Toilet Training Issue

[Hound dog]

easy child put off potty training with Brandon until just recently. I warned her it wasn't such a smart idea. But Brandon has a real issue with loose bowels and diarrhea and she kept hoping it would resolve itself to make training easier. Only it hasn't. Now the bowel issues aren't daily, but often enough to be a real problem.

The issue is with Brandon himself. He has no desire whatsoever to go potty on the toilet. Having dirty pants doesn't phase him, even when it's diarrhea even if he's got a really bad diaper rash. He will fight you to change him, he'll also fight you about pottying.

I've gotten him to stop the fighting with changing him deal, that's a no go with Nana, I simply will not put up with it. If I have to change disgusting older child poo (and yes there is a huge difference) by darn you're going to hold still and make it easier. I dunno if he still gives easy child or sister in law issues or not. He will still be totally uncooperative going potty. I just take him anyway......and he's learned Nana will not put up with yelling, hitting or kicking. (which he has done both with diaper change and potty) I don't know if he tries that with his parents or not. They haven't said. But I do know that he doesn't want to go for them. Once you get him there if he has to empty his bladder or have a bowel movement he will usually go just fine. It's the getting him there, him telling you he needs to go, and getting him to not like having a soiled diaper, pullup or cloth underwear on him.

I know that having 2 little ones so close together is hard, and expensive when it comes to diapers and wipes. I know that easy child and sister in law would hold off changing him until they just had no choice......same with Connor.......to try to stretch out diapers and wipes. I also know that sister in law, while he will at least change them, will put off changing a diaper forever if he can get away with it. So obviously, this is how Brandon became accustomed to having soiled pants.

Trust me, he can wear them forever, they just don't phase him.

easy child has tried rewards and lavish praise. Worked for a day. She tried to stay consistant. No effect. She brought Darrin on board (my suggestion) using the You Want to be a Big Boy like bro.....nope. Didn't work, even though he idolizes Darrin. She has tried out and out bribery. Nope. She's tried regular toddler underwear and rubber pants. (I knew this one was going to backfire because he just doesn't care) And it didn't phase him in the least.

So, what on earth do you do to inspire a child who simply does not care if they are soiled to go to the potty when none of the "normal" means work??? And yes, we've been at this for quite a while now, nearly a month.

I never had this problem. I started at 22 mos when biologically they have control over those muscles. I've never had it take longer than 2 wks until I had issues with an inconsistent parent. Travis still had "accidents" because he didn't have the nerve impulse to give him the urge to go develop until he was about 5, so he only knew he had to go when he dribbled a bit in his underwear, then it was a mad dash for the nearest toilet. Aubrey had issues pooping in the potty because it sort of scared her, and she has major issues with constipation.....she related pain from that to pooping in the potty. Finally Nichole left her bottom bare for like 3 days........and she was so scared to poop on the floor, she'd run to the potty and really try. It got her over the fear.

But I have no clue what to do with Brandon. I have a sneaky suspicion sister in law may not be consistent. This was an issue with Darrin, but I had him the vast majority of the time, easy child had him evenings and thankfully sister in law had him very little on his own. But sister in law has Brandon all day 3 days a week at least.........so if he's not being consistent it's going to be a problem.

Currently, we're trying to keep him spotless, hoping that at some point having messy pants will be uncomfortable. (this should have been done all along and he'd not had this issue) But I'm worrying it might be too late for that to work. If it doesn't I dunno what she's going to do. Connor is already showing interest in the potty.........and I do keep him spotless. easy child plans to start him at 22 mos hoping to avoid the issue she's having with Brandon. omg

Suggestions? This child has preschool come August and they're not going to accept him if he's not toilet trained. I have trained countless kids over the years.........and this one has me stumped.

 

[Malika]

Just an idea but what a lot of people do in Morocco (hot country) is to wait until the warm weather starts and then leave the child naked. They quickly learn to go and sit on the loo/potty. Are your summers hot enough to do this?

 

[AnnieO]

Malika, we could do this, it's plenty warm - BUT - Lisa/easy child would get hit with neglect in about 20 seconds FLAT. As a child I ran around naked, but CPS is a little nuts around these parts...

 

[keista]

How old is this child?

My friend just recently had a very difficult time training her son. It was only partly due to constipation, but the kids just did NOT want to use the potty - age 3! Well, they made it as appealing as possible. They got an ipod touch (used from ebay) and the kid just adored the thing. Well, they decided that it was the "potty toy" He was only allowed to play with it while sitting on the potty. He finally started to comply. Still took another year and a half to get things down pat due to the constipation issues. Now at 5 he's pretty good, but still not perfect.

Keep in mind that there *could* very well be sensory issues mixed in.

 

[Malika]

Malika, we could do this, it's plenty warm - BUT - Lisa/easy child would get hit with neglect in about 20 seconds FLAT. As a child I ran around naked, but CPS is a little nuts around these parts...

Ah, I see... Or rather, I don't

 

[InsaneCdn]

Malika - just be thankful you don't.

<wink>

 

[Star*]

AND......not that this has ANYTHING to do with potty training - BUT......21 years ago I had police waiting for me at the Walgreens when I had BATHTUB pictures of Dude as an infant.....with little hairbrushes and toys in the tub and smiles. And I'm his MOTHER.....and he was an INFANT. I can not IMAGINE what would have happened us had they ever caught Dude running nude - because he DID......I just didn't develop any more pictures of it.

 

[Hound dog]

Brandon is nearly 3 1/2 yrs old.

 

[keista]

Gotta make it as enticing as possible. Some sort of candy of food reward he gets ONLY when he goes potty. He puts something out, he gets to put something in. Game or toy or book or DVD even that he ONLY plays with while going potty and/or the 15 minutes after he's successfully gone.

And sister in law has to get completely on board. If he doesn't, gotta come up with consequences for him.

 

[Hound dog]

keista, those things don't work. We've been doing it for more than a month. Like I said, Brandon just plain does not care, and we've as yet to find something that will motivate him longer than a couple of times. easy child has already tried all his fav things ect. It was very short lived, then a total crash and burn.

 

[keista]

So he's doing without his favorite toys and snacks because he is that much against using the potty. Hmmmmmmmmmmm sounds like a difficult child of the Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)/Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) variety. Consult with an Occupational Therapist (OT) maybe? Seriously, not kidding here.

 

[donna723]

I won't be much help because my daughter is still having the same problem with Ethan - he will be three in a few days. I have visions of the kid wearing pull-ups to his high school graduation! He can do it, he just refuses to do it at home! He's the youngest one in his group at day care and he will pee in the potty at school because the other little boys do - peer pressure can be a good thing!! But at home he will tell Allison when he has to go, but when she tries to get him in to the bathroom to use his potty, he tells her he's "too busy" ... and then he does it in the pull-up! My suggestion to send him in to the bathroom with his daddy so he can do what daddy is doing didn't work - Ethan didn't care! I don't know ... I think that the whole concept of potty training has changed over the last several years. A lot of young moms are content to just say that they will do it on their own when they're ready. And some of it is inconsistency too. By the time Allison gets home with Ethan in the evenings, she's exhausted and still has to get him fed, bathed and ready for bed. She's just too tired to argue with him, and he's a very stubborn little boy!

Allison was trained at 18 months because her babysitter also took care of two other slightly older little girls who were potty training and she wanted to do what they were doing. And my son was trained by age two, even at night! I might be very old fashioned here but I have always questioned the wisdom of "pull-ups". They might be easier for the mom to contend with, but for the child, they feel no different than diapers! How does that help? When mine were little, we let them run around the house wearing those little terry cloth training pants. And yes, they got wet and messy and uncomfortable, but I thought that was the whole point of it! They don't like feeling wet and messy and uncomfortable, so theoretically they will be encouraged to do it in the potty to avoid that!

I told Allison, in desperation, that she should tell him that it's the RULE that once you turn three, you MUST use the potty - no more pull-ups or diapers. It's the law! Ethan was not impressed!

 

[DammitJanet]

Pull ups should be outlawed except for overnights and now that they have those new sheet things, I would get rid of the pull ups overnight earlier.

I took the diapers off mine at age two and let them wear long tee shirts around the house. They potty trained very easily. They didnt want to pee or poop on the floor. They liked to pee on cheerio's to sink them and (okay you will think I am nuts here) pooping on cheerio's was landing bombs. Cartoons really are fairly violent...lol.

I wasnt smart enough back then to do the rewards. Never occurred to me. With Keyana we did give her a mini bag of M&M's for the first month or two when she was training but she wanted to please all of us so badly that she trained really fast. In all three places -us, grandma linda, daycare- we took away diapers and went to training pants and that was it. She never saw another diaper until her little brother was born.

 

[tiredmommy]

I had to lay down the law with Duckie. She would hide behind the drapes or rocker trying not to go. So I decided she could try not to go while sitting on the potty. She was trained within a few days after I watched for her to hide and carried her to the potty, but she was about a year younger than Brandon.

 

[Hound dog]

I never had an issue with the pullups, but then I changed my kids the moment they did something in the diaper too. And Nichole was the only one to use them, and she told ME when she wanted to train and that was at about 22 months. She actually trained herself. She wanted to be big like her sibs and hated hated hated a dirty diaper.

easy child may have to use the long tee shirt method. Today she put him in undies and told him if he went on her floor he'd be in big trouble......she said he did a little better. So maybe the long tee shirt method would help. Although it's a tad chilly for that right now. (we've flipped out of august weather back to spring weather) I wish papa was around to make him a "special papa stool" to use when he goes. My step dad did this for Travis who was wary of both the potty seat and flat out refused a potty chair. Once his papa produced the beautifully built (and carpeted omg! so the boy wouldn't slip LOL ) stool for him to either stand up to wiz or sit on the toilet seat.....he was thrilled and that was that. I wonder...........maybe if sister in law makes him a "special daddy stool" it would have the same effect.....hmmm I have some scrap lumber around here. (I totally forgot about Travis' special stool until now )

I'm a bit relieved he's not the only one to resist. TM I had to laugh at Duckie. My sister was like that, it drove my mom insane. She was the only kid that ever gave her trouble.....and she always hid. Once mom figured out the hiding thing, she'd watch her like a hawk and snatch her up the moment she caught her heading to a hiding spot. lol Only Brandon doesn't hide. But I do have his BMs sort of timed to a certain time of day and I do my best to get him in there when it's due. It paid off on one day last week, not so much the next day.

 

[keista]

in my opinion potty training, just like most of parenting can be difficult, but it's not supposed to be *that* hard. When it gets *that* hard, there are other issues at hand. Son trained late, but when he trained, he was fully trained withing a week. Same with DD2. Once she got over her fear of the potty, she was fine. (kid has lots of fears)

DD1 on the other hand, got trained, then wasn't, then trained, then lost her seat at a rest stop and we lost ground, then got trained, then still had small accidents during the day, still not dry at night. UHG! Translation, she has issues. I'm convinced she has some sort of physical anomaly because her stream is like a garden hose instead of the typical urine stream pattern.

Anyway, if it's *that* difficult, there are no easy solutions.

 

[Hound dog]

It may very well be that we will just have to out stubborn him and just keep taking him until he finally has it click or decides it's better. I just hope he is trained before pre school is supposed to start.

 

[InsaneCdn]

We did cloth diapers - so, it never was an option to let them stew in a diaper... and both kids were mighty glad to get rid of diapers. We had the fitted ones... almost as easy as a disposable except for washing them. The kids went from that to "soaker" underwear (helps with dribbles, not with floods), and then to regular undies. But I can see where disposables don't help the training situation...

 

[donna723]

I suggested to Allison that she buy Ethan some really cool little Jockeys or something ("big boy underpants") so that he would want to wear them ... no dice! He refuses to wear them! It worked with my son when he was little though. I bought him several pairs of Spiderman underpants and he loved them - he wanted to wear them all the time. He thought he was just the coolest thing and so grown up in those little Spiderman drawers!

 

[Hound dog]

Yup. I know Donna. Worked for every other boy I know, except Brandon. No effect on him either.

Oh, I forgot to mention the killer to this; Brandon hates to be dirty. If he has just a little something like food or whatever on his hands ect he has a fit until it's cleaned off. Now figure that one out. LOL