Potty Training - Keller, TX

I agree with Teresa C...my daughter was just over 2 when we tried potty training. At first she loved her new potty chair. But then she decided to have nothing to do with it. It was summer so my husband and I put up the potty chair for a time. I knew she was ready becuase she would pull of her diaper after wetting. When school started and a routine was back in place, the potty chair came out. When she started MDO, the potty training began. They helped at MDO too. When we were at home, she was bottom naked! She was potty trained with a couple weeks! It was great! I was very fortunate that she also went poopy in the potty too! She only had a couple accidents and they were at night when we gave her too much to drink before bed. She is almost 4 now.
Just remember that every child is different...
Good luck!

Here's my advice:

1: Back off on potty training right now. Give it a month or so to give him a good break. In the meantime, go to the bookstore and buy a few different books on potty training - kid books. Ones that you can sit with him and read or that he can sit and read and see other kids learning to potty train. We did this with our daughter for a little while before we started officially potty training her. I think it made it more interesting to her because she saw other kids doing it.

2: Once you do start potty training again, make sure you never get upset at him (though I know sometimes it can be maddening!!). If you get too upset about it, just stop potty-training again. It won't hurt for him to be older.

3: When you start potty training, don't use pull-ups. I know some others will disagree with this, but when we officially started potty training, we tossed any form of diaper and went to a thicker pair of underwear (meant to be able to catch a little bit of urine).

Using underwear when he wets himself, he'll feel wet, and he'll get wet, and he won't like it. If he's in pull-ups, there won't be accidents and there won't be urine running down his legs - basically, what is the motivation for him in potty training while he's wearing pull-ups? Sure, it's messier, but it makes for faster learning. So, toss the pull-ups and diapers and use underwear, the thicker kind. Or even just plain ol' underwear. If you're worried about accidents, have him sit on towels. But, you're going to have to have a few accidents (or more) in order for him to understand why it's important to sit on the toilet. Try to give yourself a week at home with him (if it's at all possible) so that you aren't running to the store with a boy in the middle of potty training.

4: Take him potty every 30 minutes. It doesn't matter if he needs to go or not. Have him sit on the potty. He can even read the potty books that you bought him. The point in this is to get him in the habit of sitting on the potty to go (his brain needs to start thinking more about the toilet, and this will help get it to do so) and doing this every 30 minutes will also help to prevent accidents. I would personally try to make sure he pees every time you sit him on the toilet - even if it takes 10 minutes for him to. But do it nicely...no anger. Just let him know once he's done, he can get up.

5: Have some sort of reward system, though, I do highly suggest NOT having it be a form of candy. My sister did this and her daughters potty-trained great...until the treats went away...then so did their potty-training. She also used pull-ups and had a lot more problems than we did. Try something like a sticker chart. Each time he pees, he gets to put a sticker on the chart. Or don't do a reward system at all - just use lots of praise (or both) each time he pees, make it a HUGE deal. If he poops, make it an even bigger deal. Let him know once he is completely potty trained for a week (you can use the sticker chart to help with this to count the days down of accident-free days) then he'll get to buy a special toy of his choosing.

If he pees or poops in his pants, don't get upset, but do talk about how gross it is. Say something like, "Oooo, yucky! You are all wet and stinky. It's not fun is it? When you need to go potty, sit on the potty and go, it'll help keep you clean and you'll get a sticker! Won't that be fun?"

I wouldn't try night potty training until he is successfully day potty trained. When you're ready for night potty training, buy some bed covers (things to protect the sheets and if they get wet, all you have to do is pull the dirty one off and put a clean one on - makes for an easy clean up). Don't use pull-ups. Wake him up 2-3 hours after he goes to bed and have him pee...whether he's awake or not! It'll help teach his body to wake up at this time to pee. But that's a story for another day!

Good luck.

I have a daughter, 3 yrs and 3 months old. She just started the last 2 wks to go by herself. All my children were potty-trained between 3 and 3 1/2 yrs old. I think they just need time. Let them go when they want. One thing that did help was to take them off the pull-ups. Try that for about 1-2 wks. If it gets too messy, then you know he's not ready. If he has only a few accidents, but does try to go, then he's ready to learn and you may just have to put up with a few messes until he's got it down good. Good luck!!

I totally agree with the last response (Theresa). I have a 2 1/2 year old and we just used that exact method to potty train her and it only took us 3 days and 15 loads of laudry, but well worth it. She has been going pee in the potty for a month now and has only had one accident. She is also not having any accidents at night which it great. The only problem I am having is I cannot seem to get her to go poop in the potty. I have tried everything, but I guess she is not ready yet for that part and it will just take some time.

I have 2 children, a girl and a boy. Both were potty trained by 2 1/2 years old. I used the 3-day potty training technique with my son. Day 1 and 2 were somewhat hard, but by day 3, it seemed to click and we had very few accidents. He is 3 1/2 now - and day and night - accidents are a thing of the past.

hi M.!!!

My son is 4 and i start potty training him sin 2 1/2 and he was no ineterested , nothing work with him until almost his 4 birthday one day he decide is time to go and he went to the bathroom just let him take his time and he will go.

With our son, we started out with the usual incentives... lots of praise and encouragement, reward charts, stickers, a new toy when he got to the end of the chart, etc. He would do fairly well as long as the incentives were being offered. But, once the incentives were removed, he'd go back to having accidents again. We went through several cycles of taking breaks from it to give him more time to be ready. But, it eventually became pretty obvious that he was just being lazy and/or stubborn about it. I think a lot of it was jealousy of a new baby in the house, as well.

Anyway, what we've done now is, every time he has an accident in his pants, a toy gets taken away. And every time he uses the potty (especially a poo poo!), he gets a toy back. And he's been doing pretty well for the past several days. Hopefully he'll continue to do well. Otherwise, when he has his 4-year check up in a couple of weeks, I'll be asking about it to make sure there are no physical issues getting in the way.

Good luck to you! I know it's challenging!

I have four children. So I've had a little experience in this. First off, potty training is a big step into independence, and most tots are eager to be "big kids". Play that up. Next - biggest step of advice, is make them responsible for their own accidents. Don't clean them up and change their clothes, make THEM do it. Don't get mad, don't yell, just very matter of factly state "oh my, we had an accident. Big kids clean up their own accidents". Leave their underwear and clothes where they can reach them. Make them take off their wet stuff and put in a pre-determined spot (bucket or basket), make them get a new pair of underwear and dress themselves. If it's poop - stand them in the tub and make THEM take it off. (yes, a mess, but cleanable.) the idea is that THEY have to manage it. Yes, you have to go behind on these and make sure they are clean, but they have to make the effort.

They will complain, but stand firm that when mommy spills something, mommy cleans it up because that is what big people do. It is time for YOU to be a big boy and clean up messes. It's okay, everyone makes a mess sometimes.

The only one of my children I had problems training was the first, and I was young and inexperienced. Boys are usually harder, by the way.

For my 3 year old son, we went straight to big-boy undies and let HIM pick them at the store. He was use to being in a wet diaper so a wet pull-up didn't bother him. Wet undies (especially a wet Thomas the Train) made him mad. Of course, we still used pull-ups at night.

I also had a BIG candy jar that I filled with NEW match-box cars from the $1 Store. When he would go in the potty he got to have a new car (still in the wrapper). If he had an accident then he had to put a car BACK in the candy jar. He caught on to that one quickly and wanted to sit on the potty every few minutes. He only got a car when he actually WENT potty. We did this for 2 days and he did a great job.

My big advice is make sure you can dedicate a couple of days to this. Don't go too far from home.

Good luck!