Congratulations. I hope that this trend of using the potty continues smoothly for you.
Cal, if your book is as great as this thread, my money will be well spent!
Trust me when I say I do indeed feel your pain. I too have a three-year-old daughter. I have read “Once Upon A Potty” so many times I’ve got it memorized.
My husband is a stay-at-home dad, but he’s also a musician and a guy, which means things are pretty relaxed when it comes to potty training. Now, my daughter does use the potty almost every time, when we’re home. I work a 9-5 job, so during the day, it was up to my husband to see to it that the Little Goddess used the potty. His method was to just let her run around naked. Well, this sort of worked. She rarely has accidents, but she’s decided that more than anything else in the world, she likes being naked. I cannot keep clothes on her when she’s home. When it’s just us, it’s no big deal, but sometimes we have company. I’m a pretty open-minded sort of person, but I do have this thing about wearing clothes when one has guests. Then there’s the ice cream man. My kid can hear the ice cream man from two counties away. She’s constantly flinging open the door, trying to run outside and get ice cream, butt-naked.
Rewards and high praise worked pretty well to get her to start using the potty, but honestly, my kid was just too darn busy doing other stuff to take the time to bother. What really got her going all the time was the birth of her brother last fall. No kidding. That’s really when everything fell in to place for her. She’d been watching me use the toilet for months, and she’d used it herself some, but once she saw Mom change a few of her brother’s diapers, it all sank in, and she’s been great about using the potty ever since.
Best of luck to you, Cal!
Part Seven.
Fourth of July. Midnight had peed on the floor outside the cat boxes again, but only because Clarence and Lota had filled the nearest one, blocking the way to the clean boxes. Still, not an auspicious sign.
Turned on “Dragon Tales” for my daughter. Asked her what she wanted for breakfast. Said “yes” when I got to Grapes. My wife and I had toast. Our aughter scarfed toast from us. This will become a useful social skill later in ife.
We’re wondering if yesterday’s string of succeses will continue today, or if it was a fluke. Yesterday we watched “Rugrats”. My wife hates Rugrats. Or at least, she used to hate it. Under the constant bombardmet she is beginning to lik the show. One of the episods we saw was on Tommy getting Toilet Trained. We weren’t sure if it was a good idea to let her watch this, but we did anyway. Afterwards we tried to assure her that it didn’t really work like that. Angelica would not give her “the chair”. I don’t know if any of this made a difference.
Yesterday my wife made Chocolate Chip cookies for today’s barbecue. This was not a good idea. We ate them all. Since we still have to bring something to the cookout, she makes brownies. “Should I put chocolate chips in them?” she asks. At the mention of chocolate chips my daughter looks up.
“Mommy I want chocolate chips,” she says. We start to tell her that she can’t have chocolate in the morning, but then our brains kick in.
“You can have chocolate chips after you use the potty,” says Mrs. Cal. So obvious, but so easily forgotten. We have to re-inforce the message of yesterday. I can tell that this is difficult for my wife to say. Besides being a certified Nanny, she is also a certified Dental Assistant. Chocolate in the morning!
Our daughter’s eyes light up. She can have chocolate if she uses the potty! Chocolate in the morning! This is too good a deal to pass up. We take off her diaper and she sits on the potty, successfully producing a measurable amount. Chocolate, and there was much rejoicing (yay!).
Later, she does it again. I am amazed. We go for a walk outside, she still wearing only a shirt. She has no shame at all.
While watching Barney a revelation comes to her. She turns to me. “Daddy, Barney is a T. Rex!”
“Yes,” I say, “But friendly one.” re-assured, she turns back to he screen.
We go to the town’s Fourth of July picnic, then on to a friend’s barbecue. There are no incidents. We put swim diaper on her so she can go in the kiddy pool. She discovers that if you dump sand in the bottom of he pool it gets like a lake, and persuades the other kid to do the same. She comes running to me because Mommy won’t let her put sticks in, too. “Can I put a LITTLE stick in?” she asks.
That night she tries mightily o produce more output, but without notable success. She produces a few drops. She gets M&Ms for the effort.
When she goes to bed, I notice that she has put her stuffed Barney right next to the giant T. Rex on her chair.
Tomrrow will be at Day Care where, we have informed her, she will get no chocolate. We hope that this won’t derail the training, or the success. But two straight days of dry pants and seven consecutive potty uses seems to be a sccess. Befoe she went to bed, we read her “Once Upon a Potty” and “Bye Bye, Diapers” to drive the message home. Friday she was a Little Girl, but tomorrow she will go to Daycare as a Big Girl.
That’s the end of the Saga. I don’t want to bore you all. Thanks for your suggestions and encouragement.
I wonder if this would work with cats?
After going back and forth with my son for what seemed like an eternity, some advice a buddy gave me finally sunk in…no matter what you do…reward, praise, whatever…it ain’t gonna happen until the kid wants it to.
Now…here’s a bizarre one for you…my neighbors keep a porta-potty in the back of their Explorer as they are trying to train their very reluctant son. Sure, it makes sense when they go to the park, or maybe while they’re out shopping, but the other day, they came out of the house, opened up the back, sat him down, he pooped, then back into the house. No, they didn’t clean it out and yes, they do have indoor plumbing and another potty in the middle of the floor. No little pine tree hanging from your rearview mirror is gonna cover that smell!
This thread was great! I am about to embark on a similar journey with my daughter, and although I’m sure it seemed terrible at first, I hope to have as much success as you did! Congratulations… and if it doesn’t sound too morbid, keep us posted on her success! (I’m curious how it goes at daycare).
Oh… and I can sympathize with the cat issue too… we just replaced carpeting that was ruined by angry cats who didn’t like the introduction of our baby into the household. No fun at all.
Since Loud Mouthed Mime asked…
Our daughter had an accident in Daycare – but it wasn’t her fault. It turned out they didn’t have a potty there (!). The other kids have gotten used to the adult toilet, apparently, but that was too big a step for ours.
She used the potty successfully at home, although she didn’t quite make it in time before she ent to bed.
Midnight hasn’t peed on the floor at all lately.
May all your own efforts go as well.
Be sure to print out this thread and save it for your daughter. So much more effective to embarass her with than cheesy, bare-butt, bear-rug photos when she starts dating. She can also use it as a guidebook when her turn comes in 20 years. In any case, I’m sure she will appreciate your sharing such personal moments – eventually – maybe. . .
I came home tonight to find my daughter in diapers and Mrs. Cal cleaning the rug.
Our daughter can use the potty fine when she is constantly reminded of it (we asked her at least every half hour over the long weekend), but it doesn’t occur to her if she’s not prompted. She doesn’t yet recognize that feeling of fullness and pressure on the sphincters as the warning signs of a potty run. So she has had a few accidents.
The thing is that she WANTS to be a Big Girl, and wear her Bg Grl pants, but the sensory apparatus and the mechanics of pulling down her pants and sitting on the potty (she was bare-butt naked most of the weekend) are beyond her. A classic case of the spirit bein’ willin’, but the flesh too weak. The difference between theory and practice. Oh, well. There’s still time.
Since the problem appears to be that our daughter has trouble ientifying the need, and in pulling her pants up and down, Mrs. Cal has started an intensive course in pants pulling. This morning se insisted that our daughter pull up her own pants when she got dressed, rather than my wife pulling up my daughter’s pants. Daughter refused, crossing arms and shaking head haughtily. My wife would not budge from her position. Classic case of irresistable force and immovable object.
When my wife left my daughter turned to me and asked me to do it. “Do it yourself,” I told her.
“I’m too litle,” replied my daughter. (Normally, of course, she bristles when you suggest this.)
The conflict of wills continues.
I never really potty trained mine except to show them the potty and demonstrate it for my daughter. The boys picked up the idea from their Dad. One was trained at about two, one at 18 months (He was VERY competitive with his sister) One had absolutely no interest and was about three, when he got up one morning and wanted to wear Underoos. Remember those? He put on his brother’s and that was the last of it. The night time thing is totally different though. Not only do you have no control over how that goes, but neither does the child. My older son had problems at night, and it really frustrated him. I put a plastic cover on the mattress, and got him a kid size sleeping bag and didn’t bother with anything else for years. He would get up in the morning and put it in the washer, and I would throw it back in his room before bed. It usually doesn’t last too long. In his case till about 4 years old.