Toilet issues with 3 year old

chooey

Hi, I'm just looking for some advice on what to do with my three year old. She toilet trained about two months before her third birthday back in July. She decided that she didn't want nappies and went straight from wearing them constantly to going on the toilet or in the potty and everything went great. The odd accident over the first three days but nothing otherwise. About two weeks ago, she started having accidents in creche (same creche she's been in for the past 2 years and she enjoys going) and this has escalated to where she had 5 accidents with my dad minding her yesterday and another couple today.
When we ask her does she need to go she says no, and gets extremely upset if we try and bring her. Then about ten minutes later she wet herself.
She does seem to appear that she knows she needs to go as yesterday morning she flew in and hopped up on the toilet.
She's wearing night pull-ups in bed and creche are suggesting maybe stopping her wearing these as they wonder is she confused but I'm not sure as she was going for about two months with no issues.
I haven't taken her to the dr yet but my sister is a nurse and checked her urine and there were no abnormalities with it.
I've tried bribery etc and she tells me that she's not going to go in her knickers but it's a daily thing over the past two weeks and seems to be getting worse as opposed to improving. Nothing has changed at home/in her life over these two weeks.
Any suggestions? It's quite frustrating as I know she can go and I'm trying to be encouraging and not showing any frustration but it's difficult. Do I put her back in nappies and try again in a little while although she was very upset at this idea.
Thanks so much in advance!

John_Rambo

Could she simply be having too much fun in the creche with friends and serious fun with Granddad? (not saying you're boring!)

She's only three with a tiny bladder. Leaving it for literally one minute because she's having the craic can lead to wetting.

Not sure about the creche, but could a few treats in granddads toilet like books, toys and games and assurances that the fun won't stop if she goes to the toilet area be helpful.

I wouldn't worry too much. Sounds like she's a clever girl, nailed it early and like one of ours was wetting herself from FOMO after drinking lots of water!!!!

BarryD2

Time is the cure: two steps forward, one back. These things pass.

kylith

Disclaimer: my LO is only 1, but I've been doing a lot of reading.

I have seen people with this issue saying that when they have had this issue they set a timer on their phone so that it's not them saying it's time to go to the bathroom, it's the phone; and that seems to take the fight/power struggle out of it.

shesty

Stop talking to her about it.
If you ask my first does she need to go, she will say no.N.O. She could be cross-legged and knee knocking at the time but she absolutely denies any knowledge or need.
Changing your language first works better....I've used 'let me know if you need to go', 'don't forget to go if you have to', 'sit up and check are you SURE you don't need to go before we get in the car'....that kind of thing.If she's had accidents and people are making a big deal out of it, they know and they get embarassed by it.And to be honest she is so small, I would expect accidents at this stage.Especially if she is distracted by other things.

chooey

Thanks so much for your replies. She did a bit better yesterday and it seems to have clicked back in with her a bit again. She got some new Elsa from Frozen knickers and that seems to have done the job as she doesn't want to pee in them

Fracture

chooey wrote: »

Hi, I'm just looking for some advice on what to do with my three year old. She toilet trained about two months before her third birthday back in July. She decided that she didn't want nappies and went straight from wearing them constantly to going on the toilet or in the potty and everything went great. The odd accident over the first three days but nothing otherwise. About two weeks ago, she started having accidents in creche (same creche she's been in for the past 2 years and she enjoys going) and this has escalated to where she had 5 accidents with my dad minding her yesterday and another couple today.
When we ask her does she need to go she says no, and gets extremely upset if we try and bring her. Then about ten minutes later she wet herself.
She does seem to appear that she knows she needs to go as yesterday morning she flew in and hopped up on the toilet.
She's wearing night pull-ups in bed and creche are suggesting maybe stopping her wearing these as they wonder is she confused but I'm not sure as she was going for about two months with no issues.
I haven't taken her to the dr yet but my sister is a nurse and checked her urine and there were no abnormalities with it.
I've tried bribery etc and she tells me that she's not going to go in her knickers but it's a daily thing over the past two weeks and seems to be getting worse as opposed to improving. Nothing has changed at home/in her life over these two weeks.
Any suggestions? It's quite frustrating as I know she can go and I'm trying to be encouraging and not showing any frustration but it's difficult. Do I put her back in nappies and try again in a little while although she was very upset at this idea.
Thanks so much in advance!

I literally had the exact same experience with my little girl when she was that age, she will be 5 at the end of this month. I found that reminding her helped, every hour almost i was asking her did she need to go to the toilet, there was plenty of "No daddy" replys but she would still wet herself anyway. She was doing it in creche too, they said in creche it's fairly common for young girls to go through periods of doing this, I took their word for it and in fairness it did seem to be correct (in regards to my little lady anyway).
I also tried the treat for going to the toilet method, it didn't really work, I think she figured out that if she pretended to go to the toilet she could get a treat so that put an end to that idea.
I remember being really frustrated at one point just after she had wet herself again and I held a nappy in my hand and said to her that she was going to have to go back into nappies, i said "big girls don't wear nappies", and asked her if she was a big girl now or a baby, she said big girl so i said "well you need to stop having accidents", i didn't say it in an angry tone, i think if you say it as if your on their side they tend to find it easier and to be able to have no pressure about going to the toilet.
Maybe try asking her if she would like to try the big toilet (do you have a kids seat for the house toilet?) and have a step sitting at the side of the toilet for them to get on easily, make it sound like its going to be fun. It might be worth a shot, some kids find it scary as the bowl is too big for them. This worked for me but it didn't completely stop it.

chooey

Thank you so much for your reply. It really helped. It suddenly seemed to have clicked back in with her and we've only had one accident all week. Toddlers!!