The Almost 4 year old having accidents

[madsommer]

Long story short:

We started potty-training my son at around 3.5 yo.  He wasn't fully potty-trained (still wouldn't poop in the toilet) but we were having basically zero accidents. 

I had a baby in early August and so we started to see some regression.  It went from an occassional accidents to then refusal to use the toilet and thus accidents all day.  Our ped told us to go ahead and put him back into a pull up and give him some time to adjust to the new baby being here.  (I also think the regression was intensified due to MIL's reactions to his accidents while she watched him and his sister when I was in the hospital.)

Now the baby is almost 8 weeks old and my son seems to just  use the potty when he wants to, for example, when he wants a reward of some kind.  He will voluntarily use the bathroom maybe once a day, ask to be put in underwear instead of a pull-up but then refuse to use the potty when prompted and proceeds to have accidents.

Please help me.  I have no idea what else to.  I've tried rewards, withheld rewards, making him clean himself up (usually he then just sits in his soiled clothes for 30-45 min), trying to motivate him by showing him that his peers are using the potty.  Nothing seems to be working.  We make a point not to be overly critical or yell at him for accidents, but this is becoming extremely frustrating.  He's a big kid and trying to haul 45 pounds to the toilet when he's resisting is quite a struggle...

[pianojazzgirl]

I think in that situation I'd be ok with him continuing to use pull-ups.  You say he asks to wear underwear.  In that case I'd say that underwear is for when he's willing to use the potty.  If he's not willing to use the potty then he needs to be in pull-ups.  I'd try to be careful not to make this a way of shaming him into using the potty, but rather as a matter-of-fact statement (which in my mind it is).  In our family we don't EC so I can honestly say that kids who use the potty wear undies and those who won't/can't use the potty wear dipes (pull-ups). 

ETA I forgot to say that at this point I'd stop offering any kind of rewards/bribes/whatever.  I'd just matter-of-factly put him in pull-ups and not even mention the potty *for now*.  It sounds like somewhat of a power-struggle situation has developed and at the first hint of that in potty training I usually back right off until we're back on neutral territory.

[*MamaJen*]

Our boys were born on the exact same day! 12-29-07! Ds came out at 12:04 a.m., so I'm willing to bet he's a few hours older than yours. :)

That said, he still has accidents relatively frequently. He's been out of diapers for quite a while now. Maybe nine months? But he's still not really independent when it comes to the potty. He doesn't have many accidents, but if someone doesn't remind him, he won't go independently. Potty regression is still totally normal and par for the course at this age. My advice would actually be to crank it down a notch. Don't make a huge deal out of it, be really matter of fact when it's time to use the potty, and don't get it let too emotional. I think a good comparison would be if he was fighting against the car seat -- it's just something you do. Or, it's totally okay to go back to pullups for a while, especially if you're going out of the house. These kind of issues seem really big at the time, but they always work themselves out within a few weeks or months.