Non Potty trained 3 yr old on Disney Fantasy

I posted this in the Disney forum last week but thought i'd have more luck here (new to cruise critic). We'll be going on the Fantasy in December with our 2 kids who will be 3 and almost 1 at the time. My 3 year old is not potty trained and although we are working on it i'm pretty sure he will not be fully bathroom independent by the time we sail. We were hoping to be able to use the Oceaneers club for him throughout the cruise but i've heard mixed reviews about whether or not he'll be able to go there. I know their official policy is no kids at all in diapers or pull ups but a lot of people have said that they will let him in with pull ups as long as we check on him every hour to see if he needs changing (which i'm fine with). We only "need" child care one night that we have Remy reservations but i know he's going to want to be able to play in there and have fun during the day and the open house hours are pretty limited. Has anybody had any experiences with a non potty trained 3 year old being admitted or turned away? I will make reservations with the nursery just in case but i know he'll hate being with the "babies".

You have 3 months to get the potty training thing done...keep working on it! I'm pretty sure that if he's good to go for a couple hours at a time, they won't have a problem with him in his age group! Even "fully trained" kids have accidents....it's not the end of the world!

You have 3 months to get the potty training thing done...keep working on it! I'm pretty sure that if he's good to go for a couple hours at a time, they won't have a problem with him in his age group! Even "fully trained" kids have accidents....it's not the end of the world!

I've been told that if a child has an accident in the Oceaneers club they will not be allowed back. That's why i don't think he'll be ready in time. He was making some progress in potty training until he started school this month and he won't go to the bathroom there and has completely regressed to the point of crying and screaming if we try to take him to the bathroom. He's also not able to get on and off the toilet or dressed and undressed on his own, so all in all i am doubting that in 2 months he'll not only be completely trained without accidents and be able to take himself to the bathroom without being distracted. I can always hope of course! In the meantime though i'm trying to get info incase he's not so we're prepared. I know he's going to through a major tantrum over not being able to play there outside of open house hours and since i have heard mixed reviews on whether he can or cannot go in with pull ups if we change him i'm just trying to see if it's something we need to worry about or not.

I have been potty training for the past 3 months for our December cruise on Oasis. I have learned that I need to put her in undies and she will let us know when she has to use the bathroom. She will not tell us if she has a diaper or pull up on so we do not put her in a diaper until bed and she is not night trained yet. It has worked for us. I was so worried that she would not be trained by December and now I am pretty sure she will be just fine in the kids club.

I've been told that if a child has an accident in the Oceaneers club they will not be allowed back. That's why i don't think he'll be ready in time. He was making some progress in potty training until he started school this month and he won't go to the bathroom there and has completely regressed to the point of crying and screaming if we try to take him to the bathroom. He's also not able to get on and off the toilet or dressed and undressed on his own, so all in all i am doubting that in 2 months he'll not only be completely trained without accidents and be able to take himself to the bathroom without being distracted. I can always hope of course! In the meantime though i'm trying to get info incase he's not so we're prepared. I know he's going to through a major tantrum over not being able to play there outside of open house hours and since i have heard mixed reviews on whether he can or cannot go in with pull ups if we change him i'm just trying to see if it's something we need to worry about or not.

I am not sure if the land-based Disney clubs are different or not, but we took our son to WDW when he was three, and he went to the Neverland Club one night. Sure enough, we get a call during the luau that he has had an accident. We were just finishing our dessert so left and walked over. Appearantly, he was on his way into the bathroom and but not make it in time. They told us that because he was making an effort to go to the bathroom, he could come back again. We brought him back one other night and he was fine. Two tricks we learned - one, make sure they go just before you take them to club (if possible), and we were told by his school - no pull ups at all. When we started potty training, he went directly into cotton underwear. We only used pull-ups once when we were driving from Virginia to Cape Cod. Did he have accidents, yep. Did he make a mess, yep. But he learned very quickly that he needed to get to bathroom fast when he felt urge to go :).

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I agree that no pull ups works best. Children tend to get the idea a lot more successfully when wearing underwear.

I agree that pull-ups tend to lengthen the process. Once we did underwear he was fully trained (daytime) in under 2 weeks. That first week we set a timer for every 20 min to the potty and yes, went thru a lot of underwear that week. Enough that I was so tempted to go back to Pull-ups, but we stuck with it and by the end of week 1 things were on the right track. We started the underwear right after 3rd birthday end of July and he went to pre-school in September in underwear and never once had an accident in school. No guarantees, but I think you can get it done in the three months before you cruise.

I'm hoping the original poster or someone else who has been on the Fantasy lately can provide an update. We're cruising on 1/17 with our 3 year old, and while we've made some progress on potty training, he's unlikely to be fully potty trained in the next 10 days.

I'm hoping the original poster or someone else who has been on the Fantasy lately can provide an update. We're cruising on 1/17 with our 3 year old, and while we've made some progress on potty training, he's unlikely to be fully potty trained in the next 10 days.

Disney's rules state for Oceaneer Club:

My child is over the age of 3 and is not fully potty-trained, can they still go into the space?

We are required to accept any child between 3- 12, regardless of whether they are potty trained. Once they fall within our age group, you may have them in diapers and pullups (we have had many cases of children with bowel issues, or late potty-training, or developmental delays needing this!). We will ask you to check on them frequently as we aren't allowed to change them ourselves.

Will they follow this? Who knows?

Disney's rules state for Oceaneer Club:

 

My child is over the age of 3 and is not fully potty-trained, can they still go into the space?

We are required to accept any child between 3- 12, regardless of whether they are potty trained. Once they fall within our age group, you may have them in diapers and pullups (we have had many cases of children with bowel issues, or late potty-training, or developmental delays needing this!). We will ask you to check on them frequently as we aren't allowed to change them ourselves.

 

Will they follow this? Who knows?

Where did you find that?

Where did you find that?

We sailed last month and my son was still not fully potty trained. When we checked him in they never asked about him being trained or not so we didn't bring it up. I dropped him off for a few hours the first day without issue. A few days into the cruise we dropped him off again. They called and told me he had a "poop" accident and that we needed to bring him a change of clothes. I told them it was okay because he had pull ups on and that we would come and change him. She told me he needed to be picked up and would not be allowed back with pull ups on regardless of whether or not we are willing to come change him. Another family we met on the cruise said their child wasn't allowed back after having two accidents in a row, that they only have a 2 strike policy. We had reservations for Remy on the 5th night of the cruise so i asked if it was okay to drop him off at night in PJs to go to bed there with a pull up and they still said no. They said it's a strict no pull up policy and that all children must be bathroom independent and able to take themselves to the bathroom, get dressed and undressed themselves, etc. So we booked him into the nursery for that night with my 1 year old and there were several other 3 yr olds there as well and he had a blast. He just thought it was another kids club. We took him to Oceaneers a few more times for open house hours but honestly he wasn't happy being there alone anyway and there were so many older kids he got knocked around a lot and it made us nervous. There's so much other fun stuff for them to do on the cruise that it really wasn't a big deal. So if you have times that you need to drop your child off i'd say book the nursery because they are definitely strict about the potty training policies.

We sailed last month and my son was still not fully potty trained. When we checked him in they never asked about him being trained or not so we didn't bring it up. I dropped him off for a few hours the first day without issue. A few days into the cruise we dropped him off again. They called and told me he had a "poop" accident and that we needed to bring him a change of clothes. I told them it was okay because he had pull ups on and that we would come and change him. She told me he needed to be picked up and would not be allowed back with pull ups on regardless of whether or not we are willing to come change him. Another family we met on the cruise said their child wasn't allowed back after having two accidents in a row, that they only have a 2 strike policy. We had reservations for Remy on the 5th night of the cruise so i asked if it was okay to drop him off at night in PJs to go to bed there with a pull up and they still said no. They said it's a strict no pull up policy and that all children must be bathroom independent and able to take themselves to the bathroom, get dressed and undressed themselves, etc. So we booked him into the nursery for that night with my 1 year old and there were several other 3 yr olds there as well and he had a blast. He just thought it was another kids club. We took him to Oceaneers a few more times for open house hours but honestly he wasn't happy being there alone anyway and there were so many older kids he got knocked around a lot and it made us nervous. There's so much other fun stuff for them to do on the cruise that it really wasn't a big deal. So if you have times that you need to drop your child off i'd say book the nursery because they are definitely strict about the potty training policies.

Thanks for that report. That's very disappointing. If they have a strict policy, they really should put the policy on their website and let people know before they spend several thousand dollars booking a cruise. We're traveling with some friends who have a five-year old daughter. They were looking forward to hanging out together in there.

Thanks for that report. That's very disappointing. If they have a strict policy, they really should put the policy on their website and let people know before they spend several thousand dollars booking a cruise. We're traveling with some friends who have a five-year old daughter. They were looking forward to hanging out together in there.

I agree. I wrote a long letter and attached it to my comment card at the end of the cruise saying that their policies should be clearly stated on the website and upon registration since a large majority of 3 year olds are not fully potty trained and the information is unclear and inconsistent. Like i said, they never asked when i registered him or dropped him off. If he hadn't popped it probably would have not been an issue at all, so you can always try to leave your daughter without mentioning that she isn't potty trained and just check on her frequently and hope that she doesn't poop while she's there!

If my son really wanted to play there again i would have made a much bigger deal about it and asked to speak to management, but since he really wasn't too happy about being there anyway we just let it go and took him to the pool or the movie theater each day.