u/reluctantly_existing

We have a 5 year old client, recently started verbal communication spontaneously.

We've been potty training for a few weeks and using Skittles as a reinforcer for voiding but the family can't keep up his potty training until we make a little more progress, mom has 5 young kids to handle including the client.

For the initial weeks he was partially voiding, he would get one Skittle for partial voids and when he fully voided he would get the full (small) bag of Skittles.

Session is 3 hours. We give him tons of juice but he holds it for the entirety of session now, we don't get partial voids anymore and the BCBA and I think it's because he's getting the reinforcement of his pullups at the end of session (he's changed into underwear when we arrive). We're concerned about him holding it for so long, you can really tell he REALLY needs to pee but he won't do it unless he's in his pullups. He won't have an accident in his underwear.

We can't leave him in underwear when we leave because Mom can't keep up with the potty training and her other kids.

We have a stool to support his legs on the toilet and he gets minor reinforcers to stay on the toilet, sometimes no reinforcement since he can sit for 3 minutes pretty much independently.

Does anyone have any ideas how we can ethically discourage the withholding? I suggested putting on underwear under pullups so when he goes it's less reinforcing than the pullups but the BCBA wants to check if this is ethical before trying this. Also his pullups just changed from regular pullups to these huge old man pullups, we think the extra space is what's reinforcing the voiding in the pullups now. We don't have access to his old pullups until this supply runs out.