Toilet training frustration

I think DD is physically ready to TT - she can hold a wee and stay dry for nearly 2 hours, to the point that when she does a wee, its a big one that the Bumgenius can't handle all at once (I think doing a big one all at once doesn't give it chance to absorb properly so it just ends up leaking). And she also doesn't want to wear a nappy. She shows a lot of interest in both DH and me using the toilet.

However, for the past couple of mornings, w've had a chat about weeing on the potty, got her to choose a pair of knickers and then we sit her on the potty for about 5 mins. After this, I just asked her everynow and again if she wanted to do a wee or reminded her that her potty was there. But she'll just wee in her knickers - i don't make a big deal of it at all, jsut say something like "thats ok, mummy will clean it up and next time we'll try in the potty", she doesn't like being wet so she lets us take her knickers off, but then when I get her to choose a new pair, I'm met with a big "no" so I explain that if she doesn't want to wear knickers and wee in the potty then she needs to wear a nappy, which is also meet with a big "no".

We also tried a sticker chart today and to begin with she was interested in earning a star but then once she'd wet herself, she lost interest.

I don't know if I'm handling it right? I've just backed off for today and managed to get a nappy on her. Any tips?

I didn't put undies on DD1 until she was close to fully toilet trained. I just let her run around with a bare bum so that she could run to the potty and sit straight down without worrying about pulling her undies down. I had a newborn that was taking a long time to feed, so didn't have the time to take her to the toilet straight away all the time and she couldn't speak much so when she needed to go, she would take herself. I would sit her on the potty every hour or so if she hadn't done a wee for a while too. We had plenty of accidents and I dealt with them similar to how you are dealing with them. She was fully TT day and night at 22 months so I think that technique worked but I'm sure DD2 will be different! If you are letting her run around with just undies on now, maybe try no undies when you are at home so it's a bit easier for her to take herself to the potty. Also, rather than asking her if she needs to go, physically sit her on the potty every now and then and see if that makes a difference. It takes them a little while to associate the two. I have no idea whether that will work for your DD, but just suggesting what we did :) It sounds like you are handling it perfectly!

maybe let he pick her undies out?

backing off can also help i found with my DS who is 3 and half and just fully TT ( with some accidents) and he just one day picked it up

sounds like you are doing a great job so far

Thanks girls. We ended up backing off for a while - so much less stress! I'll try again soon.

I found reminders didn't help until after DD had got the idea through experience. I think you need to make a toilet time where you put her on the potty for 5 minutes EVERY 15-20 minutes, rather than an initial 5 minutes followed by just verbal reminders - a reminder is too abstract if she's never actually achieved what you are reminding her to do. You need to catch those first few so she has a baseline to go off, gets the whole praise routine from mum and starts to get a sense of achievement by actually seeing some stickers go up on the chart - with times so you can start to see patterns and pre-empt. Putting aside two whole days where you do this all day, where you don't give up and put on nappies, and where you will have to deal with a couple of puddles on the carpet will make it easier and quicker to train - if she really is ready. After these two days, then you can start extending the times between toilet dates and start introducing reminders instead. It took my daughter about a week to be fully clean and dry without reminders by doing it this way - it follows the wade in or dive in rule that most kids seem to abide by. If you wade in, you have to deal with issues for a while incrementally, or you can dive in and deal with a whole lot of stuff all at once but get it over and done with.

I had that with DS - the exact same experience, and he just wasn't ready. I tried again about 5 months later and he toilet trained immediately, with few accidents. He was 3 years, 2 months when he finally decided he was ready.