Yet Another Potty Training Question - Brentwood,CA

You can't make her want to do anything. It may be best to wait until it's decharged. I would suggest looking at the 3 day potty training program. You can look it up. It worked very well for us.

One caution - be careful to not over do the candy/choco rewards. I ended up geting my daughter constipated with all the candy. I didn't know that that was possible, but it ended up that my daughter happened to get constipated on too much cnady/chocolate.

Good luck!

I am so frustrated with potty training. Our son is almost 4 and is not full potty trained. He has gone pee and poop in the toilet, when he wants to. Our daughter is 2-1/2 and shows very little interest just yet. I hate to push it too soon. My plan is to to full-time potty training this summer for both of them. Potty chair outside and no pull-ups or diapers! I figure I might as well take care of both of them at the same time.
I really wanted to see all the responses you had gotten.
Good luck!

I've got four kids and am currently potty training my last one. Bottom line is, potty training cannot be forced and life is so much easier when you don't pressure the potty training. Although your little girl may seem grown up for her age, she's still only 27 months. Have the potty available, have the training pants available and have the rewards ready. It will happen, I promise! Everyone likes to put an age on potty training but let's face it, they are all different. Just keep reminding her she can go in the big girl potty just like mommy! My oldest potty trained when he was 2, the others were 3. All were different experiences. Hard for us parents to let go of something we really don't fully control. For this reason, potty training has always been my least favorite part of parenting! Hang in there, she'll get it!!!

They are all different. Be encouraging & positive. My first I tried the weekend training technique when I thought she was ready, by the 3rd day we were back in diapers and I was frustrated. Two weeks later, I have no idea why, she woke up one morning and said "No diapers, big girl panties!" At that point, she had decided it herself and had very few accidents after that. The second child wasn't remotely interested until age 3, when she got the concept, it was a done deal. The third took a long time but by age 3 she was trained, we didn't make a big deal out of it and just let her work on it. We encouraged her and gave big praise, but not a lot of effort on our part. Though she did have 2 big sisters who encouraged her and cheered her on, she loved that. Now we're working on twins who just turned 2. One wants to sit on the potty and has even gone on time, hates poopy diapers, the other? Well, we'll just let her be for a while yet. All different. Take it easy and try not to stress about it. Many people will have their opinions ("she's NOT trained yet? mine were ALL trained by age 2!") and other fabricated stories.

Take care & good luck!
D.

Ditch the pull ups. They are just a diaper that can be taken up and down by the child but still messed in with no repercussion. Put her in panties and tell her that she has to make a pee pee in her potty or the pee pee is going to wet her new panties and the floor. After she wets herself a couple of times and realizes how uncomfortable it is. The message may get clearer. If she can pee in her pull-up and there is no discomfort, why should she alter her behavior?

I told my daughter that peepee on the floor makes mommy sad. Mommy doesn't pee on the floor. Papa doesn't pee on the floor. We use the potty. She's a big girl now and gets to use the potty too!

The first time she pee'd on the floor she looked at me and said, "Mama you sad?" I said to her, "I'm a little sad because now I have to clean up all this peepee and wash your clothes. Will you help me clean up this mess and next time can you tell me that you have to pee pee so we can put it in the toilet?"

She said, "No sad mama." And an hour later announced that she had to peepee so we raced to the toilet and cheered and clapped when she peed inside.

Mama's happy.

I would recommend waiting several more months then trying again. When she is ready it should be easy and you won't need rewards/bribes to get her to use the toilet. Don't turn it into a power struggle - she will win.

A little about me: Mother of two, 19 yo boy and 13 yo girl. Married 21 years to a great Dad/suppportive husband.
Child psychiatrist practicing in Palo Alto.

It sounds like she is not quite ready for potty training , leave it for a few weeks and try again. When they are ready it usually doesn't take that long and they don't need to be bribed to go a pee/poop.

Good luck

Hi there,

There seem to be SO many approaches to potty training out there. We did the super-duper gradual approach. When she was 18 months or so we introduced the potty and she used it sometimes, but she always wore a diaper (we took it on and off when she wanted to use the potty). We just gave her positive reinforcement and she did it more and more often.

Unfortunately, she has always had a problem with constipation, so she has always been very aware of when she has to poop. We'd sit down together, I'd hold her hands, we'd read a story, and I think the position is comfortable for her. So, for us it wasn't that hard to get her to use the potty. Peeing just followed from there.

However, this summer we traveled for 5 weeks so even though her diapers were always dry, we kept her in diapers because we didn't want to stress her out with potty training and traveling (to see family in the U.S., we are living in Rome). Sure enough, she started peeing in the diaper again. She said she didn't want to use the potty anymore.

This fall we gradually encouraged her to use the potty again more and more, and bought pretty panties that she loves. We started wearing the panties in the afternoons/evenings when at home. When she had some accidents at the beginning, we just backed off and waited a few weeks until she showed interest again.

So, we have just now taken the diaper off (she's 28 months) and she's been wearing panties for 11 days now! She's had just a few accidents, is doing really well, and no one is stressed about it. I'd suggest taking this approach, it's worked really well for us. Who needs more power struggles with a toddler? And I've been reading here on Mamasource that lots of kids are not potty trained until 3 years old or later. So what's the rush?

If you need other encouragement tactics, cute panties help, and be sure to tell her how cute she looks in them! Also, when she does well, tell everyone and say how proud you are of her (that is obvious). Another thing that helped was seeing other little friends use the potty who are potty trained when they'd come over to play. At least for out little one, as soon as she felt pressured to use the potty, she would not want to use it.

Good luck!

p.s. I liked pull-ups when she was using the potty a lot and still wearing diapers because it wasn't such a pain for ME to put the diaper back on after she used the bathroom when we were away from home.

My son was 3 when we finally decided that enough was enough, time to learn to use the potty. Girls are usually easier to train earlier, but in general I think 2-3 yo is about the time the average child starts to become ready.

We tried the food rewards, that didn't work for us and our Dr always reminds us not to reward good behavior with food/treats. Positive reinforcement and going straight to underpants instead of diapers was worked best for us and it still took 3-4 weeks before he finally stopped screaming about using the potty. He's 4 now and still fights us on using the potty when we see that he needs to go.

Let her watch you use the potty. Take the poop from her diapers and put them in the potty and have her flush. Eventually she'll want to use it like mom does.

"Don't rush/force it" is what pretty much all the books/magazines/moms say. Your child is on her own schedule, not yours.

my suggestion is to not wear the pull ups and have her in training underwear which Gerber makes and is thicker under wear but she will feel when she is wet and will not like it, she will have accidents and you will need to clean them up without frustration and know it is part of the learning process, She will learn to see that her best choice is using the potty and getting a chocolate for it and lots of praise from mommy. We started this with my now 30 month old son at 26 months, and it took some time, but I am proud to say that he is pretty well potty trained 4 months later, We have occasional accidents but overall he is mastering it. Find a lot of patience and determination and knowledge that your daughter will use the potty, but try not to make her, just make using the potty the best choice for her to make. Pull ups make it too easy not to use the potty b/c they stay dry even they pee
good luck

We potty train in the summer outside, put her in a sundress,no underware or pull ups, set up a wade pool, put a potty chair next to the wade pool. Fill the pool with toys and tell her "NO PEEING IN THE POOL" or your toys will get dirty, give her plenty to drink, cool aid, water ect, even let her pour her own drinks, "shes a big girl" remind her to use the potty if she has to go pee. Our daughter trained in one weekend. PS a great video is "ON my POtty for girls" normally the library has it.

Take the pull-up off, they're too much like diapers. Your child knows the difference between panties and a diaper and pull-ups are exactly like a diaper except the way you put it on. That's not lost on your child so of course she wants to go in the pull-up, it's what she's been trained to do! Take it off - throw them all away - don't buy them anymore! Put a pair of panties on her and let her experience what it's like to pee in her pants. that may make a difference!

Every child is different but I remember when I was potty training my son I wanted to know every one else's success stories so here is mine, I hope it helps.
We began potty training at 24 months, and failed. Then again a few months later, and again failed! We decided to try a "no pressure" potty training tactit. I filled a plastic water bottle with jelly beans and placed it on the bathroom sink. We waited for Robby (our son) to ask about it. I simply expalined that anyone could earn a jelly bean by sitting on the potty and trying to go pee or poop. It took about a week for it to sink in. When Daddy or Mommy peed we'd eat a jelly bean and talk about using the potty. After questions and observations HE decided that he was ready to try using the potty. At first we rewarded for just trying (taking off the pull up and sitting on the potty) After he finally peed in the potty he only got a jelly bean for successfully using the potty. Later he only earned jelly beaans for pooping.
Make it fun for your daughter and give her control. Don't force it..she'll get there. Good luck!