Time to talk potty training. I started potty training Mark when he was just a little over a year old. I didn’t know that there were cues you were supposed to look for to see if they’re ready so I just thought it was time. I knew very little about it at all actually. I didn’t even do very much research on it. I just decided to wing it and give it a shot in an effort to have him potty trained before Rose made her appearance. I was starting the process completely alone though, no research, no Joe, no help at all just going for it.
Joe was gone the majority of the time I was potty training Mark. The time that he was home it was hard for him to keep up with the program. It’s hard to come into the middle of a routine when you have your own and just catch on to what’s happening. Potty training was stressful for all of us and it got overwhelming for him to try and potty train when he wasn’t home when it started. I had to explain to him what we were doing or trying and it just didn’t really help him understand at all.
From what I hear, it took Joseph a long time to get potty trained, and boys tend to be more difficult anyway. I did not know this going into it, so I had unreasonably high expectations for a one year old to master the potty in a few months time. I thought it would be a year tops and he would be fully potty trained by two. I was very, very wrong. Mark actually only recently got potty trained shortly before his fourth birthday. He was fully potty trained with no accidents right around 3.5, give or take a few months. So that puts us at a grand total of about 2.5 years of potty training, again, give or take a few months.
Up until the last few months, it was a trial and error of me trying to figure it out by myself. Learning new things. Trying new ways to encourage him, and losing my patience a lot. By the end we were taking him to the bathroom every 5-10 minutes. We would have timers set and no matter what we were doing, Mark was going to the bathroom when that 5 minutes was up. I mean this was our last resort. We had tried just letting him not wear a pull up, which just led us to messes constantly on the floor. The same goes for just trying to cut ties with the pull ups and put him straight into big boy underwear. I’d try giving stickers for him to put on his potty, stickers for him, and other small rewards to no avail, so the timer was our last chance. At this point it was getting increasingly stressful for all three of us, but we were so close to the end and this wasn’t something we could just give up on at 3 years old. Finally, there was a light at the end of the tunnel and Mark had finally started to get the hang of going on his own.
We let him pick out his own underwear, because we were super proud. But, again, being naive I had thought “that’s it! We did it! It’s done!”, and tried to get back into a more normal routine. Silly mommy. We had many accidents following. Honestly, not all were accidents though. If Mark got sent to time out, or sent to nap time, pretty much anything he didn’t want to do, he went in his pants. It didn’t matter if he had literally just gone to the bathroom before he went to his room. This kid was really pooping his pants out of spite. I know you’re all probably thinking I’m crazy, but it wasn’t hard to tell when he genuinely had an accident and when he was just doing it out of retaliation. I refused to wash poopy underwear when he did it on purpose. Why? Because I’m petty. I can not even tell you how many pairs of his “cool” underwear went in the trash or how many sheets, blankets, and toys I washed because of his “accidents”.
Don’t get me wrong he did have a lot of actual, genuine accidents. We always sat him down and talked with him when he had an accident. We reestablished the proper place to go potty, cleaned him up, and got him all set to go again. Like I said though, it was really easy to tell when it was truly accidental and when he was doing it on purpose though. We had so many talks I tell you. So many talks where I came down to his level, sat on his bedroom floor and talked about not peeing his pants on purpose. At one point he had to clean it up himself and you could see he understood how frustrating it was. So much laundry. So many paper towels.
He also went through a phase where if he did have an accident he would hide it at all costs. We kept trying to encourage him to tell us if he had an accident because we would rather him tell us the truth and let us help clean him up than for him to hide it and lie about it. He would come out of his room after a nap in a completely different outfit than he went in with. He would just creep around his room going through his drawers and hiding his dirty clothes. This made for a really fun game for me of playing hide and seek with piss soaked pants. He also would poop in his pants and then use the bathroom towels and his hands to clean himself up. He mastered quietly washing his hands in his bathroom. Much to my surprise, I’d find shitty towels, walls, and pants around the house in hiding spots. It was great.
Lately (knock on wood) he’s been doing really well though. I don’t find poop anymore and there’s no more hiding pee pants. He very rarely even has an accident anymore. Also, he stopped using an excessive amount of toilet paper (the whole roll), and is wiping himself now. We are FINALLY completely wrapped up on potty training Mark, just in time for Rose to really get started.
Learning from my mistakes, I got Rose a potty when she turned one but was waiting on the cues. We have never tried to push her into potty training before she was ready. We would just leave the little potty out if she decided to get acquainted with the idea. When we first got it she was sitting on it a lot getting associated with it, but we didn’t push it at all. As a matter of fact, Rose has taken it into her own hands.
We got a special toilet seat for the bathroom toilet, along with the plastic potty, and a step stool. Overnight Rose became obsessed with the potty. She wants to spend all her time on the toilet or eating, there’s no in between. I’m not exaggerating, she is like the living example of “shit or get off the pot”. I mean, I guess it’s a good thing she’s taken it into her own hands because 1. we know she’s ready and 2. it’s less stressful for her. We have a long way to go still with her though.
So far what I’ve learned from Rose is to always check her pull up for poop before she decides to take it off and sit on the toilet. She likes to poop and then immediately decide she needs to be on the potty. Not the greatest cleaning smeared poop off the toilet seat and her. Also, I’m learning that she needs instruction on how much toilet paper to use. She uses an excessive amount and also thinks you just go into the potty and wipe even if you aren’t using the bathroom. Thankfully we aren’t going the toilet paper shortage of 2020 anymore.
Hopefully in the time it takes for Rose to get potty trained I get more patient and learn even more. Also, I hope Mark starts getting more pee in the toilet than on the seat or the floor, because it’s getting old cleaning the bathroom two or more times a day.
I continue to learn every day and now have potty training both genders under my belt. I look forward to the light at the end of the tunnel, and continuing to improve my teaching methods to tailor to the kids more specifically. It’s a long road ahead of us still and I’m sure I’ll have a lot of stories and updates on the serial pottier. And to any one out there potty training, patience is key, all kids are different, you will get there eventually. And you will get used to the word “potty” and use it around adults too. Most importantly, GOOD LUCK!
