Just a few thoughts on this topic tonight, as we come to the end of Alice's 3rd day without any accidents.
Don't take me wrong, I am not claiming to be an expert. In fact, the sample I have worked with is small, so I can't make generalised conclusions. But I do believe it's worth sharing.
I have potty trained twice this year. First, my son, in February. He was 3 years and 2 months then. Now my daughter, 18 months old. These were fairly close, and I can clearly see the similarities and differences.
Why do we normally wait so long with potty training? Because some 'experts' at a nappy manufacturer's marketing department told us so? Or because we are afraid of the mess? I certainly had both in my mind when I delayed potty training my son.
Why, I don't know. All I know, he was fighting going on the potty when we started, as he felt safer with his nappies. I think by the time potty training came, he was already 'trained' to go in his nappy, and I was frustrated about not getting anywhere for 2 weeks...
On the other hand, I managed to start my daughter on the potty at 18 months. She goes to the potty and sits on it whenever she feels like it. She got the idea in just 3 days. Although she was in nappies for her first 18 months, she still prefers to eliminate outside a nappy (which is completely normal for a young mammal) – she was not trained to sit happily in her wee yet.
So how did we go about it?
We are lucky. It's the height of summer where we are, and she has been walking around naked for days. We bought a potty that she can easily sit down to herself (this is important, as she can't reverse to something yet). Also made sure she knows what it's for – simply caught a predictable morning wee and fairly obvious poops in it. We also stayed at home for a few days, so there was no pressure on her to be accident free.
So she understood. From the third day of having a potty. No fighting about nappies – unless it's about putting one on for the night (she wakes up dry, but just in case). She just doesn't want nappies. She prefers the panties I bought. Not tat we use them, because she can't take them off quickly.
We went out after 4 days. I put a nappy on her, knowing she's not ready to hold for long. On the way home in the car I could see that she needed to do a poo. I told her to hold on (haha), she can go on the potty when we get home. She fell asleep in the car, and only woke up 90 minutes later when we were home. She came to me, snuggled in for a minute, then walked to the potty. I took the nappy off, which was empty. She sat on the potty and released... Now experts, can or can not a child of 18 months hold on?
On the other hand this 18 month old girl refuses to go to sleep while she needs a wee, so she stayed up until 10:30 last night to sit on the potty and empty her bladder. Hmmm.
Anyway. Just saying, we need to be prepared for accidents, no matter when we do the potty training. I believe we could do it on average a year or more earlier. But who would buy the expensive junior nappies and training pants?
Ok. Enough off topic, I'll be back with some photos later.
First I finished my teaching practice as a babywearing Educator and trainer at the Hungarian Babywearing School. This was the extension of a babywearing consultant course I did with them last year.
