He is obviously timing it this way, it is EVERY day. He hasn't pooped in the potty for awhile now. I try putting him on the potty before nap to poop and he pees but doesn't poop. Any suggestions?
Thanks for the suggestions! I am going to try putting him in underwear for nap to see if that helps.
My son did the same thing and it is so frustrating. I just started letting him stay up a few minutes later or until he pooped. Also we went to the potty every minute for a while before nap time. I also reminded him that he need to get up and tell me and that poopy isn't good to sit on his bottom.
Good luck
This is exactly what our son would do.... every night at bed time he would get his pull up on and 5 minutes after we lefted the room we would hear "I POOPED!!!!". He refused to use the toilet for #2, but stayed dry all day everyday with no accidents.... ever! All the advise I got was, he is not ready for that step, don't force him because you'll traumatize him, just be patient he will do it when he is ready..... well we were pushing his 4th birthday and I was down right sick of changing poop and going through so many pull-ups so I cleared every last one of those things out of my house. I thought we would have a period of constipation from him holding it in, major fights about getting him to go on the potty, poop accidents, having to change the sheets every morning because of him having an accident at night but notta he just simply started to poop on the potty and wake up in the morning dry. He was only dependent on the pull up because it was there. (I was being played.... by my 3.5 year old!! hahaha) Anyways. I would try just giving up the pull ups durring nap and see what happens, that might just be the trick!! Every little one is so different!! Best of Luck!!
It may not be that he is planning it - but just that he is finally relaxed enough at nap time. It is definately a routine though. So that's a good thing. You can retrain his routine. Try giving him foods that encourage bm early - for me it's cofee, for him it's probably fruit :) Get it in him earlier - as a breakfast rahter than a lunch and insist he poop before he sleeps. Easier said than done, I know.
Sounds easy to me. It sounds like he has complete control. No pull ups at nap time, transition them both at the same time they are the same age. You will probably have a few accidents but don't give up (unless Severe constipation occurs) Treat accidents calmly saying I'm sure you'll do better next time. Dont stress him over it but keep trying. Most kids need pull ups overnight because that's a long time for their little bladders but no for a 1 1/2 nap.
My son did the same thing and I found it very frustrating as well! I actually read some posts on this same issue for ideas. What finally worked for my son was telling him that by going poo poo in the potty that the poo poo was able to go swimming with his friends. Of course I got lots of questions about how poo poo swim and where it swims to. But it made it fun and it seemed to work. Sometimes he still says "bye bye poo poo, have fun swimming!" while he flushes the toliet. Good luck!
There are three things you can not make a child do, eat, sleep, and pee or poop when or where you want them to.... (sigh).
When my son was 4 and still in diapers I took him to introduce him to his new 4 year old preschool teacher. I mentioned that he was not potty trained. She said within earshot of him that she normally did not that children that were not potty trained. Well, all his buddies were going to that school and there was no way he was not going to that school. He was potty trained (pee and poop) in 2 days.
It was the easiest thing I never did. Really. He was self motivated.
Perhaps you can find something that he really wants to do... perhaps something that he has to be poop trained day and night that will be self motivating and sustaining. Try to find one good thing so that you will not have to keep refinding things.
Also, age might help with your one twin. He is kind of at that in between age where he is almost there. Backing off for a while 3 weeks or more without any pressure. Then focus on letting him self motivate.
If they are fraternal twins they may not do things exactly alike. This does get your attention. Put him into bed with only a pair of underpants explaining that if he poops at nap time he will poop his bed and it will go all over him. Let him help you clean it up. If he has control one dump should change his mind. If he doesn't and it happens again. don't fret. It'll only be a couple of months before he has control.
Make him clean it up (with help of course).
Just FYI: night time dryness or nap time dryness, is not something attained, biologically, until even 7 years old. And is normal. It is about the body's organ maturity. Not the child.
For pooping, well I rather have my son just poop, instead of holding it in and getting Constipated. Because, Constipation is something very hard to remedy, once a child is on purpose, "withholding' their poop. I know, that happened to my daughter and we then had to take her to a Pediatric Gastroenterologist, because it then became a medical problem.
HE said, to just let a child poop, even if in a diaper. Because, once they start to 'withhold' their poop, or stop pooping all together, then that is a real, medical and emotion based problem.
HE said, a child will get there. But just let them poop.
It will fluctuate. And various things affects a child and their vacillating of it.
You are fortunate that you have the other twin modeling the behavior you want. Simply reward him in a way that makes your other son want to do it too. In our house, we used Hot Wheel cars ($1 each). We had a big supply of them set out on the bathroom counter. Each time my son pooped in the potty, he got to open one. You could also use candy, fruit snacks, etc.
My son did the same thing! So then, I just stopped putting on pull-ups and putting him on the potty before nap time. Then I told him if he needed to go potty while he was laying down, then to tell me. We went through a couple "soiled" undies, but after a few days we got it down. Now, no more. He either goes before nap or tells me if he has to.
Not that it's actually helpful, but my oldest did the same. What broke the cycle for us was going on vacation and talking about making sure that there was no pee or poop (even with a diaper) on a bed that wasn't ours.
I have no idea why that changed things, but after trying to potty train for a year, a weekend away might be a good idea anyway! :)
