Why wont my 3 year old son use the potty?

Question

My son turned 3 in August and he absolutely refuses to use the potty. He has no intrest in the potty chair. He knows when he has to go because if we are at the beach he will ask if it is okay to pee in the water.

Answer 1

Throw a party.  Get one of those pee-pee dolls and have it pee into the toilet, then throw a party for the doll.  Then let him know that when he pees in the pooty he can have a party, too.  Make it so fun that it is reaslly something he will want to do.  It may takes a few tries, but he'll get it down.

Answer 2

My daughter was 3 years and 2 months old before she began using the potty. And, the worst part was she KNEW what she was doing. She knew when she had to go, and where she SHOULD be going, but as a method of control, she refused to do it in the potty. Then one night, I took her in and set her on the toilet and she poo-poo'd and then I made a HUGE fuss about it, and she understood, just HOW GREAT it was, and kept doing it from that day forward. If you have a concern with your son's behavior, give his doctor a call.  Using a "coin" system with him could really bennifit you both.  With my daughter, I made coins out of foam sheet, and every time she pottied, she got a coin. For every 5 coins she got, she could either watch a TV show, or go to the park or something along those lines. It's also a great way for them to learn responsibility by showing that doing "big boy" things has "big boy" results.  I have a friend with a son, and she says that she put Cherrios in the toilet, and told him to pee on the cherrio's. She said he loved the game, and it got him potty trained really fast.

Also, I don't know if he lives with his dad or not, but try to get dad to keep the door open when he goes to the bathroom so that son can see, this is what the big guys do.

It's important to remember NOT TO SCOLD the child for using the bathroom in the inappropriate place. As hard as that can be, it really does make it worse. They get more stressed about it, and it just exadgerates the whole situation.

FINALLY, the thing that really helped my daughter was, putting her "big girl" panties on her to wear during the day. She didn't want to mess them up, because they were SO SPECIAL. if she did wet them, I took a while to change her, (like 5 or 10 mins) of just going "OKK now we have to stop playing, and go wash off, and change panties, and now you're going to have do this.. ect., " and taking  a long time like that really made her want to stay as dry as possible.

I hope this helped some!!

I hope this helped some!

Answer 3

he's 3 he's not ready just put him on the potty every 30 minutes! GOOD LUCK

Answer 4

No more diapers - and NO pull-ups! Those are just big-kid underwear that are more convenient that the toilet.

Emphasize the big-kid angle, and keep on top of him. I've also heard that putting Cheerios in the water and aiming for them helps with interests.

You will have to wait, though - he'll do it when he's ready.

Answer 5

Potty training is all about control!!

your child needs to be the one to control the situation. let him call the shots as to when he wants to start training.

peer pressure is a great motivator.  it will happen.

Answer 6

get a rolled up news paper and show him who is boss.....haha worked on my boxer

Answer 7

Here is what i did for my late pottier 3yrs for him. I got all caught up with the housework. told hubby To keep up with it(the house work). you have time now. got rid of diapers all together. made sure there was plastic cover for the mattress. and kept on him like glue observing behavior,  etc. no diaper just undies. not kidding allot of work.took about 3 days and a bit of cleaning. but my boy did not like messing the undies and clothes. I have 4 kids.

Answer 8

He is not ready.  Boys usually started one to two years later than girls.

Answer 9

lol maybe is is just scared, mkae him watch his dad go, thats how I taught my son and he just turned 2

Answer 10

Hey, one of my cousins didn't use the bathroom until they were 7. They had pull-ups.

Answer 11

He needs to be ready before he uses the potty and it is normal for a 3 year old boy to not be trained yet.  Keep at him, have him sit on the potty right after he gets up, before bath time and bed time.  Let him watch his dad, uncle, grandpa go to the bathroom sitting down and standing up.  Have his day scheduled so that there are natural bathroom breaks and he won't have to stop what he is doing to get up and go to the bathroom.  Keep asking him if he needs to pee and if he goes in his pants tell him next time lets try that in the toilet.  Maybe the potty chair isn't for him, lots of kids don't like it because it isn't real.  Get one of those kid seats that go over the toilet seat to prevent him from falling in and see if he's more interested in that especially if he gets to pick the characters that are on it.  If you live somewhere warm have him run around in just underwear or naked so its quicker for him to get to the toilet and he might be more careful to not make a mess on the floor or near his toys (this is only if you don't mind cleaning/are able to protect your house).

Keep exposing him to the concept of peeing on the potty and he will come around eventually.  Good Luck