Potty training advice!

[kam]

Ok, so I'll acknowledge from the beginning that I'm a little crazy.

DD is 22 months old, and we're considering potty training. She sits on it, and is very excited when something "accidentally" happens. We clap, and laugh and she is SO proud of herself. I'm a believer in early training for a lot of reasons -- I think it's possible (I was trained at 20 months, and my brothers were both trained before 28 months). I know of several <2 girls who are daytime trained now, with <1-2 accidents/week. I also think that DD wants to be independent, so this is something else she'll do to be proud of. (clothes on and off, "helping" clean her bottom during diaper changes, clearing the table and scraping dishes, etc.)

She knows when she poops, and tells us.

She has no clue about wet, but her diapers are so good that she's dry when I take them off, so I don't know how she could know. She does stay dry for a few hours at a time.

My thought is that we try for a week, and if it's not working/she's resisting, we just go back to diapers for a few months and try again in the spring. (we have a new baby due in January, so it's now or March, according to the ped). We know she might regress, but think it's worth trying, regardless.

So -- advice? Our plan is some sort of training unders (cotton) and a weekend effort the weekend of Nov 6-7. She's in FT day care, and we're hoping to get them on board during the parent teacher conference the week before. Day care firmly believes in training early, when possible, so that's not a problem.

Any thoughts, experiences from those of you who made a run at early training? Any small training pants? (Hannas XS small enough for a scrawny kid?) About the only advice I don't want to hear is "you're crazy" or "it's impossible" since I (respectfully) disagree!

[AnnieW625]

We started at that age with DD1 and it just didn't work, but since you don't want details I'll leave it at that. We used both Hanna Andersson, and Gerber brand of training pants. The Gerbers were a tad smaller than the Hannas, but you can always try both and see which work better. We first tried the training pants, but DD1 was still having accidents though and they didn't help contain the pee that well so don't get frusterated if your daughter pees right through them.

FWIW I was trained at 2 yrs., and a few months and my brother was born the following March (I was 2 yrs. 9 mos.) and my mom said I regressed a bit so keep that in mind too. I agree that unless she really gets it now and is fully trained with no accidents by the beginning of December I'd wait until at least March, maybe even May or June when all of your attention is not being devoted to the baby. My DCP was great about working with DD1.

[kam]

That makes sense -- we're going to try, but are definitely willing to abandon if necessary. That's more why I'm not looking for "it won't work" stories. If it doesn't, we'll stop!

When you got DD1 started on the successful round, did you go every 30 minutes? Every hour? How did you work that? Pooping, we'll see the effort (and pretty much know when she goes), but wetting is going to be harder.

[lowrioh]

We gave potty training a go a couple of months ago with our DD and it was a disaster. She ended up refusing to sit on the potty at all so we gave up the power struggle and decided to try again in a couple of months. Right now she will tell us that she wants to go potty but she really wants to run around naked.

Anyway, I would say give it a shot. If she "gets" it then great...if not come back to it in a couple of weeks/months. I have several friends in the neighborhood who successfully trained their DDs before their first birthdays.

We got the Gerber training pants and they were fine.

[AnnieW625]

When you got DD1 started on the successful round, did you go every 30 minutes? Every hour? How did you work that? Pooping, we'll see the effort (and pretty much know when she goes), but wetting is going to be harder.

She was almost three when she finally got serious about going (and fully trained at 37 months) so most of the time she'd just tell us when she had to go, but early on I don't think we went more than an hour with her going. For car trips more than an hour the first couple of months she was trained she was always in a pull up.

[HIU8]

We did not start actively training DD until she was 24 months old. She had been using the potty 2x a day since about 16 months (but she has an older brother). She would rip off her diaper and sit on the potty at first and either something or nothing would happen. We started taking her at bedtime and when she woke up. Preschool started taking her to the bathroom every hour on the hour at 27 months. She was honestly PT outside of the house first. She was in underwear in the car and at preschool (with a pullup for naps). She didn't become fully PT until age 2.5 (PT at home and out). She is still in pullups at night. I guess what I am saying is that we didn't actively PT her. It was led completely by DD and it worked great that way for her. I kind of just let it be b/c we had done a week of naked PT with DS at age 3.5 and that was a HARD week for me and for him (but he did ask me to help him PT b/c his friends were PTing at preschool).

[kam]

Stupid question --

How did you handle cleaning accidents on the sofa/carpet? Are there training pants that are cotton on the inside (so they feel wet/dirty) but rubber/plastic on the outside so that it doesn't leak? LOL.

[crispychicky]

First off, I don't think you're crazy. If your DD is ready, she can do it.

Here's what worked for us: (All kids are different, YMMV)

We did naked-butt. I put DD in a dress, with no diapers/pullups or undies. The benefit of this is that both you and her know immediately that she peed. As soon as she goes, label it for her: "DD went pee-pee. Let's go pee-pee in the potty!" And then run her over to the potty and have her sit, even if you're sure her bladder is empty. It gets her used to sitting on the potty when she has 'that' feeling. The other benefit for me was that I soon realized that it took 45-50min for a big drink of water to work its way through her system. So, I then knew if she had a big drink, I would set the timer in the kitchen to go off at 40min, and then we'd go sit and read books on the potty until she peed. Of course, when she does go in the potty, make a HUGE deal out of it. It took a few days before my DD didn't have daytime accidents. I did put her in a diaper for naps and overnights.

Other things that I think helped us:
-Watch the Elmo DVD about potty training. My DD *loves* Elmo. We watched this over and over and over before we started training, so DD had a good idea about the whole process before we even started.
-Use a potty seat that fits on top of your normal toilet. I tried a little stand-alone potty, but DD could get off by herself, which meant after about 1 min, she would get up and run away. NOT good when you first start out. I ditched that potty after the first morning of training.
-DD did better when *I* was calm. I have to admit, I was a little nervous about the whole process and was worried that I'd have a pee/poo soaked furniture and house. I was suprised how little her 'puddles' were.

Good luck!

Also....if you're not making any progress after a couple of days, or your DD gets upset when you make her sit on the potty, I'd suggest giving up for now and try again in x number of weeks/months. You may get other opinions about this, but that's my 2 cents.


ETA: About the carpets/furniture....Most of our house has hardwood floors, but in the carpeted areas, I put down a bunch of those cheap plastic/vinyl tablecloths to catch any accidents. It was only for a few days, so not too bad. DD never had an accident on any furniture. I guess she doesn't sit still long enough!

[HIU8]

Honestly, I got the spray you use when you have a pet that goes on your carpet/couch. It worked fine. Most of DD's accidents were on tile floor b/c she realized she had to go but couldn't make it.

[kam]

Good call on the spray. I'll make sure we have some around. We're trying to figure out the details of how to handle naked/trainers. The only thing I know we're NOT going to do is pull-ups. She's got to feel wet to understand it.