my son trained at about 28 months, and he is an oh-so-stubborn boy but it turned out successful. Have him potty before outings, and ditch the diapers! We asked him a hundred times at first if he needed to potty, and eventually stopped and he has never had an accident in public, but we still keep spare pants/unders stashed in the car just in case. It may still happen someday.

Then we ran out of diapers and decided, let's see if he can make it overnight, and he didn't have one accident at night. Maybe that is not typical but we tried and it worked! Now we have him potty before bedtime and keep liquids to a minimum a couple hours before bed.

Maybe give give it a shot! I think he will surprise you.

Put him in underpants and accept that there will be some accidents. Underpants help a lot in reducing accidents and you can further help him by keeping an eye on the clock and trying.

I really love the training pants from Imse Vimse. They have a built in PUL cover like cloth diapers so they still feel wet but they protect your stuff from the worst of the wetness. And they work super well on poop.

As for naps and night time, try and figure out when he is peeing. If pees in his sleep it is purely developmental and his body needs to mature a bit more. If is peeing when waking up, you can work on that. You can have special "nap underpants" with a cover to protect the bed or add waterproop cover under him.

Both of my kids were night trained at about the same as day (2) but I hear that is unusual.

Oh, and can I just add a gripe here? Most underpants for kids are horrible. Big scratchy elastic, weirdly cut legs that expose the crotch, elastic going up the crack, nasty stiff coated "cotton" fabrics. Some are hard to pull up and some droop down.

I would choose really well fitting underpants over almost any other article of clothing for my kids. Shop around and really look at them.

The Hanna Anderson version are expensive but I really think they are worth it. (available on sale at times and also at the outlets)

Hanna Andersson catalog sells thick (multi-ply) cotton training underpants. They're a great option for these situations. Trained both my kids with them at the recommendation of our child care center...which has seen ALOT of kids get through this stage.

I had a friend that did this. When he and his family were home alone (no guests) they would take the pants & undies off his son completely and let him run around bare bottom. As soon as he had to pee or poop he would stop dead in his tracks and yell "MOOOOMMMM!!!!" and theyd take him to the bathroom. I guess the logic is that the child knows that there is nothing to catch whatever he is about to deliver so he instinctively asks for the bathroom. They had him trained in a matter of weeks. Now... im not sure if i am brave enough to try this with my own son but it worked for them!

I used this method http://www.3daypottytraining.com/
to potty train my twin girls and one was totally trained in 3 days (no diapers ever) and the other was totally trained in 5 days and we have never looked back. I highly recommend it:) Good luck.

BTW- I started potty training my twins on their second birthday although previously we read potty books and talked a lot about using the potty.

My son was totally toilet trained @ 2.75 but we kept putting a nappy on him at night, just so we wouldn't have to deal. We didn't do pull-ups just the regular luvs or whatever in their biggest size (is it 6?). Then we noticed more and more that he was totally dry in the morning. So after a while we just put him in underwear at night and he did fine (but he was over 3 at this point). But what we DID have to do, until he was like, 5, is stop off at his room on our way to bed (like 10pm) and just pick him up or walk him to the bathroom and have him pee. He usually slept thru this and never remembered it! This little last bathroom stop always seemed to be good insurance that he'd wake up dry.

I just wanted to pop in to say that my daughter is 4.5 and still is not dry at night. Every child is different. Use them until you feel like they're no longer necessary. There's no harm in using them for a bit longer to test to see if he can hold it at night.

There's no need to rush, last time I checked potty training questions were not on the Harvard application :)

I continued to use pull ups on outings until my kids were about three. They were almost always dry but I did not want to deal with wet pants in the middle of the grocery store and it worked fine. We also kept a potty in the back of our car for times when there was not a handy public restroom and the kids needed to really go!
As for night time, I did not try to "train" them at night. It seems like too much pressure for something they really can't control. I simply put them in night time diapers until the diapers were dry for about two weeks straight when they woke in the morning. We never even discussed it with them...we just announced to them, "wow, your diapers are dry! I think you are ready for PJs with no diapers!!" We definitely don't do underwear at night--just jammies--healthier for girls especially and more comfortable. All three of our kids were dry at night by age 3.5 and we've had less than a handful of wet sheets between the three of them.

I don't think there is a set time, as every child's body and mind is different. If you start to notice that his diapers are consistently dry in the mornings, put him in underwear with a waterproof pad under the sheet. He may have an accident here or there but that's just part of the process. It may well be that waking up wet will help the process along as children past a certain age don't like that. Also, my advice is to skip the glass of water/milk before bed routine. It really helps.

If the only accidents are occasionally through the night, ditch the diapers, get a good mattress protector and leave him be. He doesn't need that safety net of the overnight diapers anymore and accidents will inevitably happen, but just go with the flow.

Is he vocalizing while at home that he needs to go potty, or are you just putting him on the potty routinely? My answer would depend on your answer to that question. If he's able to vocalize his need to go potty, you should be fine going out in public without diapers. In my opinion, putting a diaper on a potty-trained child is sending mixed messages. You're basically telling him it's ok to pee in diapers in public or in bed. To get him past wetting the bed, I suggest limiting his fluid intake an hour before bed, putting him on the potty right before getting into bed and then waking him up at about 11, or just before you go to sleep, to get up and pee one more time. He might have an accident or two, but that's part of the process in toilet training and his overall learning process. It's no fun to be soaked in your own urine and he will soon catch on. I have potty trained literally dozens of kids, being a childcare provider. Good luck!

Like one of the other commentors said, the child really needs to be ready and everyone does it at their own pace. My son surprised us by being potty trained in one day and nighttime dry in 3 weeks, but we lucked out. We did talk to him about potty training quite a bit and waited until *he* was ready at 2 yrs and 4 mo., maybe that's what did it.

As far as nighttime potty training goes, my son will be 5 in December and he just stopped wearing pull-ups at night this fall. We wake him up to go to the bathroom before we go to bed. We are getting ready to stop that because, lately, on nights that we forget, he doesn't have any accidents.
Kids sleep pretty deeply and have small bladders so the nighttime stuff can take awhile.
Good luck! It's kind of a pain to potty train, but you don't miss the diapers once it's done!

My son is 3.5 and we just stopped using the pull-ups at night. He does well, but still has an "accident" about once a week. I have to echo what the others have said: just watch his diapers, wait until he's consistently dry in the mornings, go potty immediately before bedtime, and buy a second set of sheets + a good waterproof mattress cover (I still put a towel over the mattress pad for extra insurance). If he's dry during long outings & naps, ditch the diapers, buy some better quality underpants (I personally love Gap and Gymboree - lots of sales & very soft), and ask him if he needs to potty every time you enter a store/ every hour. 5 minutes in the bathroom is a small price to pay to get rid of the diapers!

Both my kids told me they wanted to stop wearing pull-ups at night. My daughter asked right before a big trip where we would be staying in a hotel and my son right before a camping trip. For my daughter, we went for it and she never had a night-time accident. My son, we went ahead; but since we were camping I told him we would have no way to wash out accidents and so I wanted him to wear a pull-up during our trip. He didn't have any accidents on the trip and even though he doesn't wear pull-ups at night at home (for 2+ years) we still have the occasional night-time pee accident. Probably 7-10 in the two years he hasn't worn a pull-up at night.

Nighttime potty training is a misnomer. Your child will either wake to pee or not. You don't have conscious control over your bladder when you're sleeping. Some of it depends on the bladder-brain signaling; some of it, the anti-diuretic hormone. These come with growth and not from "training."

Im the only mom who does this. I've got two boys. We night trained the older one by 1.9mos. We used cloth diapers & co sleep and that helps immensely cos once your baby wiggles you know they want to pee. Either that or every 4-5h I would wake up the boy & held a big, wide-mouthed plastic bottle to his penis and would tell him to pee. I had to do that just once a night & would clean up the bottle in the morning -just like cleaning up a potty. It saved us sooo many sheets and diapers plus he was night trained -went completely dry some mos after that.

I'm another fan of the three day method. It worked really well for us. Yes, you have hiccups and accidents. It happens, but we ditched the diapers right away. The first few months, we did sheet lasagna, putting big chux pads between each layer, so that if he DID have an accident, we could just tear off a layer and get him back in bed quickly. My son was also waking up dry for a full year before we potty trained him (we waited until 3, because he had developmental delays). He still has the occasional accident. Mostly, I noticed when he's having a life transition (i.e. I had surgery a couple of months ago, and life at home was out of sorts), or when he's sick.

We haven't started yet with my daughter (who is 2.5), who is way more stubborn and still isn't waking up dry in the mornings, but is for naps (when she naps). I haven't had the stamina to even want to train her, but it's time. She gets the whole bathroom thing, is just stubborn. There's no way I could just let her go naked. She'd pee all over everything without any sort of remorse for it.

But I say ditch the diapers. The longer you wait, the harder it is, and the longer it takes them to master night dryness.

When I potty trained my 2 year old my 1 year old joined in. They were both trained, during the day, in about 3 months. I just kept them naked during that time. Now, at night, my now 3 year old is woken up around midnight to go to the bathroom and my now 2 year old is still in a diaper. My 2 year old has loose bowels and often has stool in her diaper when she wakes up. TMI? Sorry

My son was 3y3mo when we started potty training; or rather, he went straight from diapers to no diapers during the day, and 2 nights later we ditched the night diaper. He was more than ready (and capable), and that's why it went so smoothly.

Why not sooner? Because kindergarten 1.0 didn't do potty training - the majority of the kids were too young, and when we moved him to kindergarten 2.0 at 2y9mo he joined a group with around 10 boys his age who were also still wearing diapers; no group pressure.

Most kids do take longer to master staying dry at night. It is a physical development that takes longer for some kids. We went to underpants after a week of staying dry at night, with only a few accidents and that was it! I would advise no footed (zip up) pjs. The ability to whip those bottoms down is important in the middle of the night!

We just went through this! Our 2 yo daughter is now sleeping through the night without diapers. She'd been in underwear during the day for the last 2 mos. We moved to underwear during naps ~1 mo ago. Our pediatrician said to put her in undies overnight after a few nights of dry diapers. She's had 2 accidents at night but overall great! Good luck!

You can try a late-night trip to the potty when you are going to bed (e.g. around 10 or 11) and that may help him get through the night.

I'm also wondering the same thing. Our 34 month old is great at home and school with occasional accidents, but we still do diapers for most outings and night. What I've noticed is that she's started asking to use the potty while we are out and more and more comes home dry, and even the occasional dry overnight diaper now. What I'm hoping to do is just take a relaxed approach and let her take the lead and let us know when she feels ready to do more outings without a diaper and eventually overnight. I don't feel in any rush on this one. I guess I should start stocking up on extra pj's!

What about kids that do well with number 1 but won't do number 2 in the potty? So frustrating and I'm concerned about putting him in daycare as he's almost 3.

Sounds like you're just about there, especially if most of the overnight diapers are dry! Have the child earn a sticker on a chart for every night he wakes up dry. Use a waterproof mattress and accept that an occasional accident will happen. When it does, no sticker, but say to your child "Oh well- you're doing great- I bet you'll get a sticker next time!" After 10 stickers or so, have a prize in mind that he gets. Could be fancy new undies, a new toy, whatever is meaningful to him. Good luck!

Sweet Pea- my son was so scared of doing no. 2 he once went 6 days w/o a BM! Talk to your pediatrician. They may recommend Miralax- a laxative you mix into any of their drinks so that they have to make a poo, get them used to it, make it less painful. Be wary of daycares that require a child to be potty-trained by age 3. The Amer. Academy of Pediatrics doesn't even recommend you START potty-training until age 3 (esp. boys), so who does the daycare really have in mind, the child's needs, or their convenience?