Question
I am a stay at home Dad and our son just turned 2 years old last month and we are now in the 4th month of trying to potty train him. He has a 4 year old sister and she was potty trained in about 6 weeks and night trained in about 4 months.
After about the first two weeks it looked like he was about to get it and then he regressed.
We started out with the potty bell and the gate. We are still using the potty bell and the gate, but being that we are in the 16th week of this it is becoming hard to remember to set the potty bell every day, every morning, every 30 minutes.
We've played with setting it and not saying anything and just letting it be a reminder and just let him feel the consequences of peeing in his pants. But that didn't seem to work so then after a few weeks when the potty bell went off I would give him a moment or two to react himself, but if he didn't I would pick him up and put him on the potty and say Doctor said you have to when potty goes off. All of these have had mixed results.
I feel like we have tried all types of ways to conveying the message to him that we expect him to use the potty. I know its a delicate balance with a 2 year old, because as soon as he thinks its important to us, he rebels. but We could use some advice on what to say and what not to say at this point and how to say it. We have read the JR potty training book. But we are at a loss at this point.
Since the beginning he has been out of diapers at night and during the day, except on two family trips where we couldn't afford him to have an accident in other family's homes. In those two occasions we had him in a pull up at night.
Recently we moved him to a toddler bed. He still has accidents at night. Mostly wetting the bed. Sometimes he stays dry. But sometimes in the morning he poops in his pants or poops right next to the potty on the floor.
He has two potties. One upstairs and one down stairs.
In the 16 weeks we have been at this he may have been totally dry during the day maybe 3 or 4 times. Lately though, he is having accidents right next to his potty.
Most of the time I am staying calm and collected but sometimes to be honest I use a more firm tone because I'm frustrated. I know this doesn;t help but I don't know what to do at this point.
Is there a way we can reset? Please help.
