Another potty Q - Potty Seat or Potty Insert?

My sister is just starting to get everything lined up to get nephew J. potty trained (he'll be 2 in June).

He has the interest, loves to flush, signs to us when he needs a change and has taken his baby brother's diapers to the toilet to dump the poop!! He was never asked to do that, my sister was changing the baby and J. just picked it up and trotted off to the bathroom to do the dirty business!

So regular potty chair or the insert that sits on top? We've read that it's important for their feet to be on solid ground/step stool. I know some regular potty chairs convert to a insert and step stool, but is the stool high enough for feet to touch?

Advice out there? I'll need to buy one as well as J. is over here just about everyday (we live close to each other.)

Thanks.
Erin

The insert is definitely the way to go if the child has no preference. It is very easy to clean and there are no transition issues. However I should admit that DD's training really took off when I got her a little potty all her own. She just liked the 'special treatment'. I suspect that was more a personality thing than anything else. Perhaps you could just wait and see what he uses at your sister's house and then just duplicate it?

As for step stools, they have great $2 ones at Ikea.

Thanks. I'm passing along your info to my sister and I will buy the same as what she decides on.

And a bonus, another reason to visit Ikea!

An insert wouldn't work for us because Ainsleigh is kind of short, and she wouldn't have been able to climb up and turn around, etc. We have the Graco seat and a 'The First Years' seat. Ainsleigh can sit comfortably on both of them. Tkae J to BRU and have him try them out. I really wanted the Bjorn seat, but she couldn't stand up without a lot of help because of the deflection shield. But the other two seats are the perfect height.

Can't you take the deflection shield off?

I was wondering how kids turn around to get on the seat, that's why I heard their feet must be on a step of some kind. J. is on the tall side definitely not short, but I will suggest to my sister to try them out first.

We don't have a BRU but we do have a number of TRU's, hopefully they'll have some seats to try.

And the seat my sister was leaning towards was actually the Bjorn, so thanks for that tip! Good to know before hand.

erin

With the Bjorn potty, the shield is molded along with the insert, so if you take off the shield you are removing the insert where the poop or pee goes at the same time.

We're going through potty training right now with my ds who just turned 2.

We bought the Bjorn insert first, hoping to save the extra (gross!) step of cleaning out the small potty. Unfortunately, the insert didn't
work for us because my ds wasn't in enough of a squatting position while sitting on it. We just bought a regular potty (the Graco one) and it's working great. My ds took to it right away.

My ds is also tall (38" at his 2 year checkup). Also, we've found the deflector to be more of a problem than a plus because it gets in the way.

-Michelle

That is the potty we have upstairs and I just turned the insert around. Alia had a hard time with it until I turned the shield to the back - now she has no issues.

She has been doing really well with potty training the past 2 weeks. No accidents this week at all :-) She is now pooping in the potty too, so I hope this continues!

Michelle - Mom to Alia born 5/16/02

I would go for the insert. That is much less work for the parent (just flush and you're done). My DS#1 would not even sit on a potty seat -- he wanted the insert because it was more like what we used. I was more than happy about that since I didn't have anything to empty/clean. We didn't have to do this with my son, but be prepared to take the insert with you wherever you go. My friend had to do that with her daughter as she refused to go without it.

We did use a step stool (we have one in each bathrooom), which DS moves from the potty to the sink when he washes his hnds.

Sarah.......mom to Jason (5/25/00) & Devin (05/12/03)