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Potty Training is not for the weak of heart (or stomach for that matter). You hear the horror stories and wonder how you will ever survive. You’re bombarded by advice from well meaning friends & family members, articles and blogs listing tips and how-to’s and the endless books and tools to make potty training easier. Then there are the parents that feel like they need to brag about how early their child was potty trained like it’s a competition they are determined to win while subtly trying to rub your nose in it. Will you ever get to the golden potty finish line?
One day you will work up the courage to start and you buy all the how-to potty training books you can find. You start talking up how cool it is to use a big kid potty with your child to get them excited about the process. You pick up your potty training book of choice to read thoroughly but have to lay it right back down again because “enter any excuse here – I have a toddler”. You make a special event out of letting your child pick out their own potty and “cute panties/underwear”. You make one last minute attempt to prepare yourself by picking up that book again and barely skim the headlines – where are the Cliff’s Notes? You wake up one morning and you declare “Today is the Day” full of enthusiasm for how prepared you are and you lay out tarps (think Dexter style), trap them in a room, strip them down to their skivvies or less and you’re ready to Potty Train Your Child in 2 Days. Then your sweet child takes one look at the potty, strips her panties off and flings them across the room as she ceremoniously jumps on the couch, spreads her legs and pees in the one spot not covered by the tarps.
Where did I go wrong?
Well for one thing, you’re working with a toddler – not a tiny robot that follows your every command. Some people claim that potty training a little human is similar to potty training a dog and you can use the same techniques like increasing their boundaries and rewards. In my case, I am forever grateful that the shelter I adopted my fur baby from 12 years ago had already tackled that obstacle because he neither respected boundaries or liked treats for a long time – but he never had accidents. Since both of my children seem to follow in their older brother’s footsteps, I should have known that this technique wouldn’t work.
Bribing v. Rewarding
I am not above bribing my kids to do things I need them to do in the moment, but it is not sustainable for long term goals, mentally or financially. Offering rewards for using the potty worked at first but then it started to turn into bribes and even threats when patience ran thin. We tried sticker charts and that seemed to work at first and even did big kid experience rewards, like a Mommy-Daughter theater date to the local high school production of The Little Mermaid.
The rewards worked for awhile but the enthusiasm faded and the accidents increased and she wanted to go back to wearing diapers again. I was getting frustrated because I never thought she would be perfectly potty trained in time for her first day of preschool and I started comparing our journey to others and couldn’t understand why I couldn’t make it work. I was more concerned with what others were doing and how I was failing at potty training my child. Then it hit me – I was making it all about me and I was trying to control the situation.
Let it Go and it Will Flow
How many times have I listened to Elsa tell me to Let it Go and why didn’t I follow her advice from the start? I needed to let go of my control issues and self-imposed deadlines. Here is this little human whose independence and defiance is growing everyday and as any parent knows, control only goes so far. You can’t completely control how your child learns to use the potty – and that’s what they’re doing, learning. Every child is different and learns on their own terms and we are right there in the trenches learning too. Once I started looking at it as potty learning it all changed. I let my toddler lead the way and taught her how to listen to her body and it instilled a sense of pride far greater than any of the rewards ever did, for both of us. We found books that hit home with her and made her want to go pee pee and poo in the potty, just like the princesses. Now instead of reminding her that she needs to try and use the potty all the time, she is the one that reminds me and I am so proud of her.
Our favorite potty learning tools
If there is one thing that I learned from this potty training adventure is that no matter how prepared you think you are, no matter how many books and articles you read (or skim), no matter what advice people say worked for them, your child will ultimately be the one in charge and you just have to go with the flow (literally). Once you let them lead the way and stop setting unrealistic deadlines for you both, potty training, or what I like to call potty-learning is a much happier and smoother phase of life. Good luck!
