Potty Training

We are finally making progress!

We first tried to get Aaron sitting on the potty last year.  He even managed to pee on the potty one time.  But after the initial excitement, he showed no interest in potty training.  With Audrey on the way, I thought it might be better just to wait anyway.  I'd read that it's not a good idea to potty train within a few months of a major life event, such as a move or a new baby.  But after Audrey was a few months old, Kim kept gently suggesting he was ready.  We knew he knew when he had to go #2, which is a good sign.  And he also went long periods of time with a dry diaper, another sign of readiness.

But whenever I asked if he wanted to go on the potty, he said no.  Even when I pointed out older friends of his who used the potty.  Even though I pointed out that "big boys" don't wear diapers.  But I didn't want to force him even though I believed he could do it if he tried.  I didn't want potty training to be something stressful for him.

So I waited.  And the truth is, I wasn't ready.  Honestly, I don't mind changing diapers.  With Aaron, I don't even need to change his diaper when we go out in the morning for a few hours.  He only poops at home or at someone's house, so it's easy enough to change him in those cases.  The truth is, I didn't want to deal with accidents and rushing to find a potty while we are out and about.  Plus Aaron hates public restrooms so I knew it would be stressful for both of us once he was potty trained.

I realized most of my incentive to potty train was coming from feeling like he was supposed to be potty trained by now.  I was looking at friends with younger sons who were well on their way to potty training.  But then I realized that what other people think doesn't matter.  We'd potty train when we were ready.  But I did set an internal goal of getting him potty trained by 3 1/2.

Since he wasn't interested in using the potty when we asked, I decided to try another tack.  I bought a pack of underwear, which he showed some interest in.  Yesterday, Kim, with his consent, put a pair on him after his bath and they went outside to play.  She tried to let him practice in the bushes, but he didn't seem that interested.  He was outside for over an hour before he had a small accident.  He was a little upset and wanted her to take him shorts off right there.  But Kim told him it was OK and that they'd go inside and get a fresh pair of underwear and shorts.  After that, when he felt the need to pee, they raced to the bathroom.  By nap time, he had gotten 3 stickers for peeing on the potty 3 times.  By trial and error, he was figuring out when he needed to go.  I was out of the house for a few hours, so I got the summary of events from Kim later.  She was so excited for Aaron I could hear it in her voice.

After nap time, Larissa was here to babysit.  She was just as excited as Kim about Aaron's potty training.  There were frequent trips to the potty, some false alarms, some not.  And only one accident during dinner.

But the best was yet to come.  Aaron hadn't gone #2 before nap, as he often does.  He hadn't gone all day.  So we knew he'd probably need to go before bedtime.  I know that it's common for kids, especially boys, to still want to poop in their diaper so I didn't really expect him to go on the potty.  But while I was getting Audrey down to bed, Aaron told Thom he wanted to poop in the potty.  It took maybe 10 minutes of sitting before it happened, but it did happen!  We were amazed and elated.  And he kept going.  For 20 minutes.  During which time Thom taught him about negative numbers and pronouns (it fit in with their conversation somehow).  We told Aaron how proud we were of him.  And he said "I'm proud of you Papa.  I'm proud of you Mama.  I'm proud of my parents."

Our friend Jessica who has a 4 year old said that once they decide to potty train, it happens pretty quickly.  I guess she was right.  We are amazed with how well he's doing.  We are sticking around the house today and probably for the next few days until he gets the hang of it.  I'm still not sure how it's going to work when we go out, but I'll probably put a pull-up on him the first few times we go out, just in case.  We did put him in a diaper last night, but we'll do a pull-up at nap time today.  Assuming it goes OK, we'll do a pull-up again at night.