Potty training - how to make the transition to underwear & other questions

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My son is almost 4 and we've finally started making progress with potty training. He's doing great with peeing and pooping on the potty at home. How do you know when they're ready to make the transition to underwear? Problem is only the weekends we normally head out for the day to the park, beach or just out and about and don't always have close access to a bathroom so we just put him in a pull up.

Also we're going out of town for a few days next week, can we still try to potty train him on the regular toilet?

Last thing is.. my DH has not been as cooperative as I would like with helping out, he would rather just throw a diaper on him so he can go back to doing something else. I have tried to tell him that causes him to regress and isn't helpful and we need to be on the same page but it just becomes a terrible argument about how he does so much etc etc. That's another story though.

Any advice would be great appreciated. TIA!

OP we are at a similar space except our son is a month shy of 3.5. We had a week off of daycare so tried the naked training and then into underwear and it was a disaster. 2nd week and he was still having pee accidents at schools 2x day (they go to the bathroom on demand, every 70-90min) and hes had poop accidents 2x at home. We have had 3 total weekends and 2 weeks of potty training.

You can still use pullups and potty train. Our kid started to withhold during the 2nd weekend and it became a battle because he started withholding pee too! Had to use a suppository it got so bad because our son poops EVERY day normally and it was day 4 without a poop. The BEST thing you can do is lay off the pressure. Explain that he can choose to wear a pullup or choose to wear underwear. Show him what happens when pee ("water") hits underwear vs a pullup. Gently let him know that if he chooses to wear underwear and he pees in the underwear and not the potty he will need to get undressed and showered off but if he pees in the potty he can go back to playing. If he chooses pullups let him know that he should still let you know if he needs to go to the bathroom and that the rule is that you go during X times (wake up, before going outside/in the car, bedtime, etc.). If he pees in the pullup, then he will get changed.

Whatever he chooses say Ok bud! Your choice. Can you pick out the underwear you want or if its pullup then say pullup. If you want to do some naked time do naked time. My kid was having issues with the potty part, we had to pull back because of pressure but now we havent had ANY accidents. His pullups are dry so each day we take it day by day. The accidents did not improve his willingness to potty train, it actually made him just withhold and thats a can of worms I am not willing to let be open. Even though he didnt openly cry or seem bothered by the accidents it internalized somehow.

Our son has no problem using a portable potty- hes peed in 3 parking lots now including a really busy Home Depot. Just try and park in an isolated spot with shade. If you have a SUV then the trunk is a good space too. Do the outings. Start off shorter. Have the whole family pee before you go and make sure you pee before you leave if its been more than 60-75 minutes. Accidents will happen out and about especially if you have a distractible kid- all of the accidents for my son are related to playing, inside or outside.

Some kids dont do great with sudden change so if he is using the potty continue with using the potty the same way with pullups on as underwear. It will feel more like a gradual transition. I would avoid big trips while in the early stages of potty training due to higher possibility of frustration but if its all arranged then just pack xtra clothes for everyone and do frequent potty stops.

Good luck!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do not ever put him in another pull up. Four is really old to still be in pull ups! You don’t have to put him in underwear though - just his shorts or pants. Night diaper only and if necessary.

Get a travel potty or teach him to pee behind a tree.

+1. Don't ever put a potty training kid in pull ups or diaper. Once potty training starts get rid of pull ups for ever (only exception that might work is for sleep). I would do no underwear for a few months.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do not ever put him in another pull up. Four is really old to still be in pull ups! You don’t have to put him in underwear though - just his shorts or pants. Night diaper only and if necessary.

Get a travel potty or teach him to pee behind a tree.

+1. Don't ever put a potty training kid in pull ups or diaper. Once potty training starts get rid of pull ups for ever (only exception that might work is for sleep). I would do no underwear for a few months.

This was not the advice give from two separate child psychologists who worked with parents that had issue potty training or issues with kids who were constipated/withheld after PT.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son is almost 4 and we've finally started making progress with potty training. He's doing great with peeing and pooping on the potty at home. How do you know when they're ready to make the transition to underwear? Problem is only the weekends we normally head out for the day to the park, beach or just out and about and don't always have close access to a bathroom so we just put him in a pull up.

Also we're going out of town for a few days next week, can we still try to potty train him on the regular toilet?

Last thing is.. my DH has not been as cooperative as I would like with helping out, he would rather just throw a diaper on him so he can go back to doing something else. I have tried to tell him that causes him to regress and isn't helpful and we need to be on the same page but it just becomes a terrible argument about how he does so much etc etc. That's another story though.

Any advice would be great appreciated. TIA!

OP we are at a similar space except our son is a month shy of 3.5. We had a week off of daycare so tried the naked training and then into underwear and it was a disaster. 2nd week and he was still having pee accidents at schools 2x day (they go to the bathroom on demand, every 70-90min) and hes had poop accidents 2x at home. We have had 3 total weekends and 2 weeks of potty training.

You can still use pullups and potty train. Our kid started to withhold during the 2nd weekend and it became a battle because he started withholding pee too! Had to use a suppository it got so bad because our son poops EVERY day normally and it was day 4 without a poop. The BEST thing you can do is lay off the pressure. Explain that he can choose to wear a pullup or choose to wear underwear. Show him what happens when pee ("water") hits underwear vs a pullup. Gently let him know that if he chooses to wear underwear and he pees in the underwear and not the potty he will need to get undressed and showered off but if he pees in the potty he can go back to playing. If he chooses pullups let him know that he should still let you know if he needs to go to the bathroom and that the rule is that you go during X times (wake up, before going outside/in the car, bedtime, etc.). If he pees in the pullup, then he will get changed.

Whatever he chooses say Ok bud! Your choice. Can you pick out the underwear you want or if its pullup then say pullup. If you want to do some naked time do naked time. My kid was having issues with the potty part, we had to pull back because of pressure but now we havent had ANY accidents. His pullups are dry so each day we take it day by day. The accidents did not improve his willingness to potty train, it actually made him just withhold and thats a can of worms I am not willing to let be open. Even though he didnt openly cry or seem bothered by the accidents it internalized somehow.

Our son has no problem using a portable potty- hes peed in 3 parking lots now including a really busy Home Depot. Just try and park in an isolated spot with shade. If you have a SUV then the trunk is a good space too. Do the outings. Start off shorter. Have the whole family pee before you go and make sure you pee before you leave if its been more than 60-75 minutes. Accidents will happen out and about especially if you have a distractible kid- all of the accidents for my son are related to playing, inside or outside.

Some kids dont do great with sudden change so if he is using the potty continue with using the potty the same way with pullups on as underwear. It will feel more like a gradual transition. I would avoid big trips while in the early stages of potty training due to higher possibility of frustration but if its all arranged then just pack xtra clothes for everyone and do frequent potty stops.

Good luck!

+1 Fantastic advice for potty training at this age. You have to meet him where he's at. Trying to force it at this stage is just going to make everyone miserable. He's already halfway there, let him set the pace.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do not ever put him in another pull up. Four is really old to still be in pull ups! You don’t have to put him in underwear though - just his shorts or pants. Night diaper only and if necessary.

Get a travel potty or teach him to pee behind a tree.

+1. Don't ever put a potty training kid in pull ups or diaper. Once potty training starts get rid of pull ups for ever (only exception that might work is for sleep). I would do no underwear for a few months.

This was not the advice give from two separate child psychologists who worked with parents that had issue potty training or issues with kids who were constipated/withheld after PT.

Exactly. No one who has actually potty trained a hard-to-train kid would suggest this. The behavioral therapist we worked with regarding our hard-to-train DD had us avoid anything that would stress out our kid around potty issues, including trying to take away pull-ups. Over time, they figure it out. They also need to be properly motivated (and I think the best motivation is generally just realizing the potty is easier, especially as they hit school age). Scaring them does not motivate them, it makes them anxious, which moves you in the wrong direction.

[Anonymous]

Wow. The people on this forum are incredibly aggressive and mean. No way I'd post a question here. I am only posting to give support to OP. My son is late with potty training too, and kids sometimes are for a variety of reasons. Everyone gets there eventually.

I totally get using pullups for the park. I think gerber makes plastic covers for their training underwear, and that would help until you can get him changed into a new pair. Being in wet underwear is a better sensory reactor than in pullups, and it may help him to control better each time he goes. Maybe DH can show him how to pee against a tree!

[Anonymous]

I just wanted to chime in with a recent lesson/success from our experience with our hard-to-train DD, who just turned 4 and is still in pull ups. We had a lot of the same issues as other PPs, including a total regression when we tried to take the pull ups away and really bad withholding issues.

We're working with a behavioral therapist and one of the first things she told us was to go totally neutral on whether or not she goes in the potty. We actually got a script we had to practice for a bit and then do with her, where we explained that it was totally up to her whether she wore a pull up or underwear, and also up to her whether she pooped/peed in the pull up or in the potty. We told her that we'd just gotten confused because we like to use the potty and so we had just assumed that's what she would want to do, but that we should have just let her decide on her own. But then we also told her we'd talked to her pediatrician about it, who confirmed all this, but that the doctor had said it was really important that she not ever spend time in a dirty pull up. So it was totally up to her whether she wore a pull up and where she peed/pooped, but the doctor needed her to change any dirty pull up as soon as it was dirty.

Well, low and behold, this is how we found out that she absolutely knows when her pull up is wet, because she suddenly started telling us immediately when she peed in her pull up. She even started changing it on her own (something we'd tried to get her to do before but she'd fought hard, as she'd fought literally every aspect of potty training). She used to just lie to our faces about her pull up, if we asked if it was wet, she'd always say it wasn't. Even if it was the pull up she'd slept in for 12 hours and we could see it was visibly wet. One of the reasons we consulted doctors/therapists about it was that we were really worried that she genuinely did not know when she was wet, but she just flatly refused to wear anything but a pull up and totally revolted at our attempts to just go naked or just have her wear loose pants with nothing underneath (like total meltdown, crawling under the furniture to get away from us, revolted).

Anyway, I just wanted to share this because I see this advice about "no pull ups ever" all the time on these boards. For these really hard-to-train kids, I think pull ups wind up being an essential stage. I don't love it (trust me, I'd give anything to be done with them -- anything), but my experience is that the thing stopping my kid from using the potty is not pull ups. It's her own stubbornness and a pattern of refusal that we likely made worse with our attempts to take diapers/pull ups away because we had been told "it was time". I wish we'd ignored the pressure back when she was 2.5 and 3 (which is when we started potty training) and just let her move at her own pace. We'd probably be further along in the process by now.

[Anonymous]

OP, I think you just have to put him in underwear and not turn back. My advice is to give him notice and make it a happy things so he is excited about being a big boy and using underpants. Get some with characters or colors he likes. My daughter is the same age and building excitement about stuff seems to motivate her. Also, buy an OXO travel potty. You can use it alone with a bag or put it over a big toilet seat to make it kid-sized. When traveling, I found I had to have multiple conversations and tutorials about where the potty was and how to use it at our rental with my kid in order to prevent accidents and confusion.