POTTY TRAINING -18Month Old Daughter

I wouldn't worry about it right now. She may be interested, but may not be physically ready. If you do both you and your daughter will probably be frustrated. Watch her interest. In the meantime, maybe you could get pull-ups and see how she does with that. If that's too hard for her to handle, she's probably not ready yet. With my kids, when I started potty training I had to be consistent for long periods of time until they got the hang of it. I would go to the bathroom with them and sit down on the bathtub while they sat on the toliet. I sang songs and did finger plays with them to get their mind off of sitting on the toliet. (After a while they got fussy.) Sometimes I would give them a drink of water or milk just to build up the liquid in their sysstem and sometimes turning on the batrhroom sink to a tiny trinkle will trigger it. If they pottied they got an M&M or some type of small reward. We both looked into the toliet, talked about their success and celebrated. After the recognition, I let my child flush the toliet and we said bye-bye to the potty. Once you start this process, you have to follow through, so its a full time job. Figure out if your'e ready and have the time and then go ahead with it. Good luck.

I think that is great. My suggestion is to keep getting her interested it and even maybe showing her you doing it at the same time and get her all excited about it. She will think it is a fun game and want to do it more often. Good luck!

With my son, we used the "Potty Train your child in one day" by Dr. Phil (you can find details on his website under "Advice"), after months of trying everything else and it finally worked. He was just over 3-years-old.

With my daughter, as soon as she started showing an interest and was staying dry for long periods, I put the potty seat on the floor in the family room (with a towel under it just in case) and put her in underwear. When she woke up dry from her nap, I had her sit on the potty and watch her favorite show and she eventually peed. I made a huge deal of it and that was all it took. She was pretty much peeing in the potty from that point on. She had some accidents every once in a while and I would just remind her to use the potty next time. She was much easier to train than my son. She is just over 2-years-old.

Hi J.,

I've heard pediatricians say not to potty train until the child is at least 2... otherwise it could completely turn them off to the idea.

However, my daughter at 14 months started pulling off her diaper and refused to leave it on. We bought her a potty chair and put it in the bathroom. We did not in any way force her or tell her to use it. She used to like to watch other people pee and eventually just figured it out on her own. We put books & magazines on the floor next to the toilet and she would go in, sit down for a while, read & pee. She loved stickers so when she did a good job we would reward her with stickers and make it a big deal that she went to the bathroom on her potty. We never once scolded her or made it a big deal when she messed up... but honestly that was few and far between. I guess its something she really wanted to do. For the most part she figured it out on her own and only needed a little guidance.

By the time she was 23 months she was completely potty trained. She had mastered peeing/pooping in public places and sleeping thru the night without wetting the bed.

Hi J.,
I have a 17mths. old son and he has been using the potty since he was 9mths. old. He still uses diapers but this past week he has been saying " no mama diapers bad!" He wants the training pants. The way I got him started was when he was nine months old whenever I put him in a chair or walker he would strain to potty so I thought I would allow him to associate the feeling with a potty chair. He is very attached to me so often I had to use the potty in front of him so he knew the sound he made were good..."like mommy" So the first time I placed himon the chair he peed and I out a star on the calender for him. I never forced him to go. I just put him on the potty twice and day and he peed and pood when he needed, then he wanted to sit on the toilet so I bought a baby seat and he loved it because he was doing what mom and dad do and he could hear the tinkles. I use two sizes of stars. The small ones for trying and the big ones when he pees. (one for pee, two for poo) He gets so proud when he gets two stars and tells whoever is around two stars two stars! I also let him choose the colrs he wants. That has helped him learn coors and he can associate blue with things other then his stars. So just make it fun for her. Sounds like she's ready. When my son goes I puy mt hand to my hear and we both listen and whe he is finished we clap and make a big deal out of it. He gets so proud that he did well. I noticed the way my son used to act when trying to pee or poo so then I could say do you need the potty? Now he says "uh oh...star star!" So he knows as well when he needs to go. He's not fully trained. I'm a first time mother so I'm new to this but I've heard they cannot control it until after two years. I'm not sure how true that is but I am willing to allow him to take his time. He still messes in his diaper but he does get disapointed now and if I catch ihim in time and say are you going potty he'll take off for the bathroom and sometimes make it. If not he gets a little star but still get acknowledge for trying,so just do what feels right is what I would suggest. I hope that helps! Good luck and have fun with it so she can as well!

My daughter is 22 months and has been potty trained for about 2 months now. She started to show interest in it so I just went along with it. I made things fun and no pressure at all. When she started to actually use the potty I put her in panties right away. I know a lot of people use pull ups but I wanted her to have the feeling of being wet. Also she picked them out herself and knows how to put them on. She really loves her big girl panties and that helped. We only had a couple of days of accidents and now she is fully potty trained. I keep her in a pull up at night but she ussually wakes up dry. Good luck!

Hi there. My son is 20 months old and when he was just 17 months we bought a potty for him. We didn't put ANY emphasis to it other than telling him what it's for. This might be too much information, but my husband and i then made it a point to model. Our son is a huge visual learner so we felt that if he saw different ways to use it then he would just pick one. So after a month or so, he went on his own right before his bath. We are not fully potty trained because we are still using diapers but like i said, we aren't making a big deal of it. He does however use the potty right before bath since he isn't wearing anything. We do make a huge deal right after he goes and applaud him for his efforts. I don't know. Hopefully this helps. No science in our method. Good Luck!