I’m sure you’ve tried this, but my son was fully trained, day and night, by 17 months. We just brought him in the bathroom with us when we went, and of course, waved good-bye to the poo. He never used the potty chair. He straddled the toilet facing the tank. This was his idea, and evidently he felt secure in that position.
Knocks out what worked for us.
My son was much the same at the same age. Tried every kind of encouragement/ bribe/game/etc. we could think, with no luck. Resigned ourselves to wait it out, figuring he would most likely give up the pull-ups by the time he went to college.
Then the time came that we wanted to get him out of diapers to be able to send him to pre-school. Again tried all of the cajoling etc. Finally, we told him if he pooped in his pants he would get a spanking. We spanked him - hard - once. Absolutely no problems after that.
Right or wrong, we pretty much considered our kids capable of quite a bit at a quite young age, and when we thought the situation called for it we would not hesitate to draw a firm line and prohibit behavior we did not desire.
I don’t know if it’s so much “considering them capable”–most kids are, sure. But while you lucked out with the spanking and didn’t have any more problems, I’ve also known people who forced the issue and wound up in a power struggle over poop for years. It’s really not a good issue to get into a power struggle over–it’s pretty well impossible to force someone to poop when and where you want them too, and the battle can get nasty and messy. IME the persuasive method and being a little more patient works faster in the end a lot of the time.
I’m not sure it’s a good idea to try to force issues about the body. A small child doesn’t have much control over his life, but he can usually exert control over what comes out of him–and he’ll use it to fight you if he decides to.
And what goes IN, as well.
Tricky stuff, all the way around.
Well, you may consider it luck on our part, but I would imagine that if parents find themselves in a years’ long “power struggle” with their kids over using the toilet, there’s likely something else fucked up about their relationship with their kids.
Absent psychological issues with the kid, there’s simply no power struggle. The parents have the power. End of story.
Ouch. That’s worthy of a whole 'nuther thread.
What worked for my nephew, who used to hide under a table to take care of business, was having his grandfather tell him “Big boys go on the toilet”. He started the next day. Another respected/beloved authority figure, who doesn’t come with all the baggage of a parent, can work wonders.
I agree that something like this could generate a level of frustration that gets a kid a spanking, but what if one or two sound swattings don’t remedy the issue? Do you keep spanking the kid every day? Some kids are that headstrong. What then?
Have you tried removing diapers/pullups from the inventory?
What would he do if he just couldn’t wear pullups or diapers? Crap in his shorts?
If so, then try letting him run around naked for a couple days and see what happens.
Yeah, perhaps we shouldn’t hijack this one. 'Cause I could think of a whole lot to say on the topic, but meanwhile poor old Ceejaytee is still in a bind.
Wow. Thanks for all the great suggestions. We’ve tried a number of these already–treats (he’s not really into candy), stickers, making him wear and mess in his undies, making him help clean up, etc.
He wears big boy underwear all the time, except for the poopy. He has a special small seat that fits into the regular seat so his butt will fit, so there’s no fear of falling in. He can sit on the thing for hours if someone will read to him–until he has to go, when he freaks out and must get off the potty. He won’t directly answer the question why he won’t go in the big potty, but he has expressed fear at other times that the poopy will get stuck and not go down the drain (toilet clogs–they happen to everyone), but now I’m wondering if that fear, plus the inability to get good footing, even with his foot stool, might be the problem. Maybe even the fear of the splash.
We have a small potty with the bucket underneath. I think we might try that first. Maybe that will work. Plus it’ll give his father something to do in the meantime. 
He’s also moving up to a new class in his daycare in September–pre-K. Maybe if we plant the suggestion that he needs to go poopy in the potty before he gets there will work.
These are all great ideas. Thanks so much!
Got a bit of trouble with the description of kids as “that headstrong.” I’m not sure kids get to be that headstrong unless they have learned at some point that such behavior gets them what they want.
Of course, you’ll never know what it takes if you are unwilling to administer the first swat.
And I did not mean to suggest that the spanking resulted from frustration or anger or anything other than a simple, calculated reaction. Kid wants to avoid a spanking, he certainly has it in his control to do so. And if a spanking doesn’t work, well, I’d imagine with most kids there are a heck of a lot of progressive rewards and punishments that could be brought into play.
If you’ve got a 4-year old who is unamenable to they vast array of rewards and punishments a parent has at their disposal short of abuse … Well, like I said, I’m no expert. But I’d very much suspect either that kid has some emotional problems or that parent has some fucked up parenting skills or has allowed an extremely unhealthy family dynamic to develop.
Fessie, that link goes to this very thread. Are you trying to put me into a logic loop and watch my head pop, or did you mean to do something else?
Dinsdale, maybe you just never had an actual stubborn kid. Stubbornness runs in my family or something, but you know what–if someone tried to punish me into going to the bathroom when they wanted me to, I’d fight it too.
Parents aren’t there to exert control over every aspect of their children’s lives, even the very private and personal ones. They are there to teach their kids to become independent adults. IMO getting into pointless power struggles is counterproductive to that.
I’m not advocating letting a child get what he wants through tantrums, or spoiling–I’m a very strict mom actually–but headstrong kids aren’t exactly mythical or produced by bad parenting.
I can speak from expereince as both a kid who had potty issues and having had a kid with potty issues.
My parents were pretty rough on me regarding toliet training and I still have memories and painful personal issues surrounding it-- without getting into too much detail!
I feel very strongly that if you wouldn’t punish your child for not meeting other developmental milestones (walking, speaking), you shouldn’t for the potty either.
My son was a late potty trainer- a combo of personality issues on his part and inexperience on ours. Hvaing a BM was his trial also- finally one day I just sat with him and held his hands as he pooped- for whatever reason it was scary and he didn’t have to justify it to me. After he did it the one time, everything quickly progressed.
Stciker charts, candy rewards, cajoling, shaming, nothing worked because he was, and is (13 years old), a completely internally motivated kid.
Patience, optomism, and validation that it can be hard and scary to be little and change went a long way with us. He potty trained and was fine.
ETA: Raining your Spirited Child and Nurture by Nature were phenomenally helpful books!
Dinsdale, I have three children and the youngest is pretty much impervious to most things in the ol’ parental bag of tricks. I didn’t lose my mind between kid #2 and kid#3; he truly is that stubborn.
Reading the book Raising Your Spirited Child helped me understand his psychological makeup and know that this “stubbornness” can be viewed as a good thing in an adult; i.e., steadfast and secure in his opinions and less subject to peer pressure as a teen.
It is frustrating, though, as I am in the exact situation as the OP; a beautiful potty pee-er and and potty-pooping refuser. I have tried every single thing suggested here, even yours, and I have decided to wait him out.
hehe. When my daughter was just beginning to walk, she was fresh out of the bathtub, walking in the livingroom. She paused, seemed to be concentrating on something, then began to take a dump.
We stood there, not knowing what to do. At the last possible minute I dove (ala Willie Mays) and made a perfect catch. My daughter, now 17, would suffer apoplexy if she knew I told her tale. 
Cool. I was just offering my opinions - and experience, which others are certainly free to disagree with.
And I’m sure many folk would say we did our kids a disservice by cramping their “spirit.” But we generally tried to be very careful to pick our battles (admittedly with some notable mistakes). Likewise, on the somewhat rare occasions when we did lay down a hard and fast rule, our kids seemed to be reasonable enough to understand that being stubborn on that one point was not worth giving up everything else they found enjoyable.
I think that is what I was getting at in my initial post. My wife and I strive to be very rational in most things, and we expected the same of our kids from an early age. We found economic analysis effective at a very early age, when much else we heard and read claimed kids of a young age were incapable of such rational thought. And don’t get me started on folks who claim young kids are unable to attempt manipulation…
With my son we were willing to stick with the diapers/pullups until we needed to lose them for pre-school. Even after that, I believe he was wearing pullups at night into kindergarten.
And my eldest was the one who would cry until she puked, and throw herself backwards so that she would hit her head. No, they were not angels, and I don’t think my wife and I were demons. Instead, like most families, we were stumbling along doing the best we could largely via trial and error without the benefit of a reliable instruction manual.
True, but that might be closing the barn door after the horse is out. People make mistakes. Sometimes those mistakes result in a headstrong, stubborn, obstinate child. They still have to deal with the consequences.
Agreed.