Potty trained(?)

Before winter vacation started, I told myself that I’d give potty training two good weeks and if it didn’t work, I’d try again during the summer. Teaching gives me these built in times to change behavior, see, and I figured I was ready to give it my best shot. Little Bear was showing some signs of “readiness” like understanding when her diaper needed to be changed, waking up dry from naps, and understanding what a <strikethrough>bribe</strikethrough> incentive means. Other “signs,” like being able to pull up her own pants, not quite.

Monday (12/19) rolled around and we took off the diapers for good. We bought several kinds of panties. Target brand definitely fit her little bottom best (Wal-Mart, while cheaper, were quite saggy) but we ended up liking the good old Gerber trainers the most. They are padded, which made me feel better, but since her accidents were… all or nothing, as it were, I don’t know if the extra material made any actual difference.

My first plan of attack (and this was basically based on my intuition and no internet reading, which is totally out of character for me) was to get her on the potty as much as possible. We bought two Baby Bjorn potty chairs off Craigslist mostly because I liked the look of them and they didn’t play any tunes when she peed. That’s creepy, in my opinion.

As a side note, I’m not sure what’s different about a potty that plays tunes and me jumping around and singing inane potty songs whenever she peed so I’ll get back to you on that.

Getting her to sit took a combination of me reading lots of books in a very animated manner; feeding her chocolate chips, mini cookies, and All Natural fruit snacks (see how I put “All Natural” in there to make myself feel better. I mean, they were all natural, but I probably didn’t need to add that here); dancing and singing all of her favorite songs, including Happy Birthday to everyone and everything we could name such as Mama, Papa, Elmo, bear, monkey, cat, toes, and panties; getting out the iPhone, and watching movies on Netflix streaming. In all seriousness, I did feel a little bad about the last one. We really try to limit TV around here and it killed me to have her watch hours of movies just to try and trick her into forgetting long enough to actually pee in the right spot. Friends did suggest loading her up on juice but, while I gave in on the movies, I wasn’t willing to go there. She hasn’t had any (juice) yet at all and I wanted to wait until as late as possible for that. In short, I bribed her to sit there and then, when something happened, threw a giant freaking party.

But, like any aspect of parenting, there are grey areas here. Do you reward for “trying,” or only when something comes out? Does #2 net more of a treat than #1? Do you turn the movie off as soon as she goes or let her watch a little more so she doesn’t start holding it in? I, in the worst parenting form possible, basically did a combination of everything and wasn’t consistent at all.

The first week was pretty touch and go. There ratio of accidents to successes was high. That is, she missed the potty a lot. I felt a bit defeated but had resolved to give it the full two weeks so we kept on trucking. I had also resolved to spend the first week at home and not running errands. Well, that didn’t work for two reasons. A) It was the week before Christmas and I had last minute stuff to pick up, and B) I was going stir crazy. But we picked up an Elmo potty seat (just in case) and some plastic pants and… much to my surprise, she was able to travel out and about and stay dry the whole time! I have to add here that she was only peeing, like, 3 times a day which freaked me out enough (toddler with a uti!) to call my ped who assured me that it was normal.

Long story short, thanks to lots and lots of Gnomeo and Juliet and the never ending patience of Papa and our entire family over the Christmas holidays, something seemed to click. She started “going” more during the day, #1 turned into #s 1 and 2, and the accidents were fewer and farther between. I feel like we should have a sign up in our house: “__ days without an accident” because that’s how it feels.

So I go back to school tomorrow. It will basically be LB’s first day without me in two weeks. Part of me is afraid that she’s going to revert back to the diapers in protest of the change. But she acts like such a pro now. Even sits on the adult potty, sans seat, and just… goes.

Either way, I’m proud of what she’s accomplished. Even if it means I have to sing Happy Birthday to her panties.