April 12th I quit my job and April 13th I started potty training.
I had researched this a lot and I disagreed with a lot and agreed with some and then basically took the things I liked and my own thing and went to it.
We bought him a little potty when he was about 15 months old to get him used to it so when this day happened it wouldn't be scary. He has always loved going to the bathroom with us and sitting on his potty.
We didn't go anywhere for 5 days (except to sacrament on Sunday). Evan ran around the house naked waist down from Saturday-Monday. I made a little sticker chart that had poo-poo's and pee pee's. We had a plethora of treats and lots of singing and dancing and hooting and hollering every time magic happened. We even made up our own potty dance :o) We gave him tons and tons of juice and took him to the bathroom every 20 minutes. When he started barely peeing we stretched it out to 40 minutes.
I went and bought training pants on Monday night (they are like underwear but a little thicker to catch the pee) We started those on Tuesday, but he had more and more accidents so we went back to naked time. The poo part wasn't as difficult for him as we had thought it would be. He has always liked going into his room to poo. He would close the door and then come out and say, "poo poo!" So I put his potty chair in there when he had to go and he sat on it and there ya have it! From the on he was more comfortable doing it in the bathroom. On Thursday, he started taking himself to the bathroom to poo and pee! Greg and I were in the kitchen getting dinner ready and I asked him where Evan was and we went hunting and we found him on the toilet! We were so amazed and so so excited!
But then my mom came to help us move the next week and he completely regressed (except for pooing, he has continued to do well). He was too excited to even think about peeing on the potty. He started having tons of accidents, but we never put him back in diapers (except for naps and night time...which we still do). I was so nervous about our flight to Ohio because of seat belt signs (what if they went off and he had to pee?) and tiny airplane bathrooms. Thankfully, it worked out and we didn't have a single accident during our journey home...I may have restricted his fluids a lot that day haha.
When we got here he was still having a little trouble so we went back to taking him every 20 minutes 2 weeks later he's back to asking to go to the bathroom. I had a hard time knowing when would be a good time to stop taking him adn just seeing if he would do it on his own, but apparently, one day they will just get up and run to the bathroom and then you know you can stop taking them. Once he started taking himself we went back to the training pants. His real underwear are somewhere in a box, so he's going to be these for a bit.
My advice?
Do a method that you think would work with your child. There are so many different ways. Don't get frustrated because it doesn't help them learn (although it's very frustrating sometimes...especially when they regress because you know they know what to do). Try not to react at all when they have accidents. I would take Evan to the bathroom without acknowledging his pee but then when he was on the potty I would say, "Sweetheart, we potty in the potty, not in our pants." Now Evan still says, "potty in uh potty not in uh pants."
Expect accidents when they have little toddler friends over because they are not going to stop playing to pee. Don't ask them if they have to pee. Evan still says no even though he means yes and sometimes he will say potty back to me which is a yes but if he is busy he will just wait until he can't hold it anymore and then book it to the bathroom. Have them pull their pants down and pull them back up every time they go, so they get used to doing it themselves so when they want to go without asking they can get their drawers off. Just remember they are still just little guys learning all new things. Evan barely turn 2 when we potty trained him. Anyway, happy potty training!
