Potty training

2 years, 9 months old

How's that for a topic after an unplanned 6 week blogging hiatus? :) My apologies to my 4 readers for the absence. Without getting into too many excuses, we'll just say that age 2 1/2 has been a struggle lately and making time to sit down at a computer is difficult. I will do a full Barrett update soon but basically sleeping has been a real issue for a while and 9pm bedtimes were taking a toll on my free time. Once he was asleep, I wanted to go to sleep myself. BUT good news is we have turned a corner and bedtime is at 7pm again! We'll talk about that later as I want to devote this post to all about our tackling of potty training!

I've very much been of the mindset that I did not want to try this too early and make things hard for both Barrett and myself. I love hearing about kids that are interested in going on the potty early but that was never our situation. We've had a small potty since right around his 2nd birthday and he has had varying amount of interest in it. Early on, he was all good with sitting on it for 30 seconds but actually trying to go was a different story.

This winter, Bubs teachers were really good about introducing the potty to him on a more regular basis. He was one of the younger kids in his classroom so he's been watching the older ones (especially girls) peeing on the potty for a while now. Many of the girls started going regularly in his toddler classroom even. Starting in about March (2 years, 5 months old), Barrett was regularly sitting on the real potty in the classroom (3-4 times a day) but almost never actually going. No biggie. For months, he went maybe a handful of times and the teachers always said it was because his diaper was dry. If he went to sit on it after already have peed in his diaper, he wouldn't do anything. If his diaper was dry, he would go. I'll take it. No pressure and he was getting comfortable with it and following around all his friends was a big help.

Fast forward again to later June. Barrett was about to turn 2 years, 9 months old and I was starting to feel some pressure to at least begin the process and see what would happen. I've always been of the thoughts that I want this to be the least amount of stress possible. If he's not ready, I'm not going to fight him just because he's supposed to be learning to do it on his own. Maybe if we had passed his 3rd birthday things would be different but I was okay with changing diapers. Honestly, it's way easier without having to be sure to have spare clothes and making sure to go before we do anything outside the house. But I got some tips of starting the 3 day method and we started the last weekend in June. We woke up Saturday morning and transferred straight to underwear. We were going cold turkey with no pull-ups and lots of reinforcements for going.

So part of the 3 day method is that you are not supposed to put the kid on the toilet but constantly be checking in with them to make sure they are staying dry and to tell them if they needed to go. That's great except that Barrett would just go on the floor without a care in the world. We spent Saturday and Sunday of that weekend in full out torture. Barrett probably peed on the floor 40 times. He went twice on the toilet. Once because I put him on there (he didn't tell me he had to go…RULE BREAKER) and another time when I put him on there and put cherrios in the bowl and told him to shoot at them (BOY!). Late Sunday afternoon, pretty much both of us were in tears. After every accident, Barrett would scream and cry that he didn't want to put underwear on. I stopped after about 36 hours because this was not at all worth it. He wasn't ready and I wasn't going to push it. Technically, I should have waited it out for the 3rd day but he would be going to daycare and I did not want to put them through that. So back to diapers we go. No big deal.

I didn't mention this but before we started the big potty training in June, Barrett had started to go on the potty at daycare at least 2-3 times a day. He was doing so great for them which is his M-O. He also uses his manners and eats everything they give him there but he wants nothing to do with either for Mom and Dad. Stinker! I figured he was very much ready because he had no problems going for them. WRONG-O

Starting the week after the Fourth of July, Barrett really decided to show us by going 100% full time at daycare. He went 5 days straight dry and peeing on the potty and then another 4 days straight. On Thursday, July 17, I went to pick him up from daycare and his teachers said he was ready and we should bring underwear for him to see how it goes. I was actually planning to start another round of training the following weekend but decided to give it a try. I would let them do the work on Friday and if he wasn't very successful, we wouldn't push anything over the weekend (we were traveling and had lots of plans which is supposedly a no-no when you are PTing.) Anyways, to daycare he went in underwear and I pick him up with a full perfect day with no accidents! Joe and I were so proud which is really ridiculous because we didn't do a damn thing!

I was not sure what to think of this but we decided to just follow Barretts lead and see how he did over the weekend. We were stopping at the hospital to see Mr Palmer and the Maschings that night so we put Barrett in a diaper so as not to deal with accidents for there and the drive to Blooimington/Pontiac. We got to my parents for the night later and put him back in underwear for the overnight.

I forgot to mention but when we did the weekend training in June, Barrett stayed dry for his naps and overnight. I thought that would be the most difficult of the process but (spoiler alert!), he's stayed completely dry in underwear every time.

That Saturday, Barrett woke up about 5:30am (again dry!) and immediately wanted to go get his dad. I slept with him just in case he did have an accident and needed quick assistance. I asked right away if he wanted to go potty before going to get Joe and he said no. I left the two of them and headed back to bed for a bit. 15 minutes later, Joe comes to get a change of clothes, that B had a little accident. He ended up going about half on the floor and half in the toilet but that was probably both our faults and we should have just made him stand in front of the toilet to try. Lesson learned! We had a few other trips that morning to the potty which was a big learning experience for me. I learned that we should always "force" him to try to go but if he doesn't want to stand there after 20 seconds, it means he really doesn't have to go. If he needs to go, he will go! (Novel idea!) So no need to force it!

We had Baby Saxton's baby shower later that day so I headed over to Rachels to get things prepped. At this point, he went a number of times with no problems. We get there and shortly, Barrett goes outside with Andy and has another accident. Good job doing that outside, dude! Again, probably my fault, as I should have asked him as soon as we got to the house. He had one small accident for my mom later that day while I was getting my hair cut but overall, we were really happy with the progress! 3 accidents that day wasn't so bad when he was getting run around and completely off his schedule. He did great for the shower too. Again, we go against the 3 day method rules and every hour we tried to take him to the toilet. Like I mentioned, if he had to go, he went and if he didn't, we would try again later.

Sunday, was even better, another overnight dry. He ended up having just one accident that day after we had dinner but again, I can probably blame that on Joe or I as we weren't being diligent about asking him. 3 days in and only 4 accidents! That sealed the deal that we were through the hump and pretty much potty trained!

We had one small accident on Monday and today was accident free! A total PROUD Mom and Dad moment happened last night when we hear the nightly "pitter patter" of Barrett's feet running to our room. I think it was about 2:45, we were awoken by him asking us TO GO POTTY! He started doing this consistently on Monday and running to the bathroom himself but the fact that he woke himself up in the middle of the night and knew to come get us was pretty freaking awesome. We were also woken up at 3:45 with him again asking to go but honestly, who cares if we had to wake up! Another turning point for us. For keeping tally, we had 5 accident total which is so insane. It really shows that they will do it when they are ready. Barely a month ago, he had 30 accidents in less than 2 days. Barrett decided when he was ready.

Now, I have to mention that all of it isn't hearts and rainbows. You notice that I haven't mentioned anything about poop. That's because we are having a bit of a struggle with it. His schedule is synced up so that he goes at like 6pm every night so daycare rarely has to deal with him pooping. Unfortunately, Barrett is not comfortable with that yet. Finally on Saturday afternoon, it was apparent that he was holding it in because he didn't want to sit on the potty to go. I gave in and put a diaper on him and he pooped within 2 minutes. We had to do the same tonight after he went 3 days without going. As soon as the diaper is on, he releases it and we change him and go right back to underwear. I don't think there is much else we can do besides keep trying to get him comfortable to sit on the potty to go. I won't go back to diapers when he is doing so well with peeing but I also don't want to let him go more than a few days with holding it in. That's not healthy.

Overall though, I'm really proud of the progress he's made and do not regret for a minute that we let Barrett decide when he was ready.

(Be back soon with other updates, promise!)