Potty Training: when and how? Two moms’ experiences
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Photo of our son in his fav undies ©SueBarr for "Raising Your Toddler" book by Knack
Jill’s experience: (1 boy done, 1 girl on the path)
Potty training: it looms large in every parent’s mind. When and how?! Do we use rewards, naked-running, training pants, at what age, what potty?…help!
Our trip to potty training began when we had a new baby and we were, frankly, tired of changing our son’s size 6 diapers. Did they even make a size 7 diaper? It was time for 3 year old Baker to be potty-trained.
While we (eager-beaver parents and babysitter) deemed it time, young Baker had absolutely zero interest in anything potty-related. I talked little-boy potty training with anybody who would listen, prowled the internet mom boards and read every theory I could find, including (gasp) one by Dr. Phil. I dragged Baker to the potty, dragged the potty to him, hid the diapers and brought out adorable underwear. I cajoled, pleaded, reasoned and bribed, all for naught.
After four days of futility, we had a flash of brilliance: Baker wasn’t ready. So we put away the big-boy underwear. We left the potty as a stool in the bathroom, and moved on with our lives and Baker’s new baby sister.
The greatest truth we found regarding when and how to toilet train is the one everybody told me and the one I so hated to hear: he’ll do it when he’s ready. Sigh.
Several months after we first gave up the quest to get rid of his size 6s, he got interested. We made a big deal out of this interest and he started with peeing (trying to “sink” the toilet paper square “ships”) and eventually progressed to pooping. We did end up using rewards. For each poop that found its way to the toilet, he earned one of those little Jibbitz thingies for his Crocs. Those were way more interesting than candy and had lots of brag value. (Yes, they’re pricier than gummy worms or M&Ms but after 10 or 12 “wins,” we were able to stop the rewards.)
I know that I made this seem way simpler than it was – yes, there were accidents, raised voices, tears and disastrous outings, but when we let him be the boss, he figured it out. Amazing.
Since everybody says that girls are SO much easier to toilet train than boys, I figured Jenn, now 2.5, would pretty much train herself. Apparently, she’s not as advanced as I might have hoped — she still poops in the “privacy” of the living room corner, and she uses the little potty only to reach the bathroom sink. We just started talking about it again, however, and I bought more thingies for the Crocs today. Certainly, liberation is just around the corner… if she wants it to be.
Part 2 by Karen: (1 boy done, 1 girl to go)
We had the same experience as Jill did. Birch was super interested in potty training initially. We read potty training books, watched Elmo’s Potty Time (mildly amusing and fairly helpful for its visuals) and bought a Bjorn potty (small footprint, comfortable enough and easy to dump). I asked a lot of friends for advice and scoured the internet. We had two special “potty toys” that he could only play with while on the potty. We stayed in the bathroom for long stretches playing “potty toys” and not much would happen. Then he lost interest and nothing we did could bring it back. A few months later, when he was 2 years and 1 month old, he began to talk about the potty again. I was desperate to make this time work. His baby sister was due soon and I didn’t want to be dealing with this as a sleep deprived new mom. The best advice came from my sister: buy Gerber’s training pants (gender neutral) and use them for a week or so. The advantage to Gerber’s training pants is that they are thick enough to prevent a lot of pee soaking through to a child’s outside pants, but thin enough that a child can immediately feel when they are wet, unlike diapers. They are great, but prepare to do a lot of laundry. I washed about 4 pairs of underwear a day in the beginning. After 6 days of the training pants, he got more successful in recognizing “the feeling” and we would all run to the potty. There were still plenty of accidents when he was totally engrossed in playing and couldn’t be bothered to remember to get up and go, but when we got to the point of having only one accident a day at most, we moved to regular underwear.
The “graduation” was a big deal because he had chosen the styles: superheros, dinosaurs and Pixar Cars figures. All through this period we had stuck pretty close to home to reduce the chance that we might not be able to find a bathroom in time. I was 9.5 months pregnant too so this didn’t seem too hard. With the “graduation”, we still stuck home for a few more days and then ventured out. I brought the “potette” with me for those occasions. We used it at the park, a friend’s outdoor party (she didn’t seem to mind, but her husand did) and on a walk. It was the most helpful device we had during potty training. It was immediately available, clean and he could sit down on it easily and anywhere at any time. We still had accidents, but they got fewer and farther between. Throughout the training we used chocolate chips for rewards: one chip for pee pee and two for poop. They were a hot commodity for a couple of weeks and then suddenly two chips for a poop fell flat. In fact, he started “withholding”, which basically meant, he was refusing to poop. A whole 6 days went by with nothing. We pumped him with prune juice and other natural laxatives with some success. Then he regressed: he would ask for a diaper to go poop. This went on for a long time and I didn’t care much. At that point, we had a new baby and I didn’t have the energy to tackle the pooping issue. But, on his 3 year old checkup (a full 8 months after he was trained), our pediatrician asked if we had potty trained. Oh, yes, we told her….except he doesn’t go poop on the potty. She told us he wasn’t potty trained FULLY and that we needed to deal. She suggested larger rewards for the pooping. Her advice? Matchbox cars: they were inexpensive and our son was a car fanatic. At about $1 a car, we thought it was a pretty expensive reward system, but we decided to give it a go. When we showed our son the new system, he basically ran to the potty and proceeded to go…and go…and go. He started pooping about 2 or 3 times a day to get the cars and then that tapered down to a more normal schedule. Eventually, he forgot about pooping for the cars, thankfully! I think he felt he had a fairly good collection by that time. At 3 years and 1 month he was FULLY potty trained. The hardest part for me in the end, was having a newly potty trained son and a new baby. I would be out with them in the park or walking in the stroller and suddenly he would have to go potty. With my daughter in a sling, I had to find a clean place to lay her down while I pulled out the Potette, then pulled down and pulled up his pants. I’ll never forget the day that I was at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum which does not, ridiculously, have child-sized toilets. I had to lift him onto a toilet with my daughter in a sling. She nearly rolled out as I lifted him up…and my back wasn’t too happy either. It was not one of my better moments. I remember crying, sweating and muttering. Now, I wish I could have waited until after the baby was born to start potty training him. At least then I could have sat her down on the floor while I helped him. But, it wasn’t my choice to make: our son had to make it on his own.
What’s your potty training story? The more stories we all share, the more helpful it is to other parents. What reward system did you use?
There is a great book that I highly recommend to all parents: Diaper-Free Before 3: The Healthier Way to Toilet Train and Help Your Child Out of Diapers Sooner, by Jill Lekovic.
Johanna
It’s great to hear your experience with this- it’s a unique story and really helpful to parents who want to try this method- thank you so much.
Great trick Courtney- thanks for sharing it! You sneak!
Isn’t it interesting what they will do when they want attention! Great story- thanks for sharing it.
we started potty training our daughter when she was about 2.5 yrs old – we were expecting our 2nd child in the summer and needed her trained by Sept for pre-school and she actually had no problem going #2 but would resist peeing on the toilet and it was hard to be consistent since she was also in daycare (she would do great 3 days at home over a long wknd but then would refuse to go on their toilet or potty)
Anyway when child #2 was 10 days old she decided she was done with her pullups and was toilet trained – she figured out how to get attention! when she yelled ‘I have to go potty’ she got the reaction of everyone around! and it wasn’t always easy to deal with when there was also a newborn to deal with but at least she was into it
So she was fully day trained shortly before her 3rd birthday (like 2 wks before it). We neglected to do any night training until recently when she was about 4.5 yrs old. We couldn’t deal with any potential loss of sleep with a newborn and then with a baby that was teething a lot (he started teething at 4m and had them all by 15m)
have no idea what we will do with our 20m old son – he does tell us when he has done ‘doo doo’ and knows where the toilet is since his big sister likes to get quiet time and locks him out
FD
Thanks for the article. Very helpful and timely!
FD
My daughter is 17 1/2 months old and she stared showing interest in using the potty last month. I have always had her potty in our bathroom but last month she would follow me their and want to mimic my actions (sitting on the toilet, pretending to wipe, asking to be lifted to wash her hands).
So I searched the internet for advice on how to potty train a child under 2 and with the exception of some elimination communication sites I found nothing. I was very disappointed because I knew it was possible and remember hearing stories from my grandmother who had trained all 6 of her kids by the time they were one.
Not wanting to miss this opportunity and take advantage of her new found interest. I decided to have “potty time” every morning after breakfast. I would let her run around bottomless and have her sit on the potty every 15 minutes for as long as she would stay. We would read books, sing songs and I would put on puppet shows. I think at such a young age they are less independent and enjoy the one on one attention more then older children. I found that she stayed on the potty for 15 – 20 minutes at a time. This really increased the chances of her peeing on the potty. When she did, I celebrated the event gave her a sticker to put on her potty and a special treat (yogurt covered raisin). When she had accidents I would explain to her in a disappointed voice that she needs to pee on the potty not the floor.
After doing this every morning (from 7am – 9am) for a week she began to tell me when she needed to go even in the afternoons. It has been 2 weeks and whenever we are home (with the exception of naps and bedtime) she uses the potty.
If she is wearing a diaper she will not go to the potty. I think what worked for us was to go bottomless. After hours of scouring the internet I have finally found some tiny undies in her size. (She only weighs 17 pounds)
Although I still keep her in diapers when we are out and when she is asleep I think this is proof that potty training is possible from a young age and if you have the time to dedicate yourself to teaching your child to use the potty, I think they really enjoy learning a new skill. Especially before they hit the ‘terrible twos’ and rebel against your requests for no apparent reason.
I should add that I taught her from a young age to use sign language to let me know when she has pooped and we use cloth diapers so she is more aware of being wet as they are less absorbent then disposable diapers. I don’t know how much these two things affected her success but they may have made a difference.
Good luck to everyone.
We had initial success for a few weeks with our son, and then a set back after a bout with constipation. Our then 2 year old became afraid to do number 2 in the potty bc he thought it would hurt. I solved the problem by telling him, he could do number 2 in his pull-up but he had to sit on the potty while he did it. After a bit of protesting, he did it. Little did e know, I had loosened the tabs of his pull up, so that when he went, it fell into the potty anyway! He was surprised but happy, and we then went to buy a toy immediately, and had success ever since.
FD
Wow- cutting a hole in the diaper- not THAT’S creative! Love the tip!
I think its pretty common for boys to resist pooping on the potty. My little boy would go pee pee on the potty by the time he was 2 and did great. But pooping was a different story- i still had to pull out a diaper for him to get it done. He would ask for the diaper specifically to poop and no matter what rewards i pulled out i could not get him on the potty. Our solution was to gradually get him less used to the diaper and more familiar with the toilet. For a day or two (started this at about 28 months)i told him he could poop in the diaper but had to stay in the bathroom to poop (that worked!), then he could poop in the diaper but had to sit on his toilet while he pooped (worked! and gave a small reward) we did that for about 2 days then progressed to still wearing the diaper on the toilet but i cut a hole in the diaper so his poop would end up in the toilet. he would resist every now and then but after a few days and rewards when he would do it, he was ok with going on the potty without a diaper!! all in all it maybe took 2 weeks. now hes 3 1/2 and has done great ever since!
FD
We bought an Elmo potty ring for our toilet seat. Our then 2-1/2 year old daughter loved the idea of sitting on the big toilet. We didn’t use a reward system, I was just constantly asking her if she wanted to use the potty. I don’t remember exactly how long it took because her little sister was an infant at the time and I was a little scattered, but I do know by the time she was 3 yrs, 2 mos old she was trained (that’s when preschool started again). Now we’re in the process of training her little sister who is 2-1/2 years old. What I’m doing with her is as soon as she wakes up, I take her to the potty and have her try to go pee-pee on the big toilet (with the same Elmo insert). Most times she does go and we give each other a high five. Hopefully she’ll be trained by the time she’s 3, like her sister!
FD