What Emotions Should I Display When My Potty Training Kid Has an Accident???

I am going through this too, my son will be 3 on Friday. I forgot about racing to the potty. With my first son my mom would take him with her and they would count and see who had the most pee. He thought it was an exciting game, I thought it was crazy, but it worked. I try to keep even with my emotions...accidents are accidents. Good Luck.

Sit him on the potty every couple hours without asking him if he has to go. Little ones don't want to stop playing so the answer is always "No I don't have to use the potty now."

If he has an accident don't get upset at all. Clean him up and say something like "Oh you didn't make it to the potty in time. Next time let me know and we'll run to the potty as quick as we can." You can even make a game out of seeing how fast you can run to the potty (let him win every time).

Potty training can be so frustrating. As for your emotion, stay calm, but ask "what happened?"
Have you tried letting him stay in his wet clothes for a little bit? I know this might sound silly, but maybe if he realizes how yuky it feels to be wet, he would be more encouraged to go potty when he feels the sensation. My daughter would just play & play & play & ignore the signals that her body was giving her. I would ask her "what happened" & she would say "but I was busy playing". SO leaving her in her wet clothes was my solution & she didn't like it! Of course she would only be in her wet clothes for maybe 10 or 15 minutes, but it was enough for her to get motivated. When she would come up to me to tell me she had an accident, I would calming ask, "what happened" she would tell me & then I'd tell her, "I'll help you get changed as soon as I can". And add that she is a big girls & can now control her body & she needs to listen to it when it gives her signal to go potty.
I also put books that makes sound in the bathroom for her & she could only look at the books while she was on the potty. This was really helpful. I suppose any toy would work. Maybe buy a new toy or book that your child has never played with before & use that. Again, this was helpful.
I hope this helps.
GOod luck with your little one.

My son is currently being potty trained too. And he does not tell me prior to needing to go. But we've figured out if you tell him you need to go potty.. he wants to beat us using the potty. It's working pretty well.

Another friend would pull her daughter in everytime she needed to go... So it's not the every 1/2 or 1hr, but consistent.

For us, when my son has an accident, I reemphasize he would have been dry, if he had let me know he needed to go.

Good luck!

I'm potty training my 2nd now, and we just say "uh oh, next time we'll have to pee pee in the potty". We really act like its nothing when he has accidents, but when he does go on the potty we praise him to no end - we'll call daddy at work or a grandma (he loves talking on the phone). We also have a sticker chart with 6 rows of 6 squares. After each row he gets a "special prize" - Smartees, a matchbox car, play doh, etc. When we fill the chart we'll go to a fun play place to celebrate our "big boy".
This is our 2nd chart - the first one we did with Pull Ups, now we're in underpants (pull ups over the underpants when we leave the house, and pull ups when he sleeps).
Good luck. It's a pretty gross job :)

I would show great excitement when he does well, and do your best to be emotionless, matter-of-fact when he has an accident. Learning to use the toilet has a lot to do with learning to recognize your body's signals that your bladder/bowel is full and this is not always an easy task. Some kids also grow faster than their bladders and it takes time for their bladders to catch up. So chastising, shaming or telling your child you are dissappointed can be counterproductive.

One thing I did with my son is I would have him clean up to the best of his ability--take off his own wet clothes, bring them to the washing machine, give him a wet washcloth and do his best to wipe his wet skin and explain that skin wet with urine can get sore or itchy and the urine needs to be cleaned off, if he pees on the floor, give him a rag and have him do his best to clean it up, etc. Yes, you will probably have to finish the job. But the end result is teaching him about responsibility and cleaning up after yourself. My son is pretty good about cleaning up after himself, but he also rarely had any accidents because it took so much time away from playing.

P., I think that you're making a mistake by asking him if he needs to go to the bathroom. He may not know the difference between needing and wanting. He may not really know what it feels like before he "goes." Dont' ask him. Simply take him, every hour and a half or however often you think that he goes. Telling mom or dad that he has to use the bathroom is very often the LAST step in the training process, so until he is able to do that, you need to take him regularly.
If he really doesn't quite know when he has to go to the bathroom, I'd suggest being very neutral about accidents and take him more often. Good luck

Learning to go potty is just the same as everything else. It takes practice, and you should praise him when he gets it right, not act negatively when he gets it wrong. Did you act upset when he was first learning to eat, and didn't hold his spoon right or get all the food in his mouth? I'm assuming probably not - you just let him practice, and when he did particularly well, you praised him and said what a big boy he was now because he could feed himself.

hi P.--

boys are usually harder/at longer to potty train than girls.(i have 3 sons) my last two didn't get it until they were 3. try not to show anger, frustration or disappointmnent. it's all about love and support even if u feel frustrated or dissapointed. maybe you could go back to pull ups cuz it does sound like it's really hard on both of you right now. i'm not saying give up and wait til later. at least with pull ups you can tell him he's getting ready for big boy pants and this way he's the helper because he's telling you when he wants to go. if he doesn't tell you in time and he wets himself just encourage him that you know he'll tell you in time next time. the key is to be very patient and have him believe you love him no matter what--even if he doesn't get it right all the time. this is certainly training for life cuz there will be many times he'll need to believe you're there for him when he's doing something new.i think the more comfortable he feels the better he'll do. be patient an gibe him lots of love. find ways to praise him--and yourself too. cuz you're working hard and doing a good job.

HI, P.. My second son was potty trained two months before turning 2 1/2 yo and that was reinforced between us enocuraging him and him watching hsi older brother who is only 1 yr and three weeks older. This is what I have noticed and learned from mistakes: if it's fun place and kids running around, no kid wants to take time to go to bathroom, the fun may disappear or they'll miss something; if new place, I get the impression that my son thinks that new place doen't have a bathroom. He won't ask or tell an adult he has to go potty. He'll hold as long as he can then oooops. So, when we go someplace new or to a mall, I take him potty so he knows where it is and that they do have a bathroom; and I notice if he hasn't gone in couple of hours and I know he has drank enough water to need to go (I have them drink water and they take their own water bottles with them when we go somewhere, esp. my oldest who is always thirsty) I ask him and if he says no, I take him anyways. I try to encourage him and praise him for going without being asked and that prasie will reinforce that good behavor and become a habit. You are doing good and just keep going...it'll take place.

In my opinion too much emphasis is placed on a childs feelings when it comes to potty training. What do you do when he refuses to get in his car seat or to sit at the dinner table? Whatever that is do the same with the toilet. Set a timer for an hour and then tell him to go sit. If he refused and says he doesnt have to, tell him quite plainly of a consequence IF he has an accident soon AFTER you told him to go. The consequence is for NOT doing what you told him to do, not because he had an accident. Make that plain to him. "you wouldn't have peed your pants if you had gone when I told you." Dont scold him if he has an accident if you havent told him to go for example 15 mins or so after you reminded him. Dont nag him about refusing, simply reset the timer and tell him the next hour. As fas as him not going on his own, it takes longer in some kids to realize how it feels to have a full bladder, thats why we have to remind them. It would be ok to grumble when you have to clean up his mess to let him know that he is causing a mess.

Hi P.,

I just went through this with my daughter yesterday. She just turned 4, and has been potty trained for a while, but she still has accidents on occasion. We were at Chuck E. Cheese yesterday and I asked her several times to go to the bathroom and she refused. I could have forced the issue, but if I control everything, she won't be able to learn from her mistakes. Well, as we were getting ready to leave, she peed her pants. I don't carry extra clothes so she had to go home with wet pants and you know how cold is is right now! I didn't yell at her...I simply said "maybe next time when mommy says you should try to go to the bathroom, you'll go." She agreed and that was the end of that. Accidents happen to all little kids sometimes and if you just point out that they need to listen when you suggest they go, they are old enough to understand that. I guess my advice would be...don't let it be an easy or pleasant experience for your son. If you immediately clean him up and make him comfortable, where is the problem for him with peeing his pants? If I had clothes with me I would have made my daughter clean herself. She hates touching pants that have pee on them. That's punishment enough.

D.
35 year old mother of 5 with one more on the way