Mahaha.
Who is a complete expert on potty training?? I mean like... I guess there are people out there that you can hire to potty train your child for an unheard of amount of money (I may or may not have looked into it) and I'm sure there are tons of books on how to potty train. There's for sure enough children's books on using the potty. But realistically... 99.99% of people in this world are not potty training experts. And that most definitely includes your 2.5 year old son that is currently peeing on the carpet for the 7th time in 3 minutes. Just standing there. Peeing. Maybe saying "uh-oh" to give you a hint as to what is going on as you clean up messes #5 and #6 in the other room.
So since there are only 0.01% people (maybe) in this world that are potty training experts I am taking it upon myself to share my very
Grain of salt, people. Just throwing that out there.
Here we go...
How to potty train:
Step #1- make a plan
Where is your toddler going to do the deed? When are you going to start? Have you mentally prepared yourself (important haha)?
We started by getting a hold of a little toilet for our toddler's little bum. You never quite totally understand how little your toddler's bum is and how big your bum is until you sit said toddler's bum on a normal toilet. And they fall right in! Getting a tiny potty to potty train is pretty dang essential... unless of course you want to hold your child over the toilet for hours on end and count it as your workout for the day. I didn't want to. Plus strength training just isn't my favorite. Anyhow... we picked up a Lightning McQueen potty seat from GOTHE (gifts of the heart exchange) a few months back and it worked splendidly. Not just because Peter loves all things cars (including Cars) but because it was nice and tiny and low to the ground... something all toddlers are already very familiar with.
As for age? Peter was a month short of 2 1/2 when we got started. Basically we knew that we wanted to do it before the baby came but after Christmas break as to limit the messes Peter would make at grandma and grandpa's house.
Getting mentally prepared was something we didn't do. I mean we just figured it'd be hard and when it wasn't extremely terrible we were happy.Step #2- check out and start reading every single potty training children's book from the library
Prepare yourself, this could end up being 40 books. All about peepee and poopoo. A topic that can get old pretty quickly. You'll read about and look at pictures of zoo animals pooping, Calliou filling his toilet, firefighters using the john, and little princes wetting their pants. And when you start training you'll do this about 174 times in one hour just to get your little guy or gal to leave something in the potty. Just expect this process to be incredibly painful and it won't seem so bad. A lot of time sitting on the floor next to the potty reading stories and providing lots of encouragement. Heck, you can even add all of the books to your Good Reads "read" list to boost your numbers.Step #3- come up with some sort of incentive for using aforementioned potty
We made up a simple little peepee and pooppoop chart and took Peter out to pick out stickers and a treat if he did use his potty. Not surprisingly he chose an assortment of car and ball stickers. As for a treat he picked m's (M&Ms). For every 100% successful peepee he got a sticker and 1 M&M and for every 100% successful pooppoop he got a sticker and 5 M&Ms. Lucky kid, no? He caught on pretty quickly to the reward system and at one point pulled off pooping twice in 5 minutes... resulting in 10 m's. He stashed those away and very quickly went for a third poop but wasn't able to pull it off. Or I guess... push it out. Smart kid, but no dice.
For the first little while he wanted to hold the jars every time he sat down... and he wanted to sit there for a long, long time. So we just made it a party and threw Cars in the DVD player to top things off. Hey, you can only read potty books for so long.
After day one Peter had pulled off earning four whole stickers. Granted he sat on the potty for a total of about 12 hours. Something you should never be doing unless you are potty training or incredibly loosy goosy down there. Or maybe super pregnant with a bouncy fetus... those potty breaks add up fast.
Peter's first big boy pooppoop. We were all quite pumped. (:
Now that you have a potty and an incentive you are ready to start potting training! We found that putting the potty in the living room on a towel (with another towel acting as a runway coming out the front if you're working with a Mr.) worked the best with our little man. We let him run around in just a t-shirt for probably the first 4ish days. Why? 'Cause lots of people online said it helped the process along significantly. I don't know why it works but it helped Peter better understand when he was going peepee or pooppoop. He had quite a few #1 accidents and we very quickly learned that we needed to buy some carpet cleaner. He only had one #2 accident though which was awesome. Anyhow... introducing the system... this seriously was the hardest part for me because I didn't know how to explain to him that he needed to use the potty instead of a diaper. But we learned that it just takes time. Time running around in the nude, watching yourself wet yourself, and getting familiar with what that feels like. Once they catch on they (hopefully) take business to the pot and stop soaking'n'soiling the carpet.
Step #5- don't forget your patience pills and pick out some underpants
After letting Peter run around half naked/pee everywhere for a few days we took him to the Walmart and let him pick out some underpants. Todd strategically stood in front of the over priced Cars pack and Peter picked out a pack with rawr-rawrs and 'YU (dinosaurs and BYU blue) prints. We were very proud to say the least. (:
Here he is picking out his first pair nice and early the next morning. He went with the royal 'YU ones.
Step #6- say goodbye-ish to your life for another week
There are lots of messes but there's also lots of success! We did our best to praise Peter as much as we could muster every time he successfully used the potty. And when daddy came home from campus we told him all about how well Peter did so daddy could show how proud he was too. Lots of positive feedback for our little guy went a long way. He also likes m's a lot haha.
Before you know it, your little one will be wearing pants again, you'll be able to move the potty into the bathroom, and things will start feeling normal again.
It has now been a little over a month, Peter's stickers and m's are almost gone, and he only has an accident or two a week! He knows when he has to go and let's us know usually with 15 seconds until blast off. (: He's even great at leaving the house for long periods of time and using big potties at the church, library, friend's houses, etc. He still wears diapers when he naps and goes to bed but our last pack of size 4's are running low and he's slowly but surely getting better at waking up to potty. Ya sometimes it's an hour after bedtime or an hour before wake up time but oh well, who needs sleep?
The current status of his sticker and M&M jars... running low and he totally forgets 90% of the time for ask for them after using the potty. Don't worry, you'll get there... in like a month. You can do it!
Yay Peter!
Extra tips and tricks that worked for us...
- Make sure your toddler uses the potty before helping with the dishes... their little hands in that warm water will make them wet their pants fast than you can say #quithittingyourself.
- Before you leave the house explain that wherever you are going has some big potties too... then when you get there show them where the potty is.
Well that's all I've got. I hope your potty training endeavors are successful, painless, and not any messier than they have to be.
