well, we started potty training with ezra exactly two weeks ago from today - memorial day. i had sooo much anxiety about this big event because of 1. all the horror stories i had heard 2. not looking forward to being locked up in my house by ourselves for days on end 3. nervousness about how it would go with ezra = was he really ready? and what if he wasn't and peed all over the house like an out of control fire hose, etc?
so i had prepared. first i read (rather skimmed):
- Azrin & Foxx's classic book Toilet Training in Less Than a Day
- Checked out a friend of a friend's blog Sure Fire Potty Training Tips (which Erin grew up in a home with 10 children so if anyone should know about this it would be their family)
- A resource from my boss that is a condensed version of Azrin & Foxx's book
then i talked to A LOT of people = basically, any mom i knew. i also talked to our pediatrician at ezra's 2-year well baby ... re, toddler? appointment. this woman is UN.BE.LI.EV.AB.LE!!! seriously, the day we move i'll be crying the whole way to our new home, and many of those tears will be because i seriously believe we have one of the best pediatricians on the planet. (i know i can be prone to exaggeration at times, but seriously, this woman is BRILLIANT!) all this to say, dr. k recommended in order to avoid regression and night wetting to wait to potty train ezra before 27 months old. i found this eery because my mom - who although she has not attended medical school, she certainly posesses a wealth of wisdom - told me the SAME RULE OF THUMB - from all of 30 years ago when she was potty training her girls. (mom, this is where you get to sing and dance and throw yourself a party because i am saying officially "YOU ARE RIGHT!!!" :) i will say that most of the literature says to look for readiness between 18-24 mos of age, and ezra was definintely showing signs of readiness around 23 mos (he even pooped in the toilet at his maw maw's house after informing me he needed to go.) but due to my life stage - namely GRAD SCHOOL! - even if ezra was ready, mommy was not. hence, we waited per our doctor's advice til ezra was older, mommy was out of grad school, AND even bigger bonus, mommy was not working. heck, i was preparing ourselves for a long haul, so let's just say i cleared the calendar. :)
of course, i sought other advice and tips ranging from the atlantic to pacific coast in opinion, but that's what i find helpful! then i mushed it all together and did what i thought was best for ezra and both his and my personalities. so after consulting multiple "experts," this was my basic approach ...
1. talk it up & get comfy. for weeks before, we talked about potty training, had him watch daddy go on the toilet, and even started a night time ritual of his sitting on the toilet before bath, and we'd read him a potty book. he loved the extra reading/bonding, and this way, he was very used to sitting on the toilet when D-day came ... helped reduce fear/anxiety.
2. go naked. we stripped ezra to run naked belly-button down the first 3 days we were home. that way i could "see" what was going on down there. the slightest dribble and we could woosh him away to the toilet.
3. get a doll. we borrowed a Scotty Potty doll from our friends. ok, not gonna lie. these things are $$$. cheapest i could find was on ebay for $35. new on amazon were like $50. but this thing was MAGIC! on D-day, we whipped Scotty out, which made the day extra exciting. ezra and mommy taught Scotty FIRST how to go pee pee on the toilet. children teaching other children - or a doll. how brilliant is that??
4. load your kid up with lots of his/her favorite fluid. ezra's loves bush's sweet tea. yep. has tons of caffeine. but i didn't care. we basically had tea parties together all morning! :) also, some people rec feeding them salty foods, i.e. gold fish, so that they want to drink more.
5. positive reinforcement. for every time ezra peed he got one treat (in his case a a skittle). for #2 - two treats. the allure of two treats, however, was not doing the trick. ezra was too afraid and didn't poop in the toilet for the first couple days. so we upped the ante. we offered him a new toy engine - DUNCAN - IF he went poop in the toilet. ezra talked about that blessed engine like you wouldn't believe. he TOTALLY got it. just couldn't go/didn't need to. finally about 2 days later while i'm on the phone with sweet sarah c. giving her the "DL" on the potty training sitsch and saying #1 was going awesome but #2 ... not so sure, ezra runs out of the downstairs bathroom hollering, "MOMMY! I GET DUNCAN! I GET DUNCAN!" i could hardly believe it! i jumped off the couch and sure enough, he had taken care of business all.on.his own! and that was it! from that point on he never pooped his pants again! and whenever he is showing off his engines to friends, he makes sure they always know that he got that engine for going poo poo. :P
so this is how it turned out on the first day:
10:30 - self-initiated * (referred to as SI from this point forward) while Mommy was upstairs!!! VERY first time!!!
11:20 - peed with the timer
11:40 - SI during Thomas to pee
11:51 - accident on the couch while watching Thomas
11:54 - SI while Mommy was upstairs AGAIN to pee!!!
12:10 - accident outside (fussed)
12:32 - SI!!!
1-3:30 - NAP (pull up was full afterward)
4:00 - SI!!!
4:26 - SI!!!
5:32 - peed with timer
see note above in #5 for info about going #2.
after just 2 days in the house, we decided to head to the zoo with friends. he only had one little accident on the way to the bathroom - couldn't get there quite fast enough. i was pleased as punch with him!
also, his first flight home in june (over 12 hours of driving/flying) as a potty-trained little lad he did not have an accident the entire day! i put him in a pull-up just in case to cover our bases, but he never even used it. ridiculous, i know!?!
all in all, we think he did A.M.A.Z.I.N.G, and we could not be more proud!!! we seriously could not believe what a great job he did and how quickly he caught on!! we certainly realize how blessed we are because we know this is not the case for many, many families. however, we wanted to be one positive voice saying it isn't always terrible since we didn't hear many good stories leading up to the family event. hopefully ours can encourage you if you are thinking of first crossing this threshold with another little one!
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