Potty chat

We, as most of you know, followed the same Oh Crap book and are doing well. We're 100% out of diapers and will stay that way, but I'm still saying she's potty trainING, because we're working on the autonomy part (not having to ask/prompt her regularly in order to have fully successful days. She does initiate sometimes, but I would like the ball much more firmly in her court before I call it potty TRAINED, especially with poop.) We were SUPER lucky that she night trained entirely on her own, though. Once we started day training, she just simply stopped peeing in the night. I finally got brave and took the diapers off, and we've only had one night accident in like two months, and even that was just a small leak before she woke up crying and finished on the potty.

As frustrated as I am by this last little self-initiation hurdle, I have absolutely no regrets about just losing the diapers and dealing with it, though. You're wiping butts and cleaning up messes either way, but this way we're getting somewhere at the same time. And having done cloth diapers for over a year, I'm not afraid of a little extra special laundry. We just have a separate bag for the accident laundry, and I do a tiny hot-with-extra-rinse load every few days (or whenever there's a few things in there) by itself.

We've also been working on a few dietary tweaks to help get some manageable consistency to help in the poop department--she had such mushy poop that she couldn't control it, but keeping an eye on fruit and cutting way back on dairy has made a HUGE difference. (she's down to just yogurt and incidental cheese only--no actual servings of cheese. She was on almond milk vs. regular already because of gas) In fact I may add some more fruit back in now, because cutting out most cheese has almost firmed things up TOO much. Looks like she did get her daddy's lactose intolerance after all....

But how do you tell your Two year old to "Pee on the potty?" If so doesn't realize she's done it in her diaper.

Just yesterday Evan started saying pee pee when he would have to go. He has done it here and there, but he did it several times yesterday. Still a few accidents, but hey, we are getting there. We are still having to catch him before he poops. He has only told me once that it is time for poop.

Molly, I have no idea. I know the first couple of times we sat Evan on his potty, he didn't like it and just sat there not knowing what to do or what pee meant. It just seemed to click sometime after a few weeks that that is what the potty is for.

Molly, since we EC'd it was really different for us. We never had to teacher Teagan what the potty was for because its always been a part of her life. I skipped right over the part in Oh Crap about teaching what that potty is for but I know there's a whole chapter in there on that. Perhaps Leigh can offer some specifics.

So here is my story - maybe someone will have some insight about what to do.

We tried training DS when he turned 2. It was an absolute disaster - used it as a power struggle, fought, cried, just total mess. We backed off terrified of PTing. When he was 4 months shy of his 3rd birthday he trained himself in 1 day. He was fully self-sufficient PT'd in about 3 weeks or so. There has been one regression since, but it turned out to be he was sick with a bad virus and that's why he was having poop problems. So no real regressions I guess!

Now onto DD. We've introduced the potty, she watches DS, & myself every time we go and sometimes DH go potty. She loves wearing underwear. She'll sit on the potty when we ask no problem. She has trouble pulling down the underwear. the problem is - she won't pee on the potty!!!! URGH. She's peed twice on the potty and we made a huge deal out of it. That's in 15 or so hours of spaced out PTing. I'm a wimp and accident after 3-4 accidents I give up for the day - I know it's bad, just haven't had time to commit to full time PTing.

so do i just commit, or do I wait, or do I need better PTing skills?! LOL!

We have the potty, she sits on it but just doesn't know what to do in it. She'll say Pee-Pee and help me flush the big toilet.

You need to really commit. You need a good 3 days to a week where you really focus on the PTing. Don't worry about clothes at home then they can just take themselves without having to ask for you to help them with clothes.

Tobey decided he was a big boy today so I have no choice but to PT him :lol: I've left him bottomless all day and he's just taken himself when he needed to go. He's not poop'd yet but he's not an every day pooper anyway. He had one accident but I was hanging washing on the line at the time so didn't see his signs for needing to pee (twiddling his penis)

Last week was really the first time he'd figured out how to use the potty. He didn't want a nappy on so I left him running around. He drank loads, pee'd on the floor loads but DH eventually got him to sit on the potty and when the pee cam out we gave him loads of praise and gave him a chocolate button (chocolate is saved for bribery in our house, I know, bad mummy, but it works!!!)

but you really need to be watching them for signs they need to go when they don't have a nappy on, and they find it SO much easier with no bottoms on at all. I read the 3 days potty training book before PTing DS1 and he was great. I don't know what I would have done without a PTing self help book lol :-)

We've done diaper free (undies and completely naked from the waist down) and she doesn't care when she has accidents. Doesn't phase her a bit, in fact she doesn't even seem to notice she's done it. Most people say that they won't like wetting on themselves and it should be a deterrent. Not her.
She fights going to the potty and refuses to sit on it 99% of the time. If we can convince her to sit, she won't pee, even though I know she can. She watches us go, and big sister go, and she still could care less. I could try bribing, I guess. We have potty books, and the Potty Time video, and she can sign potty, but she just doesn't care to use it at all. I just really don't feel that she is ready, if she is resisting that badly. I don't want to force it and turn it into a major power struggle, we are waiting for her to initiate even the tiniest bit of interest.

Does naked or panties work best?

The method we are following starts with naked, and then when they've "mastered" that, moves to clothed (although she says to avoid panties or at least tight panties at first because they can feel too much like a diaper). The idea is to move the kid through the stages of awareness: I peed--->I'm peeing--->I need to pee.

I agree with you, though, Kristi, that it does sound like something is going on other than regular potty training stuff. Addy isn't bothered much by accidents either, which is really frustrating, but she does go on the potty so we're just having to work on the autonomy part. She's fine as long as we make her go a lot, and she does hold for pretty long periods, but she isn't super interested in learning to identify the feeling and initiate going to the potty by herself. When someone points out that she's had an accident, she's like "Oh. New panties, please?" Sigh. Still trying to figure out the psychology on that one...