OT - My 3 year old and potty training

Okay, my 3 year old is pretty much potty trained with the exception of going "poo poo" in the potty..LOL..sorry for the grossness. I don't know what to make of this??? He will pee in the potty like a big little boy all day long and is even out of pull-ups (except for sleeping at night) and he doesn't need reminders to pee, but gosh darn it he poops everytime. I tell him "Tyler, you need to poop in the potty okay!", I use my strong voice, I threathen him with no more "Backyardigans" and "Max and Ruby" and I have yet to find a way to get him to poop in the potty. Any suggestions????

~~Desperate Mom - Gina

No advice, just wanted to say Good Luck! 

I'm having the same issue with my almost 2 yr old twins. They will pee in the potty, they can tell me when they have to pee and spend the whole day dry in"big girl" panties... but poop is another story.

It's almost like they have no idea they're going to poop until they do it. I must ask them a million times a day "do you have to poop?"... thankfully they're pretty regular, so i know to watch them like a hawk in the morning for any signs that they're gonna go.

Thanks sweetie and good luck to you too. I'm going to have to learn to pay attention too... so  when he does poop at regular intervals I can try and intervene...cleaning poop out of underwear is not a duty I like to be on, ya know ..LOL.

~~Gina

I bribed my son. I kept a cntainer of herseys kisses- high in a container. When he would "pee-pee in the potteeee" I would get all excited and sing the phrase over and over and give him 1- kiss. When he would would poop I would get all excited, clapping and give him 3- kisses. Within days he was sitting on the potty demanding 3-herseys kisses before he was even finished with the deed LOL. It may sound silly but it worked for me.

LOL.. Too cute Megan...I'm willing to try anything...So...."Operation Hershey Kisses" will commence today!!! Thanks

~~Gina

I saw on Supernanny that she had the kids sit on the potty and look at a book to relax themselves. It seemed to work.

I'm not sure what to say but with my daughter I found that once she was relaxed, this is funny to say but she liked to watch herself poop, she would always try and see it coming out, finally got her to stop after a little while. I always thought this was weird but she was fully toilet trained by 2 years and hasn't looked back. Good Luck to all and I will be back there again soon enough

I use Tootsie rolls, we are still working on it though. He likes to get a Tootsie roll for giving me one

Honestly, look at it from his point of view, everything he does is pretty much "controled" by the grown ups, but he is in control of when he poops. It could very well be a power struggle for him, showing you that you can't make him do something he does not want to do.

I tried everything with my one son and nothing worked, so I ignored him, put him back in pull ups and never said another word to him about it. After three days of not acknowleding him and his poop (I would not even speak to him when I was changing him), he started going on the potty and that was the end of it.

Kids are sometimes smarter then we give them credit for, I say take a step back and let him learn that it isn't a big deal to you, and then it won't be a big deal to him.

each kid is different, so you'll have to find what works for yours! Obviously threatening isnt working, so try the reward system. I did this with my daughter, but not with food... I didnt want to teach at such a young age that candy is a reward for being good.. bla bla. Well she loves little toys out of 25cent machines, so i went and just got a bunch of those,. or little packs of toys. I wrapped each little thing up in a bit of wrapping paper.. and put in a bowl. Every time she went on the toilet... she got to pick a toy~

then i said it was if she went all day on toilet, she got to pick out of the bigger toy bowl.. (dollar tree toys) and this worked great!