This is many months overdue, but I feel like I should mention that Lily is fully potty trained! We had been exposing her to the potty last summer, but she rarely indicated much interest. Since she was waking up dry from naps, however, I was starting to suspect that she was physically ready to potty train, if not emotionally ready. This was confirmed the day late last summer when I entertained Lily while she sat on the potty for TWO FULL HOURS with no success. We played and talked and read to keep her occupied, but she didn’t go. By the end, though, she was starting to get antsy and finally started asking for a diaper SO THAT SHE COULD GO PEE-PEE. As in, she was holding it in while sitting on the potty until I could get a diaper back on her. I tried bribing and coaxing her to no avail, and she started to get upset and more insistent that she have a diaper (since she really needed to go after having already gone the 2.5 hours of nap without going and then the next 2 hours on the potty). In desperation (not wanting to miss this chance for her to have success), I tried putting a diaper IN the potty so she could go on it.
No dice.
Then I tried loosely wrapping it around her while she was still on the potty.
Nope. She still refused to go.
Then I put the diaper on her as usual, but wanted her to stay sitting on the potty while she pee-peed IN HER DIAPER.
She refused.
Only when I let her stand up and wet her diaper on her own terms would she finally go.
Umm…yeah, I was pretty sure at that point that she had adequate bladder control, but clearly she just wasn’t wanting to go for it, so I backed off and we just left it at, “hey, if you want candy you’re welcome to go potty, or whatever…we don’t care, Lily.” It just wasn’t worth it.
On October 19th, our playgroup went to an indoor playground, and her friend Landon was taken to the bathroom by his mother (they were working on potty training, too). Lily overheard this, and said she wanted to go.
So, she went and sat on the potty in a public restroom for the first time.
And had pretty much her first real (non-incidental) potty success!
Fortunately, Seri (Landon’s mom) had some candy with her that she shared with Lily. The rest of that day, Lily used the potty with some success at home.
Then she used the potty the rest of that week.
Then she used the potty every day since then.
Yeah, she, um, just decided to BE potty trained. We gave her candy and Squinkies to encourage her to sit on the potty since we weren’t always sure when she would need to go, but once she got over the hesitation to actually GO in the potty, she was home free.
We switched to pull-ups, and she had fewer and fewer wet pull-ups over the first week. Within a few weeks, she was dry pretty much all the time, but she still didn’t want to switch to underwear (again, she was hesitating, and I didn’t want to push her). I finally convinced her to give up the daytime pull-ups in exchange for an Ariel doll (specifically, and Ariel WITH LEGS). We switched to underwear the week before Thanksgiving. She still wore pull-ups at nap and nighttime, but was usually dry. By January, she was dry every time after sleeping, so I convinced her to stop wearing pull-ups two months later on March 15th (happy birthday to me!). We could have done it sooner, but this time it was me dragging my feet instead of her since I wanted to be SURE she was ready. Getting up all night with a newborn meant that I was even less willing to risk having to get up for a middle of the night sheet change.
Well, that may be more detail than you’d like on Lily’s potty habits, but I am proud of her, as silly as it is. She only ever had one minor accident, and that was right after Emma came home from the hospital and I slacked off in my reminding her to use the potty (she still needed reminders back then). Now, she goes on her own, even if I’m not around to help her or remind her (she only needs help reaching the paper and turning on the faucet).
Hooray for our big girl!
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