Looks like you’ve received plenty of advice already. I will say that yeah, you can kind of sit back and let it happen on its own. My first child was easy. My second….not so much. She does everything on her own schedule and doesn’t give a shit (ha) about what we want. She was between 3 and 3 1/2 before she was finally potty trained. We got rid of the pull-ups (she still wears them at night) and put her in cotton training pants and sent her off to daycare (their suggestion). For the first week or so, she refused to use the toilet AT ALL. Held her pee all day until she got home. Stubborn!! I was worried about the state of her bladder but she has always played by her own rules. The only advice I can give is to just not stress over it. Eventually he will do it. Oh, and my second used to poo on the floor and in the tub. That was fun to clean. You are not alone.

It will happen. I know that’s no great statement but it’s the truth. After all, how many high schoolers do you see wearing Depends?! After going through it with two boys, and soon with the third boy, my experience has been that forcing the issue doesn’t work. When they’re ready, they’re ready. After months of wondering when it will (if ever!) happen for my middle son, all of the sudden one morning he looked at me and told me he only wanted to wear underwear from now on. And that was it. No accidents, no problems.

I have two friends who ‘forced the issue’ and with one, her son ended up with severe constipation issues which just made matters ten times worse and the other, her daughter just ended up having tons of ‘accidents’ which led to emotional issues.

Hang tight, keep the Resolve on the ready and you’ll make it through!

I feel your pain! I’m in the thick of PT and it’s a long process. I’m not sure if you’ve already heard this but it will happen. I thought my 3 year old would never get it – he didn’t mind being wet, he could hold it for hours but get this – he peed at school. All his classmates are potty trained (peer pressure works). We are doing much better now after 10 days of accidents. Have yet to deal with #2 – I’m happy to continue giving him diapers/pullup until he’s ready. My friend’s son held #2 for so long that it caused issues. TMI?

Don’t make a big deal. Someone told me to relax b/c he will get it and besides had I ever seen a kid go off to college in diapers?

I can totally relate to your frustration. Just when I was about to throw in the towel, I reminded myself that I can win this battle of wills. Stay strong.

We had that same, hellish problem. Pee was good, but poop involved hiding in corners and doing it in the pants. My mom helped me with the solution of a birthday meaning “big boys who are 3 wear underpants and use the potty! You are a big boy! You are 3!” etc. etc. It actually worked, talking it up for a while beforehand. Though, of course, it’s coming too late for you to try that… My best advice would be to let it go and he’ll do it in his own time, shitty (ha! pun!) as that is to have to do. It’s less stress for everyone (like with the food and not eating normal stuff and just letting go, you know?). I keep finding that sometimes (lots of times) parenting is just about letting life take its course, no matter how much you want to control it and make it better, and that things often end up working out on their own. Kids are amazing like that.

I really, really struggled with potty training my twins (boy and girl). I am also convinced that I completely fucked it up and scarred them for life. (Although I imagine we won’t see the effects for years!) I finally had to cave and give them candy rewards, but I think that turned the tide. My daughter also refused to poop on the potty for a while, and requested a diaper. So we did that for a while and then when I reached my limit with that, I think we refused to give her a diaper and she pooped on the floor a couple times before deciding to use the potty. Now, about a year after we started, they still have accidents occasionally, but are “trained,” and stay dry through the night most nights as well. (And no longer need any kind of reward.) It took much, much longer and was much,much harder than I thought it was going to be. I learned a lot about myself and my own control issues during the process. I think as with any aspect of development, potty training is a process of leap forward, plateau, regression, mastery. So if you decide to put Riley back in pull-ups for pooping, I don’t think you are going to harm his progress. Maybe he just needs to back track a bit before taking that final step. I hate it when people say this kind of thing to me, but he will get there. And if you are like me, you will start to forget (or is it block out?) the process immediately. Hang in there!

For what it’s worth….

Our 3-year-old boy (turned 3 in May, so a few months older than Riley) is still struggling with this. I don’t care about putting him in diapers when he’s sleeping – but the thing where he pees on the potty and then starts playing and poops 5 minutes later has been driving me batshit insane.

The one thing that seems to be helping is when I just let him run around half naked, and put the potty chair where he’s playing. Clearly it doesn’t work if we’re going anywhere, but since I’m 8 months pregnant with twins, and roughly the size of a blimp, I don’t really want to go anywhere anyway.

Wow, lots of comments on this one! I agree with the “chill out for a bit” advice. It’s all up to Riley, and there’s nothing you can do to speed things up if he’s not ready.

My son’s potty training has been a sheer rollercoaster ride for almost a year, since shortly after he turned 2.5. He learned to poop on the potty first, then started peeing in the potty but pooped in his pants, then seemed to get everything together UNTIL we moved him from the 2’s room to the 3’s room at daycare, when he promptly started shitting his pants again. It’s been a few months since then and I think (cross my fingers) we’re good now. He really seems to prefer pooping on the potty–he talks about how big boys poop in the potty, not their pants, and he asks us to leave the room when he’s on the potty so he can do his grunting in private. At least he’s not asking for reading material in there. . . not yet, anyway.

There is light at the end of the tunnel, I promise. You & JB are great parents, Riley is a great kid, and all will be well. Just try not to stress over it–easier said than done, I know, but try.

check out the potty whisperer,

the theory holds that the child wants a situation to control and potty training is the last hold on being a “baby” so they refuse to potty train or something to that effect.

it comes down to training the parents and making potty training less of a struggle for the adults. the author believes the child needs to clean up their own messes, and they soon discover that clean up sucks, so they start to “choose” to use the facilities instead.

I don’t know if this is helpful or horrifying, but from everything I’ve heard, boys just take longer with potty training. Into the fours isn’t uncommon. I’m sure you’re not doing anything wrong. Who knows, if you give it a break for a while maybe he’ll decide on his own to start using the toilet?

I feel your pain! A couple of things helped with potty training for me…
1. When they’re big enough, we made a “no arguments” list – things that when they’re asked to do, they need to do. You see this type of thing in some parenting books – sit down with them and discuss the problem, come up with the solution together, and write it down. Even if they can’t read, they really like a list! It was a limited list but all those things that kids like to drag their feet on that stress out mom – time to get dressed, brush teeth, and go potty. This cut down on accidents with my 2nd child in particular who didn’t want to stop playing to go to the bathroom.

2. Another really mean (but effective) technique – when they have control but just can’t be bothered to go and do it in their underwear – clean them up with a cold shower. It just has to last 10 seconds and they get the picture. I think it took 2 times of cold showers with each kid, they really hate it. Again, this is really mean but they have no memory of it anymore anyway – and it worked!

3. Some kids are just heavy sleepers and don’t wake up to go to the bathroom. My daughter was 4 1/2 before we figured out that her room was too dark and she was so out of it that she couldn’t find the door of her room in the middle of the night! We put a nightlight on an extension cord on a dresser by the door and she was finally able to get up and go.

I know these ideas probably aren’t for Riley yet – but it’s good to have some ideas for the future! We also did m&m rewards – we had a little gumball machine that would spit out two when you pressed the lever. If you pooped in the potty, you got more!

Good luck, hang in there.

I have to disagree with people who say that boys are harder to potty train than girls. I have a boy and girl and my son was much easier.

I think it depends on the child. I agree with the person who said to let him go at his own pace. I know with my daughter she just did not like to sit on the potty for as long as it takes to poop sometimes. I think it is important to remember that their attention spans are just not in sync with the amount of time it takes to poop on the potty. I know with my daughter, it was a privacy thing as well. She would not poop at daycare. She would wait until we got home and then she would go off in another room and poop in her diaper. She mastered peeing on the potty fairly quickly. It took a couple of months before she took the initiative (on her own) to start pooping on the potty.

We just got our 3 year old boy trained. We got the experience down to 3 weeks by identifying a motivator, which in this case turned out to be going on the next pre-school field trip. You have to be potty trained to go. Also, we gathered parental forces with two other parent couples at pre-school who wanted their boys potty trained too. Since our 3 boys are all friends at school it worked great because the boys encouraged each other so they could ALL go on the field trip.

The only other advice I have is don’t force it. It is a total control thing for them. Once we backed off and let him tell us when he needed to go, things went a lot better.

Good luck! I know how much fun sitting on a bathroom floor can be. It does get better. :)

Naked time! No better way to help facilitate the connection between feeling the urge and seeing the result. Just hang out outside or in a non-carpeted area.

Become completely disinterested in the process (no threats, cajoling, no rewards, no interest). Just state matter-of-factly, “we tinkle outside or in the potty.” or “poo-poo goes in the potty.” and put it there with no further comment. When you get tired of paying attention, say “we tinkle in the potty or we wear a pull-up.”

Seroiusly, the more you get invested in the process, the crazier it gets. Just let him do it in his own time, and ignore the situation.

Hope this helps.

-Mama of three potty trained kiddos (8,5, and 2) and one 11 month old still in diapers, but toddling around naked as often as possible.

I don’t have kids, but I was a summer mother’s helper for a couple of summers. I have two things:

1. A friend from work had a kid that would not potty train. She would go in her diaper and demand to be changed immediately afterwards. She decided if the kid asked to be changed, she was smart enough to potty train so she did not change the diaper until she knew it was getting really uncomfortable. It took about a month, but it finally worked.

2. My old boss’ kid was afraid of the big toilet. He would go at home in his kiddy potty, but not at daycare where they had to use the big toilets. The boss was a first time mom and did not connect he was afraid. After I informed her of the situation, she found and purchased an kid-sized potty seat that fit on the regular “big” toilet. The kid dragged that seat around for like 2-years. The parents did make him carry it as a way to encourage him to stop using it. He did not care.

I agree with the naked thing. When our 2.5 year old daughter is naked she goes in the potty. When she’s in a pull up, she goes in the pullup. I hate pullups btw. I’m kicking myself for buying them for her because I thought I learned my lesson with my son. The LIKE them.

Our son however was much much harder. I totally get your anxiety over the issue. But my lesson learned – as someone else said – back away and become disinterested. If you make it a battle it will be. He’ll potty train when he’s ready to do it. You can make it a fight,negotation, battle of wills or you can step back – give positive reinforcement when he deserves it and just try to hang in there.

Its a long process for a lot of kids. My boy started kindergarten this year and peed his pants on monday. just takes times.

OR… you could do what the Chinese do. We just returned from China (actually been a few weeks now) where we were fascinated by this:

http://johnandloriharris.smugmug.com/photos/375701436_G7UBT-Th-1.jpg

We didn’t see babies and toddlers in diapers. Seems the kids poop and pee on the street. I couldn’t bring myself to take pictures of the actual deed. The question I wanted to ask: how do you know when they need to go so you can throw them out of your arms onto the street?

Then… one day we saw a family huddled around a tree. The mom was wiping the toddlers butt and the dad was cleaning the bottom of his pants. His own pants, not the kids. So I guess it isn’t a foolproof method.

I got to thinking: maybe the Chinese think our method of making the baby sit in his own feces is much more barbaric.

I’ve never potty trained any one, and I live in fear of the day I have to. My plan consists solely of the magical bribing power of M and M’s. Come to think of it, that’s pretty much my entire parenting plan. I am sure my kids will turn out fabulously on the M and M plan.
Anyway, I just wanted to say Good luck, it sounds Hideous. And just think, if he doesn’t get potty trained before he goes off to college, then it’s his roommates problem.

You’ve already gotten lots of advice on the potty-training, but I’ll second those who said to just lay off. My oldest had a terrible time with it and as soon as we quit harping at him, and reminding him, and trying to force him, he started going on his own. A friend who used to be a school nurse said it is SO common and truly is about control. And to keep pestering them, or being negative about it, only does more harm than good.

I’d say to him “Riley, you are a smart boy. You know how to go potty and where you’re supposed to go. Whenever you’re ready, you can do it.” And DROP THE SUBJECT. Which is SO hard. If he has an accident, say “That’s oka buddy. You’ll get it next time.” I did this with my son at age 3 and within 3 days he was going on his own.

And try to remember, there no kids in kindergarten that aren’t potty-trained. It WILL happen.

We bribed with Tootsie Pops for every time she pooped in the potty. Worked for us.

My boys were both right around their fourth birthday before they got rid of their diapers. With the first one, I wailed and moaned and tried everything I could think of. With the second one, I was sick of it and just let him decide when he was ready. And they were trained within a month of the same age.

Just hold your nose and don’t listen to people who tell you all babies can be trained by age one (Hi MOM!) and it’ll happen soon. I promise.

My daughter is trained for poop but not pee so we’re working on that and thanking our lucky stars that it’s not the other way around. I don’t know what to tell you about Riley though; we have friends with a 3 1/2 year old daughter that they cannot train for poop. They’ve been trying for a year and a half and they’ve tried everything short of threats: bribing with stickers and M&Ms, taking her there all the time, etc. And these people are phenomenal parents. Like, the kind of parents you secretly try to model yourself after. If they can’t do it, I think the ball must be in the child’s court, i.e. she’s just not ready. Maybe Riley is the same?

I’m in the camp of moms with boys who figured it out around three and a half. My oldest son used to tell me, very condescendingly, when I would ask if he wanted to go on the potty- “Oh no mom, I go in my diaper(or pull-up).” Like, God, you dumb ass, you should know this by now, ha ha.

We had to have our younger son potty trained before he could start preschool, and I was pretty sure we wouldn’t make it. But lo and behold, he just decided one day to give it a try, and he did it. Nothing we tried before that would work.

This is one of those many aspects of getting through the first five years of parenting that seems much better after it’s over with!

Oh girl…I wish I had miracle advice to give on the potty training issue but I don’t! I have no children of my own but I do have two beautiful step children. My step-son is now 13 but about 3 years or so ago he was with us for the summer. It took me awhile but I started noticing that his shorts he wore to bed were always wet and wrapped in a towel in the laundry! I talked to my husband and we figured out that at 10 years old he was wetting to bed EVERY night! I was livid, becasue he had tendencies to be very lazy so I thought he was literally too lazy to get up durign the night but my husband calmed me down! Instead of embarassing him we would wash the sheets each night and his clothes and after 7:00pm he wasn’t allowed anything to drink. My husband would get up at 3:00am and wake him and make him go to the bathroom! After a feww weeks of getting woke up in the middle of the night it was over. We talked to my husbands ex and she said she tried everything with him and he was stubborn so she was very pleased when he came back home and no longer wet at night! My husband said that even when he was younger (10-11) he had the same issue and then one day it just stopped. THANK GOD HE GREW OUT OF IT (HA)!My husband is SUCH a heavy sleeper though that I can totally see that happening…maybe his son is a heavy sleeper as well…who knows…but it stressed me out…I was a mess!

As for the doggie poop bags…I have a little dispenser that fits on one of my leashes…I have two German Shepards so poops in public are large and usually pretty gross! We venture to the Dog Exercise Park in our area rather often and you HAVE to pick up the poops or there is a huge fine. Went two weeks ago and we were walking along the trail when my male took the biggest, stiniest, runniest shit in freakin earth! And there I was gagging and cleaning it up…with three bags! Then a man and his black lab strolled by, lab was off the trail in the weeds a bit and took a big shit….the man kept walking…so the bitch that I am walked up to him and said, “Here’s a bag if you don’t have one becasue your dog just shit and it needs to be cleaned up”. i am sure he cussed me and called me inappropriate names but HELLO I JUST CLEANED UP RUNNY GROSS STANK ASS DOG SHIT…THE LEAST HE COULD DO IS PICK UP THE SOLID PILE HIS DOG LAYED!

pottytrained “pee” our almost 3 yr old in January. It wasn’t until this summer, 5 months later, that we were successfully pooping on the potty.

Before, He would just poop during nap times, in a diaper or when he woke up in the morning, also in a diaper.

The bribe was always out there, a mickey mouse doll, 3 suckers, the whole thing, and nothing worked, until one day I asked him if he wanted to go poop on the potty before his nap and he said yes. So we went. 30 minutes later, and one kibble later, he was rewarded all of his prizes. We couldn’t back down due to size of poop.

It slowly went from there, to now a few months later successful pooping on potty!!

Just drop the issue. Keep him in pullups and keep the potty available to him. Otherwise leave it alone. He does want to be a big boy and will eventually add this to his list of big boy things.

We had the same problem with our daughter. I had our second child 2 weeks before her third birthday and no longer had time to argue about it. I would say within two months of my dropping the issue she was potty trained, and she did it all by herself. I think she was really proud of that.

Oh and once he does start going try not to make a big deal of that too. Ignoring the whole damn process seemed to work for us. Good luck!

I love how little kids will decide to only wear a shirt or only wear pants.

Of course, I often feel like just taking something off–but find the fear of arrest (and a Michigan winter) is enough to keep me clothed.

My now 7 year old had a hard time with the poop part of potty training. She was just terrified of pooping on the potty. I finally just gave her the option of a pull up for poops. So, she wore panties most of the day and a pull up only when she needed to poo. She started using the toilet on her own not long after. Wiping was another “don’t rush her” issue :)

We took a big neon pink poster board and made a weekly chart with six weeks on it for our daughter. The boxes were big and the six weeks filled up the whole poster board.

We taped it to the wall in the bathroom, at her eye level, so she could see it while on the pot.

We bought TONS of different, small stickers. (Elmo, Dora, stars, etc.) She got to pick out a sticker every time she peed.

But for poop?! Poop we bought HUGE princess stickers and called them ‘Princess Poop’ stickers. For some reason, she wanted those princess poop stickers so freaking bad. I think b/c they were so big and glittery.

At the end of each week she got a surprise, which we left sitting up on a high shelf in the bathroom for her to see all week.

By the end of 6 weeks she had it and didn’t even ask for stickers anymore, the novelty wore off. But we still leave the poster hanging up and she’s super proud of it. Always pointing to the princess stickers and saying, “That’s when I pooped!”

We tried this b/c my MIL said that the sticker/chart thing worked with my husband when he was little. And it really did.

Also, we always left her in big girl panties during the day and just let her have accidents in them. Once, after pooping in a pair, we threw them away and that really freaked her out. She did not want us to throw her panties away. That seemed to help too!

But hey, just know that I’ve never seen a seven year old in diapers! He’ll get it soon…

I read you almost daily and appreciate your honesty and humor so much. I keep swearing that I’m going to write an article about potty-training, mainly a memo to grandmothers and all other believers in the “they’re two, so start potty training” school of thought that is just so unhelpful. We had some of the same problems with our daughter, and reading Dr. Brazelton’s section on “Toilet Learning” in his book, Touchpoints, helped me so much. It confirmed what I already knew on one level: back off; they’ll do it when they’re ready. Your job as a parent is to support and encourage and be available, not to force the issue. I highly recommend reading the chapter.

Dude, I’m SO scared of potty training. We’re putting it off until next summer when my kid is 2 1/2 but I’m hoping there’s some magical potty training fairy that will show us and magically do it for us. You should have it down by that point, maybe I’ll ship my kid to your house.
Good luck!

We lived your story. The good news is that my son is now potty trained. The bad news is that it happened after he turned 4. He flat out refused. We tried everything. You simply cannot “make” a child use the potty. Some kids are just not ready no matter how much you think they should be. They are the ones who are in control of their little bodies. After 2.5 years (yes! that damn long!) he is finally trained and doing well. You have to just tune out all of those people that tell you their child potty trained themselves at 18 months or you have to make them do it. They don’t know your child and every child is very different.

Be careful with the withholding of poop. Our son had some major issues with that. Talk with your doctor if you think he is withholding on a regular basis. Too much withholding can create problems with the nerve endings making it difficult to know when you have to go.

Hang in there! Once it happens it will be a dream come true. Then you are on to training the next kid in line…

My daughter was almost three before she’d poop in the potty. I mean, the kid was old enough to want freaking PRIVACY (she hid behind the couch when she needed to do her business) but not go to the toilet.

Good luck, man. Is all I’m sayin.

I probably shouldn’t post this publicly, since I know it sounds awful, but it worked.

My son was 3 1/2 and doing the exact same thing: waiting until he was in bed with a pull-up on to poop. He would NOT go in the toilet.

One day I had had it with him. He asked for a diaper and I refused. I took him into the bathroom and put him on the toilet and told him we were staying until he pooped. Four hours later we were still there so I sent my husband to the store for a child sized enema. I know. It sounds terrible. We gave it to him and held him on the toilet while he pooped and all of us cried. But he did it and then we praised him to the skies and bought him half of toys r us.

The next day he woke up and walked into the bathroom and pooped in the toilet without even mentioning that he had to go.

He’s 11 now and doesn’t seem to be scarred. :)

I SWEAR TO GOD we are going through that here. Except my story has taking a 3 yr old to the ER bec his “butt hurts” so bad he can’t go now and is given an enema.

He has been going pee on the potty for the past year, but poop?! No. He won’t do it and he is as stubborn as they come. So now, he at least SITS on the potty and “tries” and then we put a diaper on. Ugh. It is seriously a pain in MY ass at this point.

Could Riley be constipated, or perhaps at one point he was? Because it only takes one bad poop experience on the pot to blow the whole operation. Our son had terrible constipation problems and we ended up giving him Miralax because without it he would not poop. Not in the pot, not anywhere.

Once he was on the Miralax for a while, when we saw he needed to poop we just grabbed his protesting ass up and set him on the pot, and he had to go, so go he did, even though he didn’t want to. And then we immediately went to Target and bought A NEW TRUCK. That won him over big time. No problems since then.

I was in a similar situation with my 3 year old. One night, I took him aside and asked him why he didn’t want to go on potty. The answer, “I’m scared. Sometimes it hurts.” Okay…so the next time he was in the bathroom with me when I myself had to BM, we talked about that sometimes it does hurt and you make the “funny poopy face” to get it all out. Honestly, how stupid is this, but it worked! He has not had an accident since then and he accepts that this is “hard to do, but we all do it.” I am the type to not back down, but explore how he is feeling and how we resolve those issues.

Also, have you seen that book called Everyone Poops? I love that book. It has illustration of different kinds of animals pooping, and talks about how everyone eats and everyone poops. And of course it has a kid pooping in the pot too. This book really got our son interested in poop. Which may or may not be a good thing, but he IS fully potty trained, so.

Honestly, I do think you are fucking it way the hell up if you keep pressing it. Let it go, he WILL do it. So what you have to change bigger poops, buy bigger diaper. It’s not a big deal, the world will keep turning.

My guy was 4.5 but you know what? He did it in one full-swoop, didn’t look back, no accendents, poop, pee, dry at night dry all day. HE was done. It was painfree for all of us.
Trust me, there are bigger more important hills to die on.

The best part, to me, is Dylan in the background who’s a mixture of “This is so rad!” and “What the fuck? Should I scream too?”

I love it.

We tried for one month to potty train Payton (he’s 2 wks younger than Riley). Turns out that WE were the ones who were trained. Never once did he actually TELL us he needed to go. We just took him every hour or so and he’d go. He never pooped on the toilet and he, too, would wait until naptime or bedtime when he had on pullups to poop. After a month, we put him back in pullups too. I think that just means they’re not ready for potty training yet.

I didn’t read the 89 or so comments above me, so forgive if I’m repeating here.

We had the same issues with our son and I finally just let it go because frankly, it was driving everyone nuts. Our Ped pointed out that the chances of him going to University in a diaper was pretty slim, so that helped. Eventually, one day, after seeing all his little pre-school friends go to the potty on a regular basis, he asked for underwear and that was that.

I think some kids just aren’t ready until they’re ready. I know mine wasn’t and no amount of cajolling, bribing, begging, etc. helped. We just had to wait it out.

My nephew, who is now a great 13 year old young man who does great in school and sports and is just a stand up kid, pooped in a diaper until he was FIVE. He would ask for one and then go hide and poop. No amount of treats or begging or questioning as to why the hell it would feel good to have poop smeared across his rear (said in the nicest way of course) helped. It’s a battle you cant win. I would occassionally encourage, but let him go at his own pace. The joys of poop.

No kids yet, but I can tell you the story my mother loves to tell everyone – boyfriends in particular.

Evidently, I got the whole “pee on the toilet” concept rather quickly. It took a stomach bug, however, for me to accept pooping on the toilet. I did NOT enjoy diarrhea, or the required wait to have a diaper changed only to require another change only 10 minutes later.

Of course, then you have to decide if you’d rather make your kid sick and cranky or to continue potty training hell.

Oh! I feel for you! My daughter was a holder too and didn’t PT til she was over 3 years old. We did all the coercive (and non-coercive) techniques but one day she just changed her mind. It had nothing to do with us, though I suppose our previous efforts might have given her an idea of what to do once she was actually ready. I’ve pretty much blocked all of the details of that period out of my mind, it was so awful. I don’t know what the solution is for you, other than to just sit back and wait. Good luck.

He won’t go to Kindergarten wearing diapers. I promise he won’t. Don’t be hard on yourself. When he’s ready, he’ll do it. I raised four children, three of them boys. Each one was easier to potty train. I think that’s because I relaxed more each time. Sometimes the best thing we can do as parents is simply get out of the way.

I heart ALL these comments. 3 yrs 7 months, potty training for eight months, let’s count those 1-2-3-4, yes FOUR poops in the potty. And two of them he snuck off and did by himself and I thought WHOO! WE DID IT! Six weeks later…. We tried bribery and taking away toys, no go. We’re just waiting now.

I, too, think pooping is a control thing and it will come naturally with time.

I am so used to picking up dog poop with a bag that it doesn’t phase me a bit. I do double bag, though, because once I discovered my bag had a hole after I’d rubbed dog shit all over my winter jacket as we finished our walk.

Potty training is pure HELL. I HATE IT WITH THE FIRE OF A THOUSAND SUNS. TRULY.

I have two boys. My first was finally potty trained shortly before his fourth birthday. He would pee, no problem. Poop? Not so much. Finally, I just put him in big boy underwear 24/7. I told him that if he continued to poop in his pants then he would have to rinse it out in the toilet. I was tired of cleaning his poopy pants. So the first time he pooped in his pants,(his father helped him,relax)he had to wash it out. And he did NOT like that. I asked him what made him think I liked doing it and that seemed to finally do the trick. We also promised him a pinata if he would go pee/poop in the potty for a week. Don’t ask. Worked though!

Good Luck with the Urban Potty War. I’m right there with ya, again. My youngest just turned three. He’s not that crazy about pinata’s, and he is waaay more stubborn than his brother so I’m kinda stumped…

It will happen, eventually. Everyone eventually poops on the potty. I so feel your pain. We went through the same thing and I’m not sure if there’s anything else that tests your parenting skills like potty training your child. But I tell you, when it happens and continues to happen you will never be happier. Stay strong and I think you should try laying off for a week, then jump back in and try again.
Good Luck!!!

Struggled with the poop boy, age 3. My friend came to babysit for us while we had a weekend away. She told him that the diaper time was over, that he always had to poop on the pot, and it he didn’t it was his problem. He had to clean it up, clean up the bathroom, do the laundry. We returned on Sunday evening with a totally trained boy and a big fat gift for my friend.