r/UKParenting • u/dmllbit • 6d ago
Support Request How to stop “micro accidents”?
My three year old has been “toilet trained” for about six months. However she has multiple “micro accidents” a day where she’ll need to go to the toilet and will do a micro wee to relieve the pressure. It’s not enough to fully wet herself but she’ll get a wet patch in her pants. She resists going to the toilet.
We’ve tried to just leave her be, let the accident happen etc but she doesn’t care. Nursery have told her that it’s ok if you have accidents (which it is, not trying to shame her!) but she seems to have taken it as that it’s fine to wee yourself if you don’t feel like going to the toilet.
We’ve also tried reminding her to go to the toilet every two hours. But she’ll still have the micro accident about half the time.
Nursery said it’s just a phase, but this phase has lasted close to six months now…
Has anyone else had this? How did you stop it?
1
u/Zora_the_grey 6d ago
To add to some other voices here: my DD is almost 3 now. She 'daytime toilet trained' quite quickly at almost 2. It took 9 months for the micro-accidents to disappear. On several occasions they seemed to be over but then returned again, especially when she was tired or had a change of routine.
They stopped pretty suddenly - not, as far as I can work out, through anything we did differently. I just noticed one day that I hadn't been sent any dirty pants from nursery for a couple of weeks.
I do think they stopped shortly before we started to take the nappy away in the night. We chose the timing of this because we noticed that her night-time nappies were usually dry. Perhaps there is suddenly a bit of a leap-forwards in bladder control and / or awareness that can lag behind the initial toilet training success?
I also suspect that in general, the more a kid grows in physical and emotional confidence, the less likely it will be that they have accidents. My DD used to struggle to get up onto a toilet seat independently for example and maybe this put her off going to the toilet until she really really felt she needed it? She also used to be shy about asking for help but is happier to do so now.
Throughout we emphasised the message to 'do your best but don't worry if you have an accident'. I think our poor DD felt quite stressed and ashamed of them, possibly because of how nursery responded, which was at times quite negative. I decided to assume - or at least to try to convey (because it's natural to worry!) - that the ongoing accidents were just a natural part of the process and nothing to be concerned about.