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If he is that resistant I would definitely stop. There is no way to really force them to sit on the potty and go. I would just make it as low pressure as possible, and reward a ton when he DOES use the potty, and kind of be blase about accidents. He might just not be ready! We potty trained over months, FWIW, mainly by just being bottomless when we were in the house.

Our first attempt went kind of like that. She'd absolutely refuse to sit on the potty and then refuse a diaper when she was clearly in pain from holding so much.
We quit.
Two months later we tried again and she got it quickly and only had one accident. She's been trained for seven weeks now and only had that one accident.
I'd give it a few weeks and then try again.

There are some passages about being scared of the potty, were any of those helpful?

How old is your LO?

Are you being panicky in the rush to the potty mid-pee, or just quick? I was a little too panicky the first few times and LO picked up my panic.

@Ra: does he like any characters? We got an Elmo potty book and that's been helpful. Have you talked to him about the potty and let him watch you guys?

I have read the method and decided against it, for a number of reasons based on my LO's personality and my parenting style. My LO would freak the hell out if I tried to make her sit on the potty. Also, she freaks the hell out if she pees on the floor - hysterical sobs. So I just can't imagine this being successful for us.

I try in general to never put us in a situation where we could get into a power struggle, and doubly so where the power struggle is over my LO's body. We have been doing this method instead, which is light and fun and cooperative: http://www.ahaparenting.com/Ages-stages/toddlers/easy-toilet-potty-training.

We were having a similar problem and I actually talked to one of the experts with the Oh Crap! method about it just earlier this week. A couple things I think they would say about this:

1. He's likely feeling too much pressure. This can be caused by over-prompting, too much praise when they do go (sounds weird but it was totally true for my son), or just in general you guys being pretty stressed about the whole thing.

2. The sticker chart is something they would actually discourage. But some kids do need some tweaking of the plan. Like with my son, if I see he's doing a potty dance but he screams when I prompt, even if it's just a throwaway prompt, I say, "Hey! Let's be silly and go eat some fruit snacks in the bathroom!" and he'll happily sit on the potty giggling the whole time.

Once we got to the point where he was screaming over the potty (happened on day 2 or 3) we had to majorly back off. How that would look really depends though - has it been like this since the beginning, or gotten worse over time? Does he seem to want some privacy or independence about it?

DS1 does the same thing. He is very resistant to the potty. Physically, I think he can do it. Mentally, he's just not there. He also freaks out if I force him. So we don't. It feels traumatizing. At this point, he's finally trying the potty at school but not at home consistently. So we're just waiting and going on his timeline.

@Ra: we used a different method, like I said, but rewards were huge for us. We didn't use food, we used small toys from a grab bag. He needed that for motivation. I don't think any method is one siZe fits all so don't worry about doing it in a different way if that works better! My LO never ever was (nor is he now) good about me forcing him to go. It led to some major tantrums and just was not worth it, and it didn't feel right.

@Ra: the book discouraged rewards but they were clutch for us!

@blackbird: what kind of rewards did you use?

@Ra: @Applesandbananas: I think lots of kids just need some tangible motivation! We used the short YouTube toy collector videos. She stopped expecting them after using the toilet after a couple weeks

@Ra: is your LO also a summer '13 baby? Mine is, and he's nowhere near ready to potty train, just not interested. I think your idea to shelve it for a bit is a great one, because I think this process can get antagonistic really quickly!

@MoonMoon: @Ra: Yeah, we're also June '13 and aren't doing anything official yet. The potty is out in the playroom and sometimes mid diaper change he'll get up and use it. I'm a little to intimidated to go beyond that!

Yes! I didn't read the actual book, but I researched the crap out of the method. By the end of the second day, we quit. I could not face another day of it. It upset all of us and just wasn't working. We went slowly over about 3 months and he's a rockstar now! He wasn't ready until 3.5 though (he's a January '12 model). The first time failure didn't hurt him, it made him a bit less scared when we tried again, despite the absolute terror he initially had.

We tried several things- pee outside on a tree (MAJOR FAIL), small potty (FAIL), finally the adult potty with the flip down childseat worked best for us (and my SIL as well). We started with sitting and after a few weeks he went to standing, and pooping. At each major step, we did a short potty chart (5), a long one (15) and then we moved to the next thing upon receiving the big reward. Sometimes we took a week off, like our Yellowstone vaca. After our fail, we bought The Potty Book, Dino vs. Potty, and Even Firefighters Go Potty. All big hits!

Most of our first steps of success were purely accidental (ahahahahahaha) dumb luck timing. Mainly the tool I lacked was patience. Working from home, I just could not fathom how time consuming it would he and how I would have to be constantly ON. I tried stickers, they didn't help until pooping consistently. Dum dum pops worked for us, since he's very candy motivated. Later I needed him to spend more time on the potty for poop, so we upgraded to Tootsie Pops. Then stickers for a weekly toy reward for consistent poops, and I wrote down the whole routine from pants down to washing hands, etc.

Now he's obsessed with trying every potty he sees. But freaked out by hand dryers... it's always something!

It worked great for is but it was clearly because he was totally ready. He was fully trained in 3 days. I think their success with potty training depends 95% on their readiness and 5% on method. If he isn't ready, don't torture both of you. Stop and try again in a few months.

We didn't have a method; @Rockies11: posted pretty much identically what we have done. She was super close to underwear around 24 months, and then just decided she didn't care. So we did diapers again. I think most of it might well be laziness on my part, but I just figured that she would get there eventually, and as long as I supported her and made the tools available (we had small potties and potty "lids," as well as books, etc.) she would get there. She's 3.5 now and doing really well with underwear. One day she just decided she wanted to not have the diaper on and she used the potty all day with no accidents. She's had a handful of accidents since then (all pee, so I'm happy!), but is still enjoying being a "big kid." Because I'm lazy we never bothered with rewards or stickers. I emphasized that it feels nice to be clean and dry, and would definitely tell her I was proud of her, but tried to keep things very low-key. I think waiting a bit and trying again sounds like a plan. And nothing wrong with rewards if you want to use them and your child responds well!

Not familiar with the method but my daughter put up a fight as well. She held it til she was going to burst. We did calm down a little about it and used pull ups for going out, and she just got it herself (with the sticker chart motivation) in a couple weeks. In our case I feel like we waited too long to start (2y9m) but every kid is different.. We waited due to other transitions going on in our/her life..but just wanted to say it did work out. He will get it at some point. Sending you hugs, it's hard.

OCPT worked for us.

I'd agree with @wonderstruck: he may be feeling too much pressure.

Is it a power struggle? If so, read those chapters. We had a bit of a power struggle and got through it(but I don't remember exactly what we did that turned the powers ruffle around).