Potty Training Tips from a Veteran Mom

I’m not saying I know everything.

I’m not even saying I know anything.

But I do have three little kids and I have been in one stage of potty training or another for the past 4 years.

4 YEARS people.

4 years is a long time to spend teaching little firefighters to aim their water hoses.

I’ve learned some stuff. So far, this is what I know:

• People will tell you to do it in the summer. I call B.S. on this one. I do not enjoy having naked kids running around my house peeing on my furniture. Also, we occasionally have to go out in public, where being naked and peeing wherever you want is frowned upon. Do it in the winter when they can wear fleece sweat pants and have fleece sheets on the bed, those are the most absorbent. Just trust me.

• Do you have a girl? Keep a funnel and an empty water bottle in your car. I bought a yellow funnel at IKEA so that I wouldn’t confuse it with any of the regular kitchen funnels. If you have a boy you can skip the funnel and just carry an empty bottle.

• You’re going to want to buy new towels. Remember the fancy extra fluffy towels you got as a wedding gift? Those are your new go-to pee pee mopper-uppers. Cheap towels aren’t cut out for the task.

• Just wait. Yeah, sure Johnny’s mommy says that he is 100% trained at 18 months, even at night, but what she isn’t telling you is that she sets an alarm and wakes him up 4 times every night to sit on the potty. Unless you want to be constantly dealing with accidents in public or waking up to change wet sheets 3 or 4 times a night, just wait a few more months. One of my kids was 4 years old before being 100% ready. It will happen eventually.

• Don’t buy a new couch until all of your kids are potty trained. I learned this the hard way. We’re all starting to see the true genius behind Grandma’s plastic wrapped furniture now, aren’t we?

• Get the cheap seat that fits on top of the regular toilet. “But the little Lightening McQueen that sings when it senses it is being filled is adorable and I can keep it in any room in the house,” you say. It won’t be at all cute after the first time you have to clean poop out of it with your bare hands or when your little angel wants to “help” clean out the potty by dumping its contents on your carpet. Or if someone didn’t tell you they went and left the contents in the potty to later be discovered and used by a younger sibling as finger paint and/or food. Just sayin’

Ok veteran mommies, what else have you learned?

Stephanie Giese is an author and mom of three from Central Pennsylvania. She has been featured in the Amazon best-selling humor anthologies ‘I Just want to Pee Alone’ and ‘You Have Lipstick on Your Teeth’. More of her work can be seen on her blog, Binkies and Briefcases. You can also find her on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.