Saturday, January 24, 2009

Potty Training

We are in the throws of potty training (insert sympathetic sigh here). It's an interesting process. I have to be more consistent and diligent than I've ever been in my life. I have to remember to check her every 30 minutes, and then try to talk her into stopping whatever she is doing to go potty. Then, the pomp and circumstance that comes after she pees in the potty is only short of a wedding celebration. There is dancing and singing, and M&M eating. It's a regular party! She seems to do much better when we let her go commando, but when you also have a 4 year old roaming around...it's not exactly appropriate.

I feel like we are so close. She is interesting in the potty and goes whenever I put her on it. It's just a point of getting her to recognize when she has to pee vs. me telling her when to pee. And...pooping on the potty is non-existent. In fact, if she isn't wearing a diaper, she yells and screams, and says "change my diaper"...or "diaper on", just so she can head to a corner and work out stone henge.

The only consistently positive response we get is when my mom is around. For some reason (other than the fact that my mom is Avery's favorite person...ever), Avery is willing to go potty for Franma no matter what.

So, any suggestions, rants or raves about potty training? I'll take anything!

3 comments:

Heather said...

When I worked at the daycare I had 8 potty trainers to myself. After about 3 months of PURE chaos, I found out a good way to have them realize when they have to pee. As soon as they got up from nap time I immediately got them to the potty so they could associate having to pee with what it feels like to go. Luckily it worked with 5 of 8 of them and about 3 days of doing that potty training became much easier with "Ms. Header!! I gotta potty NOW."

Unknown said...

There has been a potty chair in our bathroom for over a year now, and Nate is still not trained. He is very lonely on the "Diapers" side of the potty training list on the wall in his daycare room. He won't even admit to me when he needs his diaper changed for fear it will interrupt whatever he is engrossed in.

All I can offer you is sympathy, Michele, cause I'm not doing any better over here!

Schavey Family said...

We tried a potty jar with Ella. I baught a jar that she got to decorate and we put special candy and prizes in the jar. Everytime she went on the potty she got to pick something from the jar.

My sister Dede always just went straight to the underpants with her kids...it was a wet week but that is all it took. All her kids (4 of them) took well to this.

Good luck, call me anytime so we can get together.
-Dawn