Kayla with her first Potty Chart
I was terrified of potty training. Maybe Kayla was ready, but I wasn't. The idea of cleaning up the accidents or having to take a toddler to a dirty public restroom with a 3-second emergency notice was not appealing to me. It was a hurdle I knew we would have to jump at some point, but I just kept postponing it. Diapers were so easy and, when I thought of the alternative, I just didn't mind changing them.
Sure, we had a training potty, and Kayla would sit on it once in a while, but I wasn't really doing much to encourage it.
Then one day Kayla comes up to me and says, "Mommy I need to go pee-pee." So we went and sat her down on the potty and she just did it, like she'd been doing it for years.
Then she didn't do it again. She wouldn't do it again. I knew she could, she just wouldn't. We offered new coloring books or elmo movies to no avail.
Then came a big box of hand-me-down dress-up dresses. Nice ones. Disney princess ones. One look at that and Kayla was excited.
So we made a deal. Every time Kayla used the potty she would get a sticker on her sticker chart. When the sticker chart was full she got to pick one dress from the box. We started with 5 stickers, then 10, then 20. She wasn't too excited about doing her number 2 on the potty so we made a deal that if she did it once she would automatically get a new dress-up. A day or two later--success.
I've heard other moms say that you just need to wait until they are ready and the kiddos will practically train themselves. I guess that's what we did and it worked for us. And it wasn't nearly as hard as I thought it would be.
I still don't like public restrooms though. They are not designed with small people in mind. And who ever invented those self-flushing toilets...seriously who needs the boogie man when there is something that scary.
2 comments:
The worst is when you're at a place like Wal-Mart and you can't take your cart in and your older child is having a potty emergency...and there's no "family" bathroom. The only stall big enough to accomodate 3 of you is the handicapped stall, but the toilet is too high for your child to sit down on without help. And you don't want to set your crawling child on the floor of the Wal-Mart bathroom. So, I ended up putting my 1 1/2 year old sideways between my legs and lifting my 3 yr. old onto the toilet. It was the worst bathroom experience ever! :) But, had anyone been watching, it would have been pretty funny, I think!
Way to go Kayla! Logan still isn't very interested. Every once in awhile he'll mention something about it but always runs away screaming if we try. Our Olivia on the other hand, she's just about ready. She's always trying to climb up. She seems too young to me now, but maybe we should just let her and Logan will follow? Who wants to be outdone by their younger sister? :)
Post a Comment