Misadventures of Potty Training

Potty training.

A task I really really dislike.  I mean really really.

By the time MC was Little Man's age, we'd already gone several failed rounds of (no pressure) potty training.  That in itself wasn't so bad.  But oh did I want her to have this potty thing down before her new sibling arrived! Then, over Christmas (when she was 2 years, 4 months old), as she was home all the time from Mother's Day out and I wasn't in the office so often, it just began to click.  Hallelujah! Just in time for her brother to come along in early January.

You do know "they" recommend NOT potty training your child during big life changes right?

We found out why.

Everything went smashingly for about 6 weeks.  And then she realized that the cute little baby was here to stay. Suddenly potty time became a power struggle that NEVER ended.  Every suggestion I made as to tending to her business was met with, "But I don't HAVE to go potty," often followed by, "I'm DRY!"  We're talking complete meltdowns about not having to go potty. And what would you know, but in five minutes time her panties were wet. The kicker? She could walk around in wet panties all day without a care.

Sure we have had stretches where she's done really well. I've tried every trick in the book, and most things worked for a little while. We've always tired to lay on the praise, but really, it can be hard to get excited about your 4-year-old putting her tinkle in the potty. I guess I should be thankful; I recently came across a thread of frustrated parents who have problems getting their 4-and-a-half-year-old children to poop in the potty.  At least MC has always done that bit of business without any prompting or backsliding. Still, I felt like such a failure.

After a recent stretch of constant accidents, a lot of frustration, tantrums, and not much to praise, I finally stumbled across an idea; make potty times house rules.  I'd struggled with this before as I was thinking in terms of CLOCK times rather than the natural routine of our day.  We had a couple of rules already, such as, we ALWAYS potty when we get up in the morning and we ALWAYS potty before bedtime, so it was an easy extension to create an additional rule about potty time. Now we also ALWAYS potty after meals and snacks.

The new rule garnished instant success.


Of course, we have still had damp panties here and there, and I generally have to remind her of the rules, along with keeping snack and meal times consistent, but the battle is over. While Charlotte may still occasionally whine about the rules, she willingly follows them without a fight.  She's happy to have successful days consistently, and I'm happy to have ample opportunities to praise her with genuine enthusiasm.

It seems so simple and logical now, why did it take so long for me to figure this out?

Next up? Frederick. I'm pretty sure I'm going to wait until he asks for underwear himself.  Even if that means he's five.  No more battles at our house, thanks!