According to my mom, potty training us wasn’t hard. Kids are usually fully potty trained at two years old in my country. My mom often shares funny stories of how I’d refuse to sit on the chimmy (as we call it in Jamaica). “You used to sit in that chair and rock until you piss up yourself,” she’d say in her thick Jamaican accent. I was clearly a stubborn child, and I passed that trait along to my daughter.
Princess understands the concept of going to the potty. But if she doesn’t feel like going, it’s a wrap.
Since her introduction to the throne at 18 months, she’s picked up on the routine of doing her business when she would wake up in the morning, after school, after dinner, and before bedtime. On weekends we exchange pull-ups for big girl panties (except for when we go out).
When she’s at daycare, Princess would go sometimes. She also has moments when she’d rather go on a potty strike. Many have told me, “She’ll go when she’s ready.” But, that’s not necessarily true.
I think that’s an excuse for laziness, quite frankly. Potty training is one of the many things I signed up for when I made the decision to enter motherhood. So I’ve decided to enroll Princess in what I call, potty bootcamp.
With the help of a friend, I’m kicking things into high gear. Jen has chosen to have her cutie pie go commando the entire day to make getting on and off the potty easy breezy. It makes total sense!! Before you start with the cruel mommy comments, read on. You never know, you may get inspired to try a new training technique too.
Since Princess and I were both home and feeling under the weather, I figured this would be the perfect opportunity to give this potty bootcamp idea a try. As soon as she got out of bed, it was bye-bye training pants. I couldn’t have her running around completely naked, so I grabbed one of her daddy’s tanks which she sported most of the day. The key is to be her shadow the entire day.
I’ve been on her like white on rice. She sits on the potty every half hour to an hour (sometimes more often because she drinks lots of water).
Everything was going smoothly until I got a phone call. The talkaholic that I am stayed on the darn thing a little too long. I completely lost track of time. I looked up and saw pee all over the chair. “Why didn’t you tell me you had to potty?” I asked.
“I have to potty,” she replied.
I had to try my hardest not to laugh. Luckily, the pee was contained. Clean up was a snap.
About an hour later Princess ran out of the room screaming, “I potty mommy!”
Ugh. I went into the room and saw liquid EVERYWHERE. It was on the table, chair, floor, and there were even droplets in her hair and all over her shirt. After looking closely, I realized she’d mix her water with pee.
Anyway, there were a couple of other minor accidents, including a carpet spill.
But that’s what potty bootcamp is all about. Overall, my baby girl did pretty well. She only wore training pants during naptime and bedtime. We went for a walk with without them too.
We have a ways to go. But, I’m hoping to have this potty thing down pat in five days. Hey, I was potty trained at two years old. She can do it too. Stay tuned to find out what happens at daycare. This should be interesting.
Please share your kiddos potty training experience.
She really looks cute and she is starting to school, I am wondering maybe would you please take a look at my colorful story book for little children who just start to school? Here is my page link 🙂
http://tuts.3d2dizayn.com/index.php/2012/08/some-story-books-illustrated-by-me/
I really like your potty logo! We did the bottomless thing too over a weekend and it worked great (I seriously need to get on the ball writing a post about the details of that). It all started when we couldn’t keep a diaper on Nia around 21/22 months so we “went with the flow.” We used disposable diapers at night and naps but noticed they were staying dry so didn’t buy more when they ran out. Now she just wears plastic training pants over her regular ones at night which help with accidents which she rarely has. She’s such a skinny mini that that the conventional underwear (and branded with too much pink/characters IMO) didn’t fit so we got old school white training pants online which I’ll hold onto for #2. Looking forward to hearing how the rest of potty boot camp goes!
I keep missing your posts! Hmph…
I’ve always said that I let the kids”potty train” themselves. When they were ready, they would take off their diapers and hop on the toilet. I quit buying tons of diapers because they wasted them so it was commando during the day. No pull up or potty chairs involved. We didn’t have many accidents because I made it a game of who could get to the bathroom the quickest when the pee was coming. Both kids were potty trained by 20 months.
Cool! I just checked out your page with all the cool illustrations. Great stuff!
I remember you were telling me about those plastic training pants at Blogher! I’m so happy to hear that Nia is doing well with potty training. Thanks for the compliment on the logo. I just came up with it-spur of the moment. I did it in photoshop with some help from my buddy Chade. Potty boot camp is going pretty ok so far. It is a lot of work, but seeing Princess have fun makes me enjoy it. I’m watching her grow up. It’s so rewarding.
Really? That’s a great method. 20 months? Amazing. The most important thing is that they had fun. We reward Princess with lots of hugs and kisses. Today she’s getting Pizza for a job well done.
That is so funny, lol! The things we go through lol! What actually encouraged and finally trained my little one was getting her one of those cute, little seats that go on top of the toilet seat. Once she realized that she was going the same way eveybody else did, it made her really feel like a big kid. She wanted nothing to do wit the little potty anymore, and loved hopping up on the big girl seat.
I may not make it through the boot camp…I laughed so hard I nearly wet my self. This is an AWESOME post and I thank you for the laugh. Hang in there…just takes time.
Hey thanks a lot 🙂
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