Potty Training Back Peddling

potty training that the child suddenly decides that they arent interesting doing anymore.. couple of choices...
make him change his own pants, he will quickly lose interest
if he has to carry his own diaper bag.
when he wets his pants...take him back home, he will lose interest in wetting his pants if he isnt allowed to go anywhere with wet pants
dont retrain the child for using the potty, he is just doing this because he wants to.
i seriously doubt that this has anything to do with you filing for a divorce
K. h.

Children sense stress, has their been any changes in your life that may affect him? Also boys have minds of their own use your positive reinforcement. Good job Great, wow you are such a big boy , have a party in the bathroom. If he knows he is pleasing you he is more likely to use the potty. little boys always want to please their mommies.

It may all just be part of the adjustment process, but it is worth a trip to the doctor to check it out. My son did the same thing and we found out he had an impaction. The sooner you treat that, the easier it is to cure. If the problem is not treated quickly, it can last for years.

Good luck with this and the other challenges you are facing right now!

Hi

Kids react to any changes in situations in different ways , I notice that you are seperated and getting a divorce , is this quite a recent thing? More than likely connected. Try not to be too h*** o* him although it is very frustrating for you , maybe try talking to him about why he goes in his underwear , ask if he is upset or angry about anything. He will get back on track but you will need to be patient.

Good luck

K.

Hmm... Check with the preschool and see if anyone else has been having accidents lately. Maybe he noticed the attention he/she got.

It seems like kind of an attention/control issue, do you think?

You might try getting one of those kiddie seats that go on top of the potty (I don't know how expensive they are). But, you could take him shopping with you (online or in person) and have him pick out a really colorful one that's very cool. When you get it out, you could even pretend that you want to sit on it (but it's his!) so that you'll be sure that he'll really WANT it. Then he'll be fighting you to sit on that potty before you can!

E., don't get discouraged. your son is going through a lot of garbage right now, if he back peddles, just keep moving forward, he will eventually get past this.

I am also a single mother with two boys, and it's been a long horrible road. Your boys are going to do some questionable behaviors in the next year, they're mad, sad and don't know how to fix this problem between mom and dad. They will eventually have everything fall into place and life will begin again.
hang in there.
~A.

I would take him to the ped for a check up to make sure there isn't anything else going on, like a urinary tract infection that would cause him to pee a lot. Otherwise, dump the pullups. Having a crutch will just give him more incentive not to go and is confusing for him. I know this is hard, because for both my kids I got sick of having pee everywhere. My daughter was a willful 3 yo and had "accidents" on purpose. She would just refuse to go even though I knew she knew how to. Her preschool director recommended that when I knew she had to go, make her stay some place that was easy to clean up and that wasn't much fun. One day when she came home from school and had been holding it for 4 hours and was ready to burst, I told her she couldn't leave the kitchen until she went, that mommy didn't want to have pee all over my sofa and carpet. Within 5 minutes she grabbed the potty and went. We called daddy and grandma and did the works and she was pretty good with #1 after that. With my son, it was more learning when he had to pee and to stop the fun things he was doing in time to go. Every morning before preschool I ask him, "where does pee pee go?" and he shouts back "In the potty!" "Are you a baby or a big kid?" "I'm a big kid! I wear underwear! I go potty!" It took a while, about a month of soaking himself in underwear before he got it. he still has some accidents and aim issues, but we are almost there. I found he had a fear of falling into the toilet that he needed reassurance for. Since your son can do it, see if there is something he is afraid of. maybe he did fall in (my son did once, he also sprayed himself with pee once which set him back). Get some potty videos and books in his favorite characters, talk about what big kids do that babies can't. Some of my friends got favorite character underwear, like Diego or Thomas, and reminded their sons not to get their Tommys wet, if they did, "oh, Tommy is so sad, try to keep him dry next time." One friend would put her son in the plastic covered underwear pants (i have found the potty scotty underpants on the potty concepts website to be more absorbent than Gerber, just my opinion). If he stayed dry for several hours, then she let him put on his thomas underpants, if Thomas got wet, he had to go back into the plastic pants for several hours. Make him go every hour for a while, some people set a timer. Go back to rewards for being successful too. We sent in little M&Ms to preschool which he loves for successes there. Good luck, it will happen soon. he is on his way!

I have been in your situation, I had a newborn little girl, and 2 boys at the time of our separation. Stress has a lot to do with the potty problem, that aside, my boys both decided on their 4th birthdays that they were ready for big boy undies, and that was that. I kept them in pullups, but they were rarely wet in the mornings.