We had two successes today and lots of failed attempts but they were attempts. She’d sit on the potty but not do anything. Usually, if she sits on the potty she will go but for some reason it wasn’t working for her. At least she tried.
We had 3 successes. The fact that we are having successful potty trips each day is encouraging. Just a week or so ago it was sporadic and we’d only have the occasional success now and then. To have daily successes is a good thing. Even with the failures I just remind myself that today I had three less diapers to change today and three less diapers to buy.
When Paige went potty the last time of the day, she jumped up and down excitedly and said “Yay! I poo poo the potty” which made proud to be a Mommy at that moment. I have also learned that Paige will not go to the potty for Daddy. She will only go if Mommy is there. Maybe it’s because I’m home with her all day and I’ve been the only one around when she needs to go, or maybe Mommy magically makes the pee come out; who knows but that was an interesting detail I learned. Daddy offered to take her to the potty because I’ve been battling a severe migraine for 4 days and he wanted to give me a break. Paige threw a fit and said, “No Daddy, Mommy’s turn.”
Every success is progress and I can’t beat myself up over the accidents.
I’m not sure why but Paige will not get serious about potty training in the mornings. She rarely uses the potty until after her nap. I realize the first hour of the morning is pretty busy with her Daddy getting ready for work and later in the morning we have Tot School and she gets so involved she doesn’t want to stop but there is plenty of time in between that she could use the potty but chooses not to.
It was not a good day today. Paige only had one success today. Oh well, tomorrow is a new day.
Paige is 29 months old
Welcome to the first Potty Training post.
Bringing you up to date: As my daughter neared her second birthday I was determined to start potty training. I practically begged the family to buy her a few pairs of “big girl undies” for her birthday with whatever gift they wanted to give her. I was full of ambition and determination that I would have her potty trained within months. HAHA, yeah I was delusional. Can I blame it on being a first time mommy?
A week before Paige’s second birthday I was laid off from my job. I took this as a sign. Her second birthday came and we bought her a potty chair and big girl underwear (along with many other gifts) and the grandparents also gave Paige some big girl underwear along with their other gifts. I purchased some reward stickers and an egg timer and thought I had it all under control. I severely underestimated the stubborness of my child. Within a week with zero success and a child who wouldn’t sit on her potty seat for more than 5 seconds, I quickly grew frustrated. How was I ever going to get this child potty trained.
I thought to myself, okay maybe setting the timer at 15 minute intervals was too much so I extended the time, then extended it even more and eventually hid it before I tossed it out the window. Okay, time to regroup. The timer wasn’t working so maybe letting her wear the big girl undies would work since they won’t protect her like a diaper so she will actually feel wet. Again, I underestimated my child. I should have paid attention to the fact that she has never cared about sitting in a soiled diaper so why would she care if she sat in soiled panties. Ugh!
Still determined, I marched on. Let’s try no panties at all. Yeah, all that did was make my house stink and create a LOT of messes to clean up. That child goes potty in little spurts and VERY frequently. This isn’t working.
I tried again. I did something I never imagined I would ever do in my life. I sat on that potty chair and I peed. Then I got up and I showed her what I did. I did a potty dance and rewarded myself. She was amused. Maybe this will work. I kept trying to put her on the potty and then one day she peed! I was so excited and she was completely freaked out. She hadn’t meant to pee on the potty and it terrified her. I told her what a good girl she was. I rewarded her with an entire pack of stickers. We did the potty dance. She was still mortified and wouldn’t go near the potty seat again for months despite my urgings.
At this point, I gave up. She simply wasn’t ready.
Eventually, she would sit on the potty. I bought her books that she was only allowed to read while sitting on the potty. We call them her potty books. It amused her for a while but then she grew tired of it. She still wasn’t ready. Now and then we would have a success but 99.8% of the time it was a failure.
A few weeks ago, Paige was taking a bath and she said “Poo poo the potty! Poo poo the potty!” and was pointing to the chair. I asked her if she needed to go potty and she nodded. I plopped her on the seat and sure enough she peed. By now, I had switched the reward to Cadbury Buttons (a British treat that we can only buy at the British Import store). Ever since that day, she will go pee in the potty but only when taking a bath.
Last week seemed to be a major turning point, however, in her potty training. Paige will now come to me (once in a while) and tell me she needs to go potty (Uh oh, Mommy. Poo poo the potty!). I find that it happens more often when I am changing her diaper and she still does it at bath time. On Thursday (I think), we had our first poop in the potty. It really freaked her out. She was really concerned about the mess she made in the potty chair but got over it when I gave her a chocolate chip cookie. She was so enthralled with it. “Mommy! There’s chochit inside! There’s chochit inside. Lots, Mommy!” It was cute and it helped her get over her fear of pooping in the potty.
On Sunday, Mother’s Day, we were out to dinner with the family and Paige says she needs to go to the potty. She had never had any success going potty in public restrooms because of the big toilets but she did it! We were so happy and she was so proud of herself that she announced it to everyone when we got back to the table. Everyone cheered and I’m pretty sure that half the restaurant turned to see what the deal was with 10 people cheering loudly. Later that night, we had our second poop in the potty. Yay!
Today, we had 4 successes and 3 accidents. That is Paige’s best record yet. I’m so happy for her. She’s doing a great job. She seems to have hit her stride. I’m hoping that this means she is finally ready. I’m not deluding myself anymore. We will have good days and we will have bad days. Today is a good day.
I have decided to add a new category to my posts to discuss our successes and failures of potty training. I’m not sure what I’m hoping for with this category… support maybe, shared empathy, shared successes, I’m not really sure. I guess I am just hoping that maybe others will join in and we can listen to each other and cheer or share frustration with each other. For some reason, I cannot seem to get my Linky Tool to work properly on my blog but I’ll work on that. In the meantime, if you want to join in, please feel free to comment and post a link to your blog so that we can read each other’s potty stories.
