I thought he would be trained by 2, and I've been trying off and on since he was 1.5 or so but here we are, at 3.5, and nowhere near potty trained! I've tried putting him in underwear but he just pees them and goes about his day like nothing. He just this past week started understanding what I mean when I say "let's go pee" and let's me pull his pants down and aims his penis at the toilet and grunts and strains a bit but no pee comes out. I can't even think of sitting him on the potty for #2 or he screams bloody murder. He spends most Saturdays at his Abuela's (my mil) and she said she sits him on the toilet but he doesn't use it. I'm worried she's forcing him and it's scaring him bc she's always pushed him to be more advanced than he's ready to be. His ped suspects him of Autism bc of some of his behaviors and he wasn't speaking near enough words at his last checkup. We've put him in speech therapy as a start but haven't had him tested yet. He's been going twice a week for a couple months and JUST hit 20 words in one session a few days ago. We've tried to explain to her that he might be slower to learn some things and pushing him when he literally screams is doing more damage than anything, but bc my husband's cousin has a daughter about 6 months younger than our son and she's been potty trained for a while, my mil is acting like she's embarrassed bc her grandson isn't yet.

That kind of turned into a rant, but my questions are, what can I do when he's terrified to sit on the toilet and isn't communicating that he has to go, only tells us maybe 45% of the time that he's gone and it's only when he goes #2 and likes to stand and pretend to pee but doesn't actually pee yet, and secondly how can I get my mil off our case and if she is forcing him how do I get her to stop?