A while ago I wrote a series about the three-day potty training challenge. Yup, I took three days out and just stayed at home attempting to get little miss toilet trained. Spoiler alert: it didn’t work. Nope, it was horrendous. Instead I wasted three glorious days off with both of us feeling pretty miserable and hassled.
Related: The three-day toilet training challenge
So, hubby and I decided to give it a rest, wait until summer was here, when missy could run around with her pants off and piddle all over the wooden floors.
Of course, it was still in the back of my mind, so I went out and bought a whole heap of toilet paraphernalia to encourage the potty training, right down to a rather hideous pink step up toilet ladder that she could fix to the toilet. And guess what? She peed in it. Immediately. After refusing the toilet for weeks she just got up and went.
OK, I said to myself, it’s nothing. Then came a day out with friends. Little miss was hanging out with her little friends, some of whom occasionally frequent the toilet, some of whom don’t. Little missy’s friend tried to have a tinkle, so then little miss thought she’s give it a crack. If only I’d known that all this time my girl likes an audience. There she was, surrounded by friends watching her go, and she did not one, but two, number twos. I nearly cried, I was so friggen proud.
From there it steamrolled. Within a week we were only wearing knickers. The occasional accident still occurred, and childcare initially struggled with the challenge of toilet training, but she was getting there. She still liked to do her dirtier business in a nappy, but things were looking up.
What we found was we still had to remind her multiple times a day to pee. It was almost like she hadn’t learned the urge yet. This made a few people question our methods, but I figure as long as missy was accident-free and in knickers it really didn’t matter.
Then, all of sudden, there were no more dirty nappies. I can’t decide whether it was bribes of ice-cream (there was so much ice cream) to get her to do a number two, or just a natural progression, but whatever it was, it happened.
Then before you know it, we turn out backs and missy has just upped and taken herself to the toilet mid-play because “she needed to go”.
So, how did we do it? I’m going to be honest with you. I have no fucking idea. Seriously.
Part of me thinks the three-day training kind of got her mentally preparing, but I really don’t know. I think it just comes down to encouragement and readiness. Whenever she had an accident we didn’t yell, we just said, “it’s no problem” and cleaned it and put on new knickers. And the pride she got from doing a giant – what my husband calls – log was pretty beautiful. She was so proud of herself, exclaiming “look mummy, I did a poo”. Followed by, “Can I have an ice cream now?” Yeah, if you’re following the ice cream strategy I recommend making up some healthy popsicles pre-training.
I’m sure this blog has helped nobody, but maybe it will give hope to anyone who has given it a shot and hasn’t seen results yet. It does happen!
Don’t get me wrong, it’s not all perfect. Missy moo still wears nappies to bed, and has had the occasional accident due to either not enough time or tantrums, but overall we’re clean, dry and mummy no longer has to wipe poop out of places that poop should just not go! Huzzah!
In saying that, one caution I will give everyone is the night waking. No longer can missy do a tinkle in her nappy and go back to sleep. Even the slightest dribble must result in a toilet break and a new nappy, meaning countless trips to the bathroom after bedtime. Most of the time it’s just about finding a way to stay up later, but it can get tedious! Still, total worth it.
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