Potty training in Less than a Day

What am I doing wrong? my 3.5 yo and I have been doing this all day-
from 8 in the morning until now, at almost 2:00. he loved teaching
the doll. He loves the underpants. He likes to sit on the potty,
with the underpants on. He likes to walk away and then pee, or poop.
There is NO WAY I can make him ignore everything in the house- I can't
force him to stay in the kitchen only, and even if he is in there some
of his favorite toys are there too- pots, pans, dishwasher, etc.

Is this whole idea f*cked? or does it not work on really smart kids?
I read the darned book thoroughly, am skeptical about chastising him
for an accident but am trying. I think the technique was designed for
mentally retarded kids- see the four references- 3 are for training
them, not gifted kids. I've tried to approach it as potty
teaching since he isn't a dog, but it isn't working.

btw, I agree that dr Phil got his idea from this book- he only added
"calling a cartoon character" after success. Of course, Dr Phil
doesn't know much about a lot of things. His ideas on weaning (same
show) were lifted straight out of "what to expect the first year"
which were lifted straight out of some non-physiological training
manual. He is incapable of learning from his guests so how can they
learn from him?

(SweetMilk) wrote in
om:

What am I doing wrong? my 3.5 yo and I have been doing
this all day- from 8 in the morning until now, at almost
2:00. he loved teaching the doll. He loves the
underpants. He likes to sit on the potty, with the
underpants on. He likes to walk away and then pee, or
poop. There is NO WAY I can make him ignore everything in
the house- I can't force him to stay in the kitchen only,
and even if he is in there some of his favorite toys are
there too- pots, pans, dishwasher, etc.

Is this whole idea f*cked? or does it not work on really
smart kids? I read the darned book thoroughly, am skeptical
about chastising him for an accident but am trying. I
think the technique was designed for mentally retarded
kids- see the four references- 3 are for training them, not
gifted kids. I've tried to approach it as potty
teaching since he isn't a dog, but it isn't working.

it's quite possible he's just NOT physically ready to train,
which has nothing to do with being gifted (although gifted
kids are harder to bribe into things, so...)
my son is 4 years, 1 month. he's flirting with toilet
training & has been for 2 years. he sometimes notices he has
to pee or poop before it actually happens, but it's rare. he's
more likely to use the toilet (or run outside) if he's bare,
but that doesn't help much in New England. kinda chilly to go
pee outside in the winter oh, & my kid *hates* underpants.
he'll only wear one particular brand of diaper. shrug
lee

(SweetMilk) wrote in message . com...
What am I doing wrong? my 3.5 yo and I have been doing this all day-
from 8 in the morning until now, at almost 2:00. he loved teaching
the doll. He loves the underpants. He likes to sit on the potty,
with the underpants on. He likes to walk away and then pee, or poop.
There is NO WAY I can make him ignore everything in the house- I can't
force him to stay in the kitchen only, and even if he is in there some
of his favorite toys are there too- pots, pans, dishwasher, etc.

Ease up. I wouldn't worry about him staying in the kitchen. The
point is that he initiates going potty himself, and not you. Don't
put him on the potty yourself. Just keep asking, "Do you have dry
pants?" and then praise (or treat) when he says yes. If he has an
accident, then change his undies and try again. I never did the "go
potty 10 times after an accident" thing with DS. However, if we were
out and he had an accident I would take him home: "can't play in the
park with wet pants." I didn't get upset at him, but used natural
consequences instead. This seemed to work for DS.

I would go ahead and keep talking about where pee and poo goes
throughout the day if you're just getting started. Stuff like, "When
you have to pee, you'll put it in the potty, right?" However, there's
a fine line with that kind of talk, and you don't want to fall into
taking potty responsibility away from him. Be creative....

I think it also helps if you have potty content videos or books that
you're working with at this time as well. I believe DS got more out
of the "It's Potty Time" video than any book, but your kid may be
different. This vid shows older kids, not babies, so your 3.5 year
old may be able to relate to this better than other shows. I also
thought "Potty Time with Bear" was a good one.

Is this whole idea f*cked? or does it not work on really smart kids?
I read the darned book thoroughly, am skeptical about chastising him
for an accident but am trying. I think the technique was designed for
mentally retarded kids- see the four references- 3 are for training
them, not gifted kids. I've tried to approach it as potty
teaching since he isn't a dog, but it isn't working.

With a bit of tinkering we had success with this method. YMMV, of
course. The book is so dogmatic about all the steps you should take,
it seems scary to alter them, but we did and it worked well.

btw, I agree that dr Phil got his idea from this book- he only added
"calling a cartoon character" after success. Of course, Dr Phil
doesn't know much about a lot of things. His ideas on weaning (same
show) were lifted straight out of "what to expect the first year"
which were lifted straight out of some non-physiological training
manual. He is incapable of learning from his guests so how can they
learn from him?

The guy is a dork, that's about all I can say about Dr.Phil :-P

dragon