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Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Potty Training so far...

Well, so far so good....I finally feel like I don't have to always worry about accidents (knock on wood). We started on Friday and had one accident on the bathroom floor that day. Saturday was good but I think there were two accidents (all followed by a distressed Zoey notifying me of them). Saturday I also went out and bought potty training underwear (the thick kind that absorbs more). Those have been great. She's had a couple accidents since, but luckily only a little bit of pee. She catches herself and holds the rest for the potty luckily. At night and when we go out I put a diaper on her. I was worried about this because I've been told to stick strictly to the house when potty training otherwise you'll delay the process. However, Saturday she went with me to the store, Sunday we went to church, yesterday we went out to dinner at a restaurant, and today to the store again. Every time we've come home to a completely dry diaper....yes! At the restaurant last night she even went potty twice while we were there, both times telling me. I've been using lots of reminders which have helped but I'm feeling like she has finally established bladder control and doesn't need my reminders as much. I've also noticed that at night she stays much more dry, sometimes completely dry. So.....I feel BLESSED to have such a good potty trainer. She basically trained herself. For months now she has been telling me she wants to go potty or is going potty. I would take her a few times but was scared to actually "start" training because of all the horror stories and I just felt too lazy :( honestly. But, now that I've started there's no going back and it's been much better than I thought. What a great little girl we have. Let's hope Jane's the same way :)

If anyone's wondering how I starting training well....I didn't do much so I really don't have much advise to offer but here's what I did do.

-For a few weeks now we've been explaining to Zoey that we go potty in the toilet and take her if she lets us know.
-I put underwear on her and explained that she could not go potty in her underwear. Not quite sure if she understood everything I was saying but I hope so :)
-I gave her a treat every time she had a successful "potty"
-I gave lots of reminders, every ten minutes or so the first couple days. Now, I only give one if I feel it's been awhile. She is mostly doing it on her own now.
-Lots of praise of course
-We had a potty chart until Zoey took all the stickers off, but she liked it while it lasted.

That's about it. I think once they have actually demonstrated that they are capable of going in the toilet/potty reminders are the most important thing. Eventually they associate going potty with the toilet and walah...you're on your way :)

Another tip one of my teachers at BYU told me....She had everyone in the family getting treats if the child went potty not just the child. She said this was a much bigger deal for them because little children are so eager to please. We did do this with Zoey and I could tell she liked it. When we went to get her treats she would immediately say "mommy, teeet, daddy, teet" She almost didn't even care about her treat. So, I think that helps too and my teacher said that was the key to training all of her kids. So, there's my bit on potty training. I'm so glad we are almost there but I have a feeling I'm not quite done yet :)

1 comment:

Nikki said...

Sounds like she is doing great. I think the hardest for me was going out with Katya and having her go #2 in the toilet. But she always tells us that she needs to go when we are out and now she goes #2 in the potty. It is so nice to have a potty trained child. At first I was really nervous how hard it was going to be but she did awesome. And it sounds like Zoey is too! And YOU are doing a good job too! Keep it up!