Saturday, May 30, 2009

Time to "Go"

I figured I'd better blog something soon before this site becomes solely a "see Sarah's monthly pics" site.

So what's new? Hmmm . . . . well I started potty training Claire. And then promptly stopped the training.

I thought I had it all planned out perfectly.

Pack of training panties? Check.
Child-sized potty seat attachment? Check.
Fun foamy soap for hand washing? Check.
Step stools for toilet AND sink, candy for rewards? Check, check and check.

So yesterday was "Go time". After breakfast, I removed Claire's diaper and dressed her in training panties and a t-shirt. (soooo stinkin' cute by the way) I informed her that we were going to try using the potty so she needed to let me know if she needed to "go".

Now before you laugh at me, I knew that wasn't going to work perfectly. I was totally prepared to clean up several accidents. After all, the pack of training panties came with 3 pairs, so I had my backups ready. Right?? Right.

I gave Claire her juice cup which was 50/50 juice and water as opposed to her normal 10/90. I wanted her to ENJOY the juice enough to drink, drink, drink! And drink she did. My plan was to take her to the potty every 30 minutes whether she needed to go or not in the hopes that eventually she'd accidentally go in the potty. This would allow me to offer grand cheers and a candy treat thus showing her how WONDERFUL it is to go on the potty.

Here is how the entire 1 HOUR of training went before I threw in the towel.

9:00--Claire is dressed and ready.
9:30--I take Claire to the potty (she has drained an entire sippy cup by now) No dice. I re-dress her and replenish her juice cup.
9:55--I am gearing up to take her for the next potty trip when a friend texts me and I take a quick moment to respond. MISTAKE.
9:56--Claire announces, "Tee tee on the potty??" I jump up with excitement only to find that a more appropriate statement would have been, "Tee tee all over the carpet??"
9:57--Hose Claire down. Put 2nd pair of training pants on her cute little hiney. Praise her for understanding the action that took place and remind her that we want to try to "go" on the potty next time. She agrees and I am off to clean up the mess.
10:00--I have just mopped up the floor and rinsed out the dirty training pants. I am just starting to put the pants in the dryer when Claire walks up and says, "Clean up the tee tee Mommy?" I look down to see that she has soiled herself again. Thus a new clean up process begins.
10:05--Claire is sporting her third and FINAL pair of clean training pants just as Sarah wakes and needs feeding.
10:07--I am sitting down to nurse Sarah when I hear, "Tee tee on the potty, Mommy?" Yep. She did it again. Three accidents in just over 10 minutes. In such a short time, I now have NO dry training pants to change her into and an infant who is furious that her feeding time was interrupted.
10:10--All messes are cleaned up and Claire is sitting happily in a diaper watching Elmo's World.

Sigh, sigh, SIGH!

I quickly determined that potty training is not a one person job if you have an infant at home too. We are going to make our next attempt in July (we don't have any other weeks in June that aren't interrupted by travel plans and apparently you need to stay close to home for this potty training business.)

I told Michael that we are picking a weekend where he has Friday off and that way I'll have his help for Friday, Saturday and Sunday before going it alone on Monday.

So as I wait on the next attempt, does anyone want to offer some sage advice on what will work best to train a child who has an apparent gift for frequent urination?

I'm all ears.

7 comments:

Amanda said...

hehehe... uh... we're going through the same thing over at my blog. Tips? Don't try the 'potty train in one week' or 'potty train in one day' strategy because it's not going to happen. Lesson learned on my part. Camden's making progress, but that still doesn't stop him from going #2 on my carpet and running his toys all through it before I can stop him. :-)

Pigs said...

I'm going with the "wait until he's for sure ready, then give it another week" plan. Boys are apparently retarded at peeing in the potty, which I find ironic since they have much more efficient equipment than girls do. I'm hoping to have him trained by school. That would Labor Day. That would be three weeks before he turns THREE. Did I mention I have two of these boy-creatures to train??

Julie P. said...

Amy, both Rilyn and Ella were potty trained completely by their 3rd birthday. Claire might not be ready yet...but if you still want to give it a 'go', we put a training potty in the middle of the living room floor with Elmo on the TV and sat her on that toilet for 2 hours with juice until she just peed in it. Success! (b/c she was relaxed while watching her favorite show!)

Misty said...

I'd say wait till your home and have help. It did help with Eric home over the summer. And, I had TWELVE pairs of panties. And the first day, I use all 12 pairs by around 1 (naptime). Yeah, fun, but it got better each day. I should have done the 'night time' training at the same time, but I haven't and Cara is still in diapers at night and nap. Since we just put Micah in her room to sleep (that's going extremely well!), who knows when we'll night time train!

Kim said...

Wait till they're really ready, and then be prepared for 3 days of madness. If they're really ready, I think they can be trained in 3 days--Emily was, and I've heard others who've had the same success. Good luck!

momimi said...

Sage advice from your Mom...I don't remember how we potty trained you and David. But somehow it got done...and now that you're in your thirties, it doesn't seem to matter much. Take heart!

The Lyons Family said...

One word...SKITTLES!!! Jake will do anything for 2 Skittles (which is also a great color recognition activity). And for poops (since he struggled w/ holding it in) we do ice cream. Bad Mommy...Bad, Bad Mommy. The kid's gluteous is SUPER maximus, but he goes every day!

I'll echo Misty's advice on the 12 pair vs. three. Our 1st week was Day 1 - 12 pair; Day 2 - 3; Day 3 - ONE! Jake took about 2 weeks to be what I would deem "completely trained" for daytime potty. Having a 2nd adult is helpful, but I did most of it on my own and survived. I was in charge of M-F potties, and Jason got weekend duty. Get it? Doody? ;)

Potty chairs are great and Jake did well with them, but I got sick of cleaning them so one day I hid them in the basement so he HAD to use the big potty. SOOO glad we did that - much easier to just wipe & flush!

We still have accidents. Had one today. Most are my fault for not being more timely or forgetting to put on a diaper at nap/bedtime.

Speaking of - don't worry about night training! Talked to our pedi, and he said not to even bother until after 3/3.5 yrs. As long as you're supervising daytime potties, they're still too young to be held responsible for doing it alone in the middle of the night.

Hope that helps! Oh, and be prepared - learning to potty brings out a VERY independent streak in toddlers. Mr. Sassy Pants got quite the attitude when he trained!