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Tuesday, October 27, 2009

Potty Training Progress!


The closest thing to a pic of my husband that I can get away with

I am so happy to say that Layla is almost potty trained!

For the last few days she has been having very few accidents, and most of those have been while we were out. Yesterday I started to realize that she was having a breakthrough. While we were at preschool  she said "potty pants" a couple times and I told her to wait a few minutes until I could change her. You see, usually when she would say something, that meant that she had already had an accident.
I laid her down to change her, and realized that she was still dry. She went inside and used the bathroom, but then wet her pants on the way back home. Last night about an hour after I put her to bed she woke up saying "momma, potty pants," so I took her and she went to the bathroom. She did go in her diaper again during the night, but hasn't had a single accident all day.

I think we're gonna be completely done within another month and she just turned 2 on the 14th!

So here's the basic plan I used to train her:

1. We started putting her on the potty whenever she had a dry diaper after an hour or two when she was about 14 mos. old. Sometimes she would go on the potty and be surprised at the result.

2. After we moved to Portland and were a little settled in, we stared really working on the training. I would put her in either cloth training pants or a cloth diaper when she was at home, and try to take her at least about each hour when she was awake. She got to the point where she could empty her bladder when it had something in it. We also introduced the reward of giving her a date whenever she went. This worked really well for awhile, but then the novelty wore off. She still kept going on the potty most of the time though.

If I lost track of the time or she had a lot to drink though, she would just go in her pants. This is why cloth is more useful for training. They feel the moisture more in the cloth more than with a disposable diaper or trainer, so they realize that the wet feeling isn't a good thing.

3. The final stage is your baby being able to realize the feeling of a full bladder, or the feeling that they need to poop. The poop is actually easier because you usually see them straining and hiding in the corner somewhere :-0

We are just seeing the beginning of this stage now, like yesterday when Layla actually asked to go at school before she wet her pants.

The last step of this stage is night-training. This is the hardest because they will have a hard time waking up fully during the night to ask for the bathroom. I am totally fine with Layla sleeping in it for now .

Why is early training better? Babies seem to be less stubborn about learning than older toddlers. Plus, you will save tons of time and money not buying diapers and washing loads of them.

22 comments:

Nikki said...

Thanks for the steps/tips! I'm impressed at how well she's doing at this age...I've never raised a child before, but I know my little cousin was at least 3 before he got any grasp on potty training at all.

I actually didn't realize that I could start as early as 14 months. My son will be 18 months when I graduate, so I'll probably plan to start then when I have more time.

NtN said...

Not to mention that cloth diapers are better for baby butts and cheaper if you're willing to wash them out :) (I was raised in cloth diapers and was fully trained at 19 months :) )

MashaAllah, keep up the good work!

Skye said...

masha'allah sis thats great news im very happy 4 u and ur family hehehehe i shall keep the tips in mind for onedayyyy lol =p

NoReply said...

Ahh this brings back so many fond memories :0D Completion of potty training is such a big hurdle - its like clearing Beechers Brook in the Grand National!

GTFrenzy said...

Congrats sis! Awww Layla is sooo cute, mashAllah!

Great tips, saving money is key. Diapers are expensive in the long term. Plus, they're horrible for the environment ... they just end up in a landfill.

Umm Omar said...

This post was encouraging for me. Omar is 2 1/2 and he's giving me a hard time with the potty training. Thanks for the tips. and HOORAY for Layla!

Stacy K. said...

@Nikki, That would be a perfect time to start. Let me know if you need help or more tips. I hope your life is a little less stressful by then InshaAllah.

Stacy K. said...

@Noor, Nice! I think she could have been done earlier, but was kinda stubborn about going for a while a few mos. ago.

Stacy K. said...

@Umm Omar, Let me know if you need any help. Some people told me boys are easier, but I have also heard that they're harder, so I guess it just depends on the kid.

Angie Nader said...

GOOD JOB LAYLA!

caraboska said...

My dad got the job of training me. Basically he sat me down on my potty chair when I was 2 years old and some change, and made me drink milk until I produced results. It took a couple of hours and I do not recall being particularly happy about having to stay in one place for so long, all the more so that I didn't really understand why this was necessary...

One thing I have heard about boys is that you have to be very careful while changing them, because many of them have an odd sense of humor and will hold their pee in until after you've got the diaper off, so they can squirt you with it. This is according to reports from, I think, friends who babysat baby boys when we were in high school. Or maybe it was a neighbor who had little boys herself?

Stacy K. said...

@Caraboska, I love your dad's idea. It would definitely work to make a kid more aware of what's going on down there.

caraboska said...

PS I guess once I produced the results, everything became clear to me, because apparently that was it - I was trained. At least regarding pee.

As far as poo is concerned, don't ever tell a kid anything to the effect of 'Put your grunties in the potty'. They'll think it's just fine to eliminate them anywhere, as long as they pick up after themselves and make sure that IN THE END, the grunties end up where they're supposed to be. Fortunately, by age 2 and some change, it is possible to explain the error in this understanding of the matter, and get the proper result after that.

Stacy K. said...

lol! I could definitely see Layla doing something like that :-)

caraboska said...

Gosh, I hope Layla doesn't get embarrassed reading all this about herself someday...

Stacy K. said...

ha that's not something I even thought about. Good point!

caraboska said...

I'm not saying you should get rid of all documentation of this phase of her life, it could even be interesting, but yeah...

Umm Ibrahim said...

asalaamu alaikum

awesome! We just really intensely started PTing our son, he'll be 3 in like 2 months, before this neither of us had the time or energy to really do it and plus he never really got it, or was "ready"...now that we r settled in and I'm not working or in school...it's getting easier.

basically what I do is the uber old fashioned method...I just let him run around the villa pants-less or sometimes with shorts on and keep reminding him about going in the potty. he usually has 2 accidents per day where he peeps his pants or the floor and the other half the time he sits on his potty (which is conveniently located in the living room...LOL) and goes. He is seeming to understand and now really fights a diaper.

Anonymous said...

lol, you gave yourself a lot of trouble for nothing,children don't have the physical capacity to be toilet trained before the age of two.
If they are trained,it's really the parent that does the work running after them reminding them etc.
I raised 3 boys,when they turned 2 ,I started training them,within a week they were trained.NO need to remind them, and sit them on the potty for hours

caraboska said...

Anonymous, being two is no guarantee. I was enough past two that they were worried about whether I would get potty trained in time for nursery school. And supposedly girls are easier to train... I guess I was some kind of exception?

iMuslimah said...

14 mos is great- so young. Our pediatrician mentioned that most babies begin to control the bladder and rectal muscles at 18 mos, so being that my son is 18 mos old- we are going to install a modified potty seat for him on the adult toilet tmorrow! I can see that he gets "it" and grabs his front or back when he has to go.

Someone told me it is harder to train boys than girls, does anyone konw if there is any truth to this?

Good luck with the night-time training!

Candice said...

That's great! Nora is 2.5 this week and I never really thought to start early because of her being confused with language at the time. (English, French and Arabic all mixed up) She's getting so much better with that! Then at 2 she was very sick... and we recently started. And yes, she is stubborn!

Contrats for Layla!