Making Progress

We’ve had some tremendous progress with potty training in the last few weeks. Samantha’s been holding her water for longer and longer periods of time, and while she doesn’t always tell us she has to go, we have been asking periodically and she’ll either say yes or no. If we don’t ask she will, occasionally, tell us, although sometimes a bit too late. Of course sleeping is a different story. She will have wet diapers while she sleeps, but that, too, seems to be lessening. When she’s gone in her diaper, she’ll say “wet.” She’s becoming increasingly uncomfortable with being wet, which I think is evidenced by the fact that she pulls her clothes off after her naps and in the mornings when she wakes up if we don’t go into her room quickly enough to run interference and get her on the potty. And pulling her clothes off often includes a big wet patch on the floor. Ordinarily, we’d have let her hang out in her room for a while to play after she wakes up since she can be kind of grouchy and likes to doze a bit more, but that seems to have to come to an end. Samantha still isn’t able to open doorknobs and we keep her room shut at night to prevent wandering (even though she sleeps pretty soundly and stays in bed), but someone suggested that we gate her room instead of closing her door so she can call to us if she has to use the potty. We use the baby monitor, but she doesn’t know that, and I think having an open door may make a difference. I guess I’ll have to say goodbye to my half-hour of coffee and leisure while she plays in the mornings now!

Now I know I’ve said repeatedly that I wouldn’t talk about poo, but I have to talk about it, because I know that in this supportive blogging community, there are many of you out there who are going through the same thing. I find it really helps to read others’ posts about the same subject, and hope I can help some of you, too. So here it is. We’ve also had progress with #2. Several times in the last few weeks, at our prompting, she’s done it on the toilet instead of while she was sleeping. Once she pulled her clothes off after a nap and used the floor. Lovely (more reason to go into her room asap). She felt really bad about this. When I sternly told her off, I then checked for understanding: “Where should you go poo?” “Potty.” “And where else should you go poo?” “Nappy.” Good. A few times she’s woken up whimpering in the middle of the night, and when I’ve gone in to check on her she tells me she has to use the potty, and she does #2. Very, very exciting!

A couple of questions for those of you out there…is the fact that she’s taking her clothes off really a sign that she wants to use the potty or doesn’t want to be wearing her nappy? Do you have any advice for using public toilets? I find this so awkward, and have left her in a diaper when we’ve gone out for an afternoon. Sadly, she will usually tell me she has to use the potty at the most inopportune time, and all I can do is tell her I’m sorry. What a way to destroy progress! I’m completely grossed out by porta-johns and public restrooms in general. When we drove back from Michigan, we stopped at many, and it was pretty traumatic for both of us. Even with the potty seat that I was dragging around with me (it didn’t seem to fit properly on many of the public toilet seats, and I had to do some serious juggling to keep her legs/clothes from touching any part of the toilet, or to keep the potty seat and her from falling in!). What works for you?

School will be starting back up in a couple of weeks, and they’re good about keeping to a potty schedule as well. I feel like Samantha has shown more interest in the last two weeks than she did when she was in school before the summer session started (summer school did not focus on potty training). She’s been sick for the last few days (some sort of stomach bug), so she hasn’t really been into the program, but I’m sure she’ll be right back on track as soon as she’s feeling better.