Potty Time~ - Lockport,NY

You don't do away with pull ups at bedtime until they are dry a couple of weeks with no accidents at all.

Pull ups are not diapers. They are shaped like underwear so the child can learn to pull them up and down and YOU don't have to bleach floors and clean up poop all day. If you really want your floors and furniture to have that stuff on it then that's different. I choose to have less laundry and less cleaning and have a more enjoyable time potty training.

It's a personal choice of course. I will say though, the extra cost of cleaning supplies and all the extra expense of load after load of laundry will cost more than that box of pull ups. Plus your time is worth something. He'll be happier spending time with you instead of you living tied to the washing machine with all the bed linens he'll wet night after night until he's much older.

There is no such thing as night time potty training. He will stay dry when his brain turns on the signal to stop making urine when he's asleep. Once that happens he'll go to sleep and the urine production will stop. Then he will be dry from then on.

It really depends on the kid. With my oldest, I put him in Pull-Ups for nap and bed and realized that he almost always stayed dry while he was sleeping. So, pretty much cold turkey with him. My youngest was no longer napping when we potty trained, so no issue with naps. However, almost a year later he is still wearing Pull-Ups to bed every night. I have a feeling he'll be one of those kids who wears them for a few years. Some kids do.

I understand your concern about Pull-Ups being just like diapers. They are and they aren't. It really depends on your approach and how you use them. I use Pull-Ups with our son because most mornings he wakes up with a very full Pull-Up, so he needs something. When he wakes up in the morning, usually the first thing he does in go into the bathroom and pee. He wouldn't be able to do that unassisted if he were wearing a diaper. He may be genetically predisposed. His father wet the bed until he was 7 or 8 (no Pull-Ups then, just lots of laundry), and his cousin on his father's side wore Goodnights until she was 9 or 10.

Remember, nighttime dryness is a physiological milestone and something that the child has no control over. As long as you let him know that this is just for bed time (and nap time) and take it off when he wakes, I think you'll be fine.

Good luck!!!

Take him to Target with you and let him pick out some big boy underwear. Pick the kind that have extra padding in the front (toilet training underwear). They have the fun pictures on them. This gives him some ownership in the effort.

Accept that there will be accidents. It's okay. Offer him incentives. What I did with both my kids that worked very well was to show them M&M's and count them out. He gets one M&M for just sitting on the potty. 3 to pee-pee in the potty and 10 to poop in it. Act very excited when you show him. Get the clock and show him that every time the big hand is up top, you will take him to the potty and that's how he has a chance to get M&M's. Then offer him plenty of water throughout the day in order to give him success.

If he doesn't make it to the potty, act sad FOR him, not because of him. Tell him that you know he wanted to pee in the potty. NO M&M's for peeing off the potty.

Clap your hands and tell him what a good job he's doing when he goes on the potty.

Make sure you put a diaper on him at night. It will be a long time before he night trains. Night training should not be part of day training.

Expect a few setbacks. It's okay. Take extra clothes with you if you travel.

He's pretty young to train, to be honest (boys usually train later than girls.) If he fights this after a few days, put it away for 3 months and try again. Never fight him with pottying. All you'll do is cause yourself lots of frustration and you don't want that between you two.

My approach has always been cold turkey during WAKING hours. Diapers at nap and bedtime as usual - unless you want to wash the bedding every day.

Our incentive (bribe) was one m&m for a pee, two for a poo. Even if they only squeezed out a drop, they got one :)

With my older 2 I used pull-ups when we'd leave the house. MUCH easier to take a child to a public bathroom to use the potty with a pull-up than with a diaper. Just explain to him that it's NOT a diaper, but training underwear.

As for nighttime dryness? My 5 year old has stayed dry at night since potty training at 2; my youngest wakes up dry 6/7 nights per week; but my oldest still needs her Goodnights. At almost 7, her body just isn't ready. We're getting there - we're at about 50% for waking up dry, but it'll happen when it does. Don't stress about it and NEVER make him feel bad for it - it's not something he can control.

Good luck!

I agree with you about Pull ups so we went cold turkey and used two pair of cloth training pants with a waterproof cover over them at night and naps, the same trainers he wore a pair at a time in the daytime. He took potty training literally and got up at night to use the potty, he was fully trained, day and night, pee and poop, by 27 months. I can count on one hand the times he's had night accidents, and he turned 4 in April. Granted, not all children will know to get up, or have a strong enough bladder to hold it until morning, which is why I made sure he had a place for accidents to go. And if there's an accident it's not a big deal.

I use cloth diapers at night and nap times, but cold turkey otherwise. My kids night trained a few months after day training. But they were young, 21 months.

I toke my daughters to the store to pick out big girl under wear (Twins) and i stocked them up and i put them to sleep in pull ups then when they stopped going in there pants i gave them the underwear