My son is scared of the potty

[desperate315]

I'm hoping someone out there has a suggestion for me.  My son is 3 years 2 months and refuses to go on the potty.  He is a bright little boy who communicates well and he says he doesn't want his pee pee to come out.  I have him in underwear and fill him with drinks all morning.  I have him sit on his potty or stand in front of the potty (whichever he wants to do) every 1/2 hour or so.  He will willingly sit on the potty as long as he doesn't need to go potty.  When the urge does hit him, he will cry and dance around for hours, but will not sit on the potty.  Finally, when he just can't hold it any longer, he wets his pants.  If I have him bare bottomed he cries the whole time that he wants his underwear.  I have put all the bribes out there...m&ms, ice cream, toys laid out ready to be opened and even a football helmet.  I put him in a diaper for his nap/bedtime and he will pee and poop in his diaper (I don't want him to hold his poop and cause other problems).  Two times when he wasn't wearing underwear, after dancing and crying, he did pee and I ran and "caught" it in the potty seat.  We made a huge deal about it, he seemed so proud at the time, but he just won't do it.  This is our second attempt, after trying for 2 weeks (with same results) about 2 months ago.   My 4 year old daughter was so easy!  We also have a 1 year old, so maybe he wants to be baby-ed, but he doesn't seem to want to be baby-ed in any other ways.

I guess it's possible that he's not emotionally ready to be trained...but he seems to be physically ready, because he can hold it for 6-7 hours...it's not like he can't control it.   Help!  Should we back off again?  This time we've only been at it for a day.  If anyone has any suggestions, please post.  I'm willing to try anything.  

[LosingMyMindInGA]

Most like its that he just isn't ready....with my middle two...they didn't train until about 3 1/2.  We tried and tried....so I stopped pushing, stopped aggressively trying.  I would still ask if they wanted to try the potty but if they said no i left it alone...Every few weekends I would just put them in underwear and ask do you need to potty ...  Suddenly one weekend it was just like out of nowhere they started going potty and have fewer accidents....been trained every since.

They are 14 months apart so this happened the same way with both, but at different times...one is a boy one is a girl.

[sstaceyy]

Iam going to say good luck my 5 yr old still isnt potty traied completly try useing a toddlar potty and then work from there.

[mummyangel]

Why dont you make it fun..........like draw a funny face in the bottom of the potty....

We used a ping pong ball we drew a face on and asked him to aim at the ball every time he hit the target we gave him a sticker, he loved the idea and soon progrest to use the toilet!!! of course with the ping pong ball in it.......... he needed to be trained quite quickly as he was due to start pre-school and they dont accept yr children in nappies!!! he was 3 years old.....

hope this helps ;o

[AnnieBrooke]

I would back off for a while; i.e., put him back into diapers and tell him that he will go in the potty when *he* wants to.  Probably he's feeling out of control (i.e., that you are controlling something and he is scared of it).  Just let the tension die down.  (And his possible sense of failure about it.)  There are some pretty good books about potty training (written for kids) that can be found at the library, plus videos and toys and all kinds of stuff online.  Maybe in a month you can try one of those.

[AnnieBrooke]

I like the idea of the ping-pong ball too.  My son is peeing sitting down in his potty chair, though ... maybe he wouldn't know if he was hitting the ball or not.  LOL