Have you started potty training your little one? What age did you start? How's it going? What tips and tricks have you got to give to others that are going through it?
I started potty training my daughter when she was about 18 months old. Some parents start earlier, others start later, depending on the child's emotional development. Starting early served no real purpose, cause she was constantly have to relearn the process. One of the major obstacles was that she didn't want to use the little bitty kids potty and insisted on getting up on the comode. And, considering how short she was, that was a big problem. But, with lots of patience and time, she got the hang of using the bathroom, rather than wearing diapers during the day, though it took well over a year. She was not fully night time potty trained until almost four years old. Once we got serious about night time potty training, the process took less than two weeks with only one accident, once we cut out ALL liquids (except for a couple sips of water), right before bedtime. Encouraging my daughter to go to the bathroom at least twice before bedtime, also helped. She would go right before brushing her teeth and then we'd read a story or watch a little TV show and then she would go to the bathroom again and then onto bed. This routine really worked to simplify the process. The biggest difference between daytime and night time potty training was due to age. When she was going through day time potty training as a toddler, it was frustrating, cause she couldn't communicate with me the way she was able to later during the night time potty training process. If I were to give any advice on potty training, I would say to wait until the child is emotionally ready and can actually communicate with words, around two years old or some time later. You'll save yourself so many headaches. And, the child won't feel so rushed, being part of the process.
AAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!! I started potty training a month ago and it is sooooooo hard to keep up the schedule. I started by letting her pick out her potty seat and things to decorate it like stickers. At first she did not want to go into the bathroom so I had to go in and show her what to do. Then once she would go in she did not want to sit on the potty LOL. Now she has gotten past that but now she does not want to pull down her Huggies and sit LOL. She still has not gotten over this one but we are working on it. I take her to her potty every 2 hours (or at least try) even if she does not have to go just so that she gets used to it. She also has books and videos on potty training which she likes to watch and hopefully get her in the potty mood LOL
Potty training takes so much time. It's not going to happen overnight. And, there are no shortcuts to making potty training work. Too much pressure or negativity over potty time is just going to cause her to dislike potty training. At least, that was the situation with my own child. When I was potty training my daughter, I made it optional and she was more than happy to use the potty cause that meant she didn't have to wear diapers. Kids that age like to have choices. My biggest issue during the potty training phase was how she would put EVERYTHING in the big people toilet, including toys and clothes. Not sure what was going through her head on that situation. Maybe she thought the potty was some kind of recycling bin for everything.
