Potty Training Material

Once upon a potty is a book we have. My daughter is 20 months old and also very advanced and strong willed. She has shown interest in the potty since she was 15 months old, so we bought a potty, but we haven't pushed the issue at all. She will sometimes choose to sit on it. I'm not planning on really trying any "training" until she's 2. I personally plan on skipping the pull ups because they are too much like diapers and will just have her sit periodically until we have success. Good luck!

My daughter is 19 months and acts as though she's 3. I'm guessing we are equally tired :-)

I offer the chance to go to the "potty" when I go, and before baths and bedtime. She will tell you yes or no most likely.
I never make a big deal about it one way or the other for now. Dora's potty book has helped with the interest as well.

Trust yourself, no one knows your kid better than you!

Potty Training in One Day

My friend taught me this and it worked, even with my child with special needs. Granted it took two days instead of one (and longer follow up).

The big idea is that you potty train your child in one day. You can start with a 2 year old. It’s best to do it before they get in to the ‘no’s, when they still want to please you. But it still works perfectly when they are older. It is not an issue of waiting until ‘they are ready’. I am not a naturally cheerful person, but I put on a big act all day. Amazing how it works. One cannot get angry or show frustration (trust me I know – I’ve done it with three kids). Cheerful! Happy! Enthusiastic!

You and your child spend the entire day from after breakfast until dinner in the bathroom. You fill them with as much liquid as possible as early as possible for as long as possible so they have to pee a lot and get to practice feeling the sensation of needing to pee a lot and of running to the potty a lot. If they take an afternoon nap, stop the liquid 2 hours before nap time (I diaper for the nap time, but my friend did not).

The child wears a tshirt and panties (thick training ones or thin normal ones) that she can pull down on her own easily.

You two play games, sing songs, have a great time together.

Then you say, “Are your panties dry?”
She feels her panties. “Yes!”
“Good job. You kept your panties dry! You get a skittle! Let’s run to the potty! Isn’t this fun?” You sit on the potty to show how much fun it is to do. She sits on the potty. Have a big drink of chocolate milk

The point is not to go pee on the potty or to wait until she goes on the potty. The point is to keep the panties dry (the derivative is that she pees in the potty).

Every few minutes you stop your song/game/puzzle and say, “Are your panties dry?”
She feels her panties. “Yes!”
“Good job. You kept your panties dry! You get a skittle! Let’s run to the potty! Isn’t this fun?” You sit on the potty to show how much fun it is to do. She sits on the potty. ! Have a big drink of chocolate milk!

Repeat every five/ten minutes. Eventually she will have drunk so much that she will have to go. It doesn’t matter if she has an accident. Be cheerful. “That’s okay. Let’s clean it up! (Have her help you.) Sit on the potty. Yeah! Let’s get on dry panties.’ In a few minutes, ask her, “Are your panties dry?”
She feels her panties. “Yes!”
“Good job. You kept your panties dry! You get a skittle! Let’s run to the potty! Isn’t this fun?” You sit on the potty to show how much fun it is to do. She sits on the potty. Have a big drink of chocolate milk.

In the afternoon, practice running from another room to the potty, repeat everything.

They will get a lot of practice feeling dry (treats), sitting on the potty (balance, coordination, success being independent). And eventually even peeing on the potty. The focus is on keeping their panties dry!

Before the Big Day
Let them be in a diaper. Don’t worry about potty training and previous struggles with it. For a week ahead of time, talk about what fun mommy and child are going to have, a whole day together – no sister, no daddy, no etc. We are going to have fun! You get to keep your panties dry! We will play! We will run to the potty! We will go peepee on the potty! So exciting.

The Big Day
Do not: answer the phone, check the computer, make dinner, call about the roofer coming.

Do: Put on an apron with good pockets filled with little favorite treats (skittles, m and ms, goldfish – whatever she doesn’t usually get). Fill sippy cups (stoppers out so easy to drink more fast) with whatever she will down huge amounts of (I never gave my kids full strength juiee or chocolate milk, but they got as much as they wanted that day). Stock the bathroom with toys, books (not a movie player), music, little puzzles. (Don’t have them all out to see and be overwhelmed with – have them in the bathroom closet or under the changing table – bring out a few things at a time to play with.

She will get lots of experience and joy out of keeping her panties dry and lots of experience running to the potty and experience in peeing in the potty. You are well on your way to having her out of diapers.

For the night time, I kept her in diapers. The reward for keeping her diaper dry for three nights in a row was getting to wear her panties to bed. Stop liquids of any kind 2 hours before bed. If she regularly has a wet diaper at night, no big deal. Tons of kids have small bladders. Just let it be. Make it a big deal to get to wear panties, but not cajoling/punishing/teasing/stressing about it. One of my girls wore diapers to bed for quite a while after being fully potty trained during the day.

You’ll do a great job!

free video mailed to you: http://www.pull-ups.com/na/potty_training_dvd.aspx

Potty Training 1-2-3 by Ezzo was great. I haven't followed all their rules, but my son is on the potty a lot now.

Each kid is different. So just go with the flow, talk about pottying a lot. Let her see you go. Let her flush for you and say "bye bye poop" or whatever you want. I have looked for the thicker 'training pants' but don't find them at the stores. So we use pull-ups or plain underwear during the evening when we're at home and able to use the potty every half hour or so. Good luck. I agree to check out the library. There are a lot of videos you could check out. We got one about Elmo that my son liked.

I really liked the book No More Diapers for Ducky and Once Upon a Potty for her. They also have a video of Once Upon a Potty for girls, but I really did not like the video. It is a very short video so it would keep the attention of an 18 month old, but I only let my daughter watch it a couple of times. I would skip Pull Ups because they really are no different than a diaper. I would instead get the thick training pants with covers. I only used Pull Ups at night time. To get some more ideas for books to help with potty training, I would go to your local library and see what they have. That is what I did, and I found lots of good stuff! Best of Luck to you!!

Hi Heather,
My daughter is 18 months as well and she just loves using the potty like her big sister. What we have done is just put her potty in the bathroom so she can come in and sit there and "hang" out with us while we go or with her sister. She always sits on it before bath time (on her own) and when she stands up we clap! She thinks its hysterical. This is kind of what we did with our older daughter as well. She trained in a week...fingers crossed that it goes as smoothly with #2. However we won't even attempt to really train her until she is about 2.5 yrs. Oh and she carries her potty around the house sometimes sitting on it in front of the tv :)

Honestly, I think books and videos are not needed. If you start training when your child is showing signs of readiness and an appropriate age, you don't need to have an extended process. She is too young to connect books and videos to herself.
I would skip the pullups too. They extend the training process. If you want her to understand what happens when she pees, cloth diaper her or get multi layer cloth training pants with a waterproof outer layer or plastic pants. I waited til my kids were closer to three, I skipped the whole little pottie thing. I didn't need kids to occasionally go in the potty. When they were ready, I took them every hour and a half without fail, throughout the day, diapering for naps and bedtime. I didn't ask if they had to or wanted to go, it was not a game, it was expected behavior - so I didn't offer any kinds of bribes or rewards either.
Good luck

I will jut answer about books.
The Potty Train
Everybody Poops
Once Upon a Potty (girl)
Potty! By Milo Freeman
It Hurts When I Poop if you have any issues with #2 (whick a lot of people have)
Good luck
P.S My DD is 5 and has been potty trained for years and still likes to read these books...

My daughter started to show interest around a yr and a half as well and I tried a reading her books and showing her DVDs I found at toysrus,but it all ended with a lot of frustration on my part and unnecessary pressure on her part.
It was just too early. I pushed for it when I noticed she showed interest because all the other moms at the local watering hole said that their children were potty trained by then. HA! I can't see how that could of been done without making my daughter feel inadequate. She just wasn't ready.
I decided to wait it out, she couldn't possibly go to high school in diapers. At 2 I showed her how to use the potty, she showed interest again but then stop. At 2 1/2 I did the same thing again, you sit here, flush, wipe and wash your hands...yade, yade, yada...and then one day out of the blue she just told me that she wanted to use the potty. She got on, peed, flushed, wiped (not doing a very good job but trying was good enough for me) and washed her hands. ALL without my help!
What I'm trying to tell you is, when they're ready they'll do it. All you have to do is teach them how and just let them decide on their own when they're ready.

Let her come in the bathroom with you. We read 'Everyone Poops' by Tari Gomi when DS would sit on the potty (be careful - you may end up spending your life in there if they like the books too much). We switched completely to underwear when we started (pull ups at night) since we thought sometimes diapers and sometimes underwear would be confusing. If we had it to do over, we would have just skipped the nighttime pull ups and done it all at once. We did not do 'rewards' of any kind - just explained that pee and poop go in the toilet (we did a Baby Bjorn toilet seat cover/insert - then there is no potty to clean and she can go on the same toilet as mommy and daddy - a plus from her perspective). I think you're right about the timing - right now she is probably enthusiastic about pleasing you. Soon she will be much more concerned about being her 'own' person.
Good luck :)