(First published on The Contented Calf website on Sunday 24th July 2011.)
So are you all dying to find out how our four days of Potty Training went (The best laid plans of mice and mummies)?
What was our call yesterday as to whether we’d send BF to nursery in pants or nappies?
Were we ‘totally potty’ to attempt Potty Training....?
Well, here’s my mummy report:
Day One, Thursday (aka D-Day!)
To be honest, it was a bit of a mixed bag. It started off well with BF being very enthusiastic about wearing her ‘big girl pants’.
In the morning, she did a couple of prompted wees in the potty and one which I think was semi-self-prompted, so I was excited by that!
We then had a couple of accidents, but one was while playing with running water and one after a big trip and face plant, so not surprising. Towards lunch-time, though, there were some accidents – I wondered if that was because she was getting tired?
The afternoon proffered two more accidents – both while watching TV, so I decided no TV the next day, or at least until BF was sat on the potty. Late afternoon into the evening, we were back on track, with all wees in the potty. These were, however, prompted by me, along with the bribery of being able to watch ‘Bob’ on YouTube on my phone!
Day Two, Friday
It was much the same as Day One, with numerous accidents. However, we also had one of her friends round, and she did enjoy ‘performing’ her new trick in front of a couple of my NCT mums! So I still thought it worth giving it a full four days before making our minds up.
Day Three, Saturday
The morning was a great success! BF did have an accident first thing, but she had insisted on going outside, wearing just her pants, and it was quite cold, so again, not surprising.
From then on in, starting with a 20 minute gap, increasing up to over an hour by the end of the morning, I asked her if she wanted to use the potty. For most of the morning she was happy to sit and have a wee. She even initiated sitting down for a poo mid-morning.
Towards the end of the morning, which had been our danger-zone on Days One and Two, I really wanted her to sit and have a wee so as to avoid accidents, so I got out ‘In the Night Garden’ on my phone for the final two wees. But our lunch-time report was, despite the early morning outside accident, potty all the way!! I was really excited and proud of her.
And could really see with another practice day at home, she’d definitely be ready to see how it went at nursery on Monday.
But then, remember what I was saying about ‘best laid plans of mice and mummies’?
Well, they went awry, of course! ;-)
After her post-lunch sleep, BF woke up not wanting to change from her ‘sleep-time nappy’ back into her pants. I wasn’t too worried about this as it had also happened one of the other days, but by the time she’d properly shaken off her sleepiness, she was happy to go back into pants.
This didn’t happen this time.
The poor wee (excuse the pun!) mite was so upset about losing her nappy!!
We certainly didn’t want to cause any stress around potty training, especially as she’s still so young. So we asked her whether she wanted to wear pants or nappies. Nappies was the answer. We explained that if she wore a nappy she’d be doing wees in the nappy, not the potty, so where did she want to do wees? Nappy was the answer. We managed to wrestle off the wet nappy she was wearing to put on a clean one, and after that she seemed a lot happier.
Our decision was made. Potty training to end. Pants, potty and potty chart all packed up and put away, ready for another day.
I kind of suspect she’ll probably train herself and we’ll find we just switch her nappies to pants one day.
Whatever, the next step, I’m happy that we’ll leave it for a few months until she’s more ready. And hopefully now we’ve had a go, the next time it’ll go even more smoothly.
For now, though, I’m excused the constant tipping out of wee into the loo, but must continue the nightly ‘slop out’ the potty post-evening poo!
Urgh!!
As always, with love from our family to yours,
Elena x
