Questions on Potty Training "Going Naked" Method

Hello, I am in the process of potty training my 3 yr old son as well. He already goes pop on his little potty and we got him to do that by rewards. He loves monster trucks so we started out with them. Well he was doing such a good job that we had to switch over to match box cars they are only a dollar not so bad on the wallet. We are working on wearing big boy pants now and knock on wood no accidents yet. I was even brave and took him to a friends house with his underwear on and we cont training over there. Rewards seem to work as long as they arent to extravigant i guess. We are going to the toy store later if he makes it all day. Hopefully fingers crossed training will be over soon. I would rather by underwear then diapers my husband says. Hope this helps
M. sahm of one

1. I am very nervous about the leather recliner! Put a large blanket in it to protect it. Or just try to keep distracting him whenever he wants to play in it.
2. I hate the idea of all that pee on the carpet. It is not practical to stay outside all day. We did our training in November so we couldn't stay outside all day. She ran around naked for the first few days, well, not naked she wore dresses or shirts just no pants. We had a few accidents the first day. Less on the second and by the third she was really getting the hang of it. Just keep some vinegar handy to clean it up.
3. How long will it take? I know at least 3 days, since we tried 2 days before and I gave up. (he didn't care that he was wet and he was refusing to sit on the potty) Consistency is key! If he knows Mama is serious, he will be more serious! There is no way to tell how long it will take though.
4. Do you offer rewards for sitting or results with this method? I offered rewards for results. If she peed she got an m&m and if she pooped she got 2.
5. What if I need to go out? What do I do then? Also nervous about him getting his car seat smelly. The second day of training we went out. I was so terrified of a mess I went to Target I think and got some of those plastic pants with the clothe on the inside. She wore those out. That way it still felt different from a diaper but it would protect if she wet herself.
6. Do I need to start first thing or is midday OK? The first day you can start whenever you want. Although morning would be better. After that you need to start first thing!
7. He poops randomly - no set pattern. Usually around 3, but sometimes at 10 am or 6 pm. I guess it will be messy and I may have to throw away some underwear. My daughter doesn't have a regular poop time. She pooped in her pants twice and was miserable about not having a diaper on at the times she had to poop. You need to get him to sit on the potty every hour and a half any way so make sure you get him on it around his general poop times.
8. Should I wait until my 12 month old stops teething? It seems like that may never happen! You need to start when YOU are ready! I have decided that children potty train when the parents are ready for it not when they are lol. When YOU are ready, you will be more consistent and insistent that he do it. Until then you will start and stop and get frustrated easily. Not that I didn't get frustrated cause I did. I was ready to stop midway through the first day but I was ready to get rid of diapers so I kept on going. If I hadn't been ready I would have stopped! No one can tell you the right time to start only YOU know if YOU are ready!
9. If I have to use a pull-up at some point during the first few days, will that mess everything up and hinder progress? I would have to say yes. Go get you some of those plastic pants with the liners in them or the thicker training pants and the seperate plastic liner if you want. They work great and are cheaper than pull ups too!
10. Any resources to point me to? Nope I went at it blind. If you want to read my struggle with it you can go here: http://candacej73.blogspot.com/2007_11_01_archive.html Start at the bottom, there are stories all throughout the month.

Hi A.,

I thought I'd respond as I've JUST gone through this with my daughter. She is now pretty much potty-trained (yay!) First off I have to say, seriously, they will do it when they are READY. This just happened to be my daughter's 'time' which was 2 days after her 3rd birthday. And I know that different methods work for different children. For example, I have a friend that uses rewards. She wraps tiny dollar store gifts and puts them in a basket in the bathroom. So when her child goes on the potty, she gets a treat. That method did NOT work with my daughter, she simply wanted the treat NOW! Also used by some people is a sticker chart. Again, not something that worked with my child. BUT if your child responds to rewards then I suggest those methods! Here's what worked for my daughter Eva. I put her in underwear around the house. Yes, I expected a mess, some accidents. But I have this solution called Kids and Pets (I highly recommend it in general - it works on blood, urine, feces, vomit - all the nasty stuff that comes along with having children ;) Not only does it clean up, it deodorizes and neutralizes the odor - I swear it works! Keep it handy! My method was to just have her in the underwear all day until bed time when I'd put a pullup on her. I too didn't want to confuse her so I kept that up when out and about. I put her in the underwear (and prayed ;) but always travelled with a change of underwear/clothing, some wipes, and a foldable potty seat. They even sell disposable potty toppers. Another recommendation is the 'piddle pad'. That's for the car seat. It absorbs in the event they have an accident. Another thing is I just always showed my daughter when I was going to the bathroom. I would say, what a big girl mommy is, good job mom! And now she praises me when I go, it's cute. We made a big deal out of it - I took her shopping for a new step stool, hand wash and underwear. She loved that...I hope this information is helpful! I do strongly believe that if the child is not ready, you need to set it aside for a little while and try again later. That's how it was for us (I tried her at 2 1/2 and she could care less, but once 3, she was all about it!) GOOD LUCK!

**First of all I would suggest that you make a commitment to stay at home for 1 full week. If you have to go out try and wait until your "relief" comes home.
**Secondly, no pull ups unless he is going to sleep (naps, bedtime only)
**Thirdly, make it an important event you are beginning on MONDAY. Take your little man to the store and let HIM pick out the new underware (even if he already has some). Also, let HIM choose his new "Big Boy" outfit that he only gets to wear when he is completely accident free for an entire day! Build it up as much as possible. What I did was take my child to the store on a Friday. Then he/she was asking to wear new goods all weekend. I replied that I would need to wash them first. This builds excitement and anticipation. Then on Monday put him in his new, fresh underware and shorts/t-shirt. Remind him that he doesn't want to get them soiled or messed up.
Lastly, ask frequently throughout the day if he needs to go (maybe 1 time each hour or so). Be prepared for accidents. My son had 6-8 the first day, 3-4 the second and 1-2 (including 1 stinky!)the third day. After that he was completely potty trained. I let him wear his new outfit on the 5th day. He used pull-ups at night for several months, but was dry most of the time so I quit pull-ups after around 3 months later.

I have a 6 yr old son and a 4 yr old daughter. They both were completely trained in less than a week.

Good luck to you and be committed :) Stay home too :)
A.

Ok, A., take a big, deep breath!! I did the "going naked" method with my daughter after trying everything else, and it worked! :) Here is what worked for me.
answers to your questions...
1)We have leather furniture too - layer some big beach towels on the furniture
2) Towels and sheets on the floor too. We stayed in the living room and brought her toys in there and had more than the usual TV/movies. Also brought in the training potty and sat on it every hour. Don't force it. Sometimes she only sat for 3 seconds, but I felt my point had been made. And yet we did a lot of laundry.
3) We did it for 1 week CONSISTENTLY!!
4) My daughter liked stickers, we bought a small poster and put it on the wall. 1 sticker for tt and 2 for poopie. She also got 1 or 2 skittles. I didn't like the idea of extra sugar, but what is 10 skittles in 24 hours anyways?
5)I ran as many errands before hand and if we went out she wore a pullup and it came off IMMEDIATELY when we came home. had a bath towel on the car seat after big girl panties came out of the house. By the way, at the end of the week she got to pick out her own underwear and of course it was princess. I told her that Cinderella didn't like tt on her so don't tt on Cinderella. She seemed to get that.
6)We started first thing. I know that mid day is easier for momma, but to him what is the difference?
7) My daughter poops randomly too, just watch for leg twitching and hands grabbing things.
8)don't wait, it could last for a LONG time.
9)pull ups just messed us up, the cool alert ones, the cheap ones, it didn't matter. She would wet them anyways
10)my best resource was my gut and talking to friends.
I wish you the best!! GOOD LUCK!
S.

Here is an idea I'm thinking of doing with my son who is 2yrs old. Underwear and rubber pants or a pull up over it. He knows where the pee and poop come from, knows how to sit on the potty and will bring me a diaper when he is poopy (doesn't care how wet his is though) but will not find the patience to sit there till he pees. He knows when he pees as well because he will put his hand there and say pee pee!! He is way ahead of the game with it came to behaving like this compared to my daughter and that is what I finally ended up doing with her, underwear only at home and a pull up over it if we went any where. Only took a couple of days for he to get the idea!!

As far as you worrying about your carpet and car seat, you have 2 kids, invest in a good carpet shampooer. And car seats were made to be taken apart and washed!!

~S.

I know what you are going through. I have been trying to potty train my son off and on for a few months now. We use pull ups when we are out and about and underwear when we are at home. There are messes and I tell him I am proud of him when he does go and we clap. But he has to be the one to be ready. We have good days with no accidents and then we have lazy days where he refuses to use the potty. It's a work in progress and you have to have patience. The going naked thing will be hard for when your child is ready for school because the teachers won't want your child to strip naked to go. I tried it with my son and realized that it was the tight clothes that confused him. I wear loose shorts on him in the house and he feels more comfy to pull those up and down than jeans and things like that. I'm right there with you so good luck.

Boy you have allot to read through! I'm potty training my daughter right now and it's definitely different from a boy. With my son, we did the naked outside thing. Fortunately for us, we were in California at the time and had plenty of nice weather. He liked the peeing on the fence like the dog thing and when he was inside we had pull ups on him. We never called them diapers... big boy pants or pull ups. It's allot of work but I asked him constantly when we were in the house if he needed to go to the potty. There is now a "peter potty" that you can get on line at Target that is a urinal for potty training boys. Maybe, he'll think of it as a game and use it. As for the poop... we just acted very upset if he went in his pull ups and we would have him watch/help dump the poop in the potty before throwing it away and putting on a new pull up. As for going out... my daughter and I go to the bathroom about three times within an hour of shopping. My son use to go once and most of the time it was so they can check it out! My son did well with praise and hugs and kisses. Huggies came out with a special pull ups box that you put stickers on that my daughter loved. She'll be three at the end of June and she's just been taking it slow. It only took a couple of months for my son to get potty trained. He had just turned two and I've heard so many people say girls are easier. With my daughter there is allot of time reading and singing too. Just stick to it, keep your eyes open to the gotta go signs and be persistent! Good Luck!

I think your stressing to much. I think you should put hi in pull ups when out and keep asking him if he has to go or taking him anyway and trying to get him to go.And at the house just keep him in a diaper or underware and try to get him to go frequently to keep him from wetting everything.If he's not ready then wait a little longer and put him back in a diaper or pull ups.

You're just going to have to go for it. I trained my two boys when they were two to two and a half. Wearing cloth training pants worked well with my first boy... he didn't like being wet. This didn't work with my second, so I just let him go naked at first. He was harder to train.

I decided to lay out a big plastic sheeting type thing in most of the living room and just sort of set up camp there. I made sure I didn't have any plans for the week and decided it'd be my potty training week... no looking back.

I did end up having to go out a few times, so I either put plastic panties on him or cut up a garbage bag and laid it over the carseat.

You'll need a lot of patience, but just try to keep him in your sight and when you catch him in the act of peeing or pooping, rush him to the potty and hopefully some of it will end up there. Keep potty chairs at different spots throughout the house, so they're always close by and available. If he doesn't warn you or try to go to the potty on his own, then give him a few practice drills.

After cleaning up the mess. Tell him, "Remember what you do when you need to go pee or poopie? We hurry to the potty. Let's practice...." Take him to where he had his last accident and say something like, "Uh-oh, what do you do when you have to pee or poop? We hurry to the potty." Then walk him quickly to the potty. "Pull down your undies, sit on the potty and then we pee(poop)." Direct him into each of these actions when you're saying the words. Then go through a practice drill a few more times.

This is how I did it with 2 year olds... I think it'll probably be easier for yours to catch on, because he's older. It can be frustrating at times, just remain patient and know that it'll get better and better each day and he'll be trained before you know it. Also expect times when they'll be doing real well and you'll think they're trained and then they revert back. Just keep at it and they get it... it can be like that saying sometimes.."3 steps forward, 2 steps back" The key is not to give up though.

I hope some of what I did can give you some ideas. Good luck!

I did the "going naked" thing and my daughter never wet the floor or furniture. I just planned to stay at home the first 2-3 days unless I ABSOLUTELY had to go out, in which case I waited until right after she used the potty and then went. Unfortunately, accidents are going to happen, and you may have to clean up a few messes, but once he "gets it" those accidents will be few and far between. My daughter was also very random about pooping, but I found that she would go whenever she went to pee so it wasn't an issue. I too wanted to avoid messy underwear, so that's why we did the naked thing. Plus for some reason, even though she didn't care about going in her diaper/pull ups, she NEVER wanted to have an accident on the floor. It's like they sort of "know" that's not an option! I do know several friends who say that their sons took a LOT longer to potty train than their daughters, and were still trying at 4 because they just weren't ready. I've never had to train a boy, so I can't say for sure. My daughter never needed a tangible reward, because she was thrilled with the praise I gave her for using the potty. Also, she badly wanted to go to school--she starts three year old preschool in the fall and when she was two and started talking about school, I just told her that she had to wear panties to be able to go to school. That was an incentive for her. My sister tried putting Cheerios in the potty and having her son "aim & shoot" and that seemed to work for him. Just some ideas!

Perhaps you should consider waiting a little longer. This sounds like it is stressful for you. One of my sons was actually four when he fully potty trained. At that point, he just trained himself, which was such a relief since I was busy with three children under age five. You don't have to do all or nothing with the naked method. Just let him play naked in the kitchen (or other hard floor area) for a few hours each day. The idea is that he will be more aware of his bodily functions when he directly sees and feels them. Each time he "goes" when naked will build his awareness. I wouldn't let him near carpet or furniture at this point until he is consistently choosing to use the potty (when naked) rather than do it on himself/the floor. As he gets better, you can transition to encouraging him to be just as aware while wearing pullups or underwear. Relax, it will come. Good luck.

I'm still working on training my son (and therefore seeking ideas myself!), but the one piece of input I have is to put a Pull-Up (or those vinyl underpants if you're worried about him thinking it's ok to go in the Pull-Up) on over the big boy underpants if you're worried about being out, ruining carpet, etc. It's still somewhat uncomfortable (and messy for you) if he has an accident, but you don't have to worry about the carseat, etc. getting dirty. Good luck!