Aug
10
Today, Lucy woke up with a dry diaper. She answered my good morning greeting with, “I have to pee.”
“Do you want to pee in the potty?” I asked.
She nodded her head and in 10.3 seconds she was naked from the waist down and sitting on the potty. Three renditions of Mr. Sun later, she had done it.
Julia and I threw her a potty party right then and there. Lucy beamed and shouted, “I did it! I did it!” She was so proud of herself. We called daddy and grandma to share the news.
“So, she’s ready to train. She should be done by the time the baby comes!” I’m told.
And my response is, “Maybe.”
I have no intention of punishing Lucy for her accomplishment by putting pressure on her. I’m going to let her enjoy her success fully and thoroughly. I’ll remind her of it, sharing the instant replay of the glorious time she peed in the potty. And I’ll let her choose to do it again. When she’s ready. I have faith in her that it will be soon.
I am a laissez-faire potty trainer, much to the chagrin of certain family members who cannot understand why I haven’t tried to “break” Lucy, especially with a new baby on the way. “Do you really want to change two sets of diapers?” they ask. And I say, yes, if the alternative is cleaning up pee puddles and poopy underwear, not to mention those hideous plastic mattress covers and the nightly washing of bedsheets. I don’t want to do any of that. And I don’t want to put my child through the humiliation of needing that kind of assistance. Take it from a “pee hog” who had trouble making it to the potty and keeping things dry at night, it is more inconvenient and shameful for the accident-maker than it is for the cleaner-upper.
And so, I’ve let my children take the lead on potty training. My role is simple: I make a potty chair available in every bathroom in the house along with potty books. I issue an invitation to use the potty chair when I go to the bathroom, because my kids are usually just a step and a half behind me, anyway. I make myself available whenever they want to try and I’m one hell of a cheerleader when they do. And I try to maintain an open dialogue about it saying things like, “Once you choose to pee in the potty, you’ll wear underwear instead of a diaper.” But that’s it. That’s all I do.
Some people call this lazy. I say, “If the shoe fits, I’ll wear it.” I’m all about free shoes.
Comments
8 Cool Kids Commented
Stuff I Do
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Stuff You Should Do
You know, Stuff.
Yes, children and not pets.
(And for us, the relaxed approach to potty training HAS worked.)
The bottom line is that you can’t rush kids into potty training. You can either beat them and yourself up for 6 months trying to force it, or you can just wait the six months out and let your kid happily decide that it’s time. One way is a lot less stressful and scarring.
You’re a good mama… and you and I wear the same shoes, it seems (the lazy shoes).
We potty trained the same way with Amy. Easy, stress free, she was dry at home for months before we tried going nappy free at the supermarket and so, I didn’t find it that hard at all – except for the pooing in the potty thing, that took a good 8 months after everything else to be done.
I’m planning on doing the same stress free thing with Isaac.
I felt all kinds of pressure to potty train Annabelle and it just caused melt downs (both for me and her). The day she turned 3 I asked her if she was a big girl and she said yes. The proceeded to throw the diapers in the garbage adn was pretty much totally trained in 3 days. She had to make that decision on her own. And I still cheer her on more than a year later:)
I feel the same way about potty training. Elyse has been using the potty off and on for months now, but if I start to encourage her to use it more, she always uses it less. When she is ready, she will do it. Until then it’s Pull-Ups for now.
And even worse are the comments like I got from my mother…”I don’t understand why she isn’t trained already. You were potty trained at a year old!” Um…yeah! My dd, now 7, was right at 3 1/2. I tried every method known to man, and until she was ready, it just wasn’t gonna happen. And (haha) in my relatives face, because no, she did not start Kindergarten wearing diapers!
I totally agree with your approach. My 1st, a girl, was NOT a quick trainer, especially since she had undiagnosed sensory issues, and still had daytime accidents at 5, and wasn’t able to try bedtime w/o GoodNites until age 7. My son, on the other hand, simply decided he was done with diapers just before his second birthday. Yeah that bends the mind a bit, eh?
I’m like you… they will do it when they are ready.
I hade 3 in diapers at the same time at one point … it was FUN! NOT, but really, I didn’t mind.
I don’t know of any kid who walked down the aisle in a diaper! They all graduate to knickers eventaully!