Potty Training

I’ve kept mum about our recent potty training adventures with Lindy because I didn’t want to jinx myself.  Now that we are 1.5 weeks into it and she is doing pretty good, I figured I’d write about it!

Saturday, June 18th Lindy woke up and the first thing I did was sit her on the potty.  She peed a tiny amount and I told her I thought she had more.  She peed a little bit more and then she eventually emptied her bladder.  We were so proud of her!  I decided hey, she’s gone once today, let’s just see what she does the rest of the day.

I don’t know what made me put her on the potty that morning because I hadn’t really planned to start potty training her that day.  But once we got started, there has been no looking back.

I used a 3 day potty training method with Will that was pretty intense.  I have tried it twice with Lindy and we had no success.  I knew I was going to have to try something totally different.  I emailed a cousin a few months back and asked her how she trained her little boy who has autism.  She told me that she took her son every hour.  If he did not go then she’d take him again in 15 minute increments. 

That is what I have been doing for 1.5 weeks and it seems to be working!  The beach trip last week was a bit of unfortunate timing but oh well.  We kept up with it as well as we could when we were at the beach house but couldn’t do too much down at the beach.  I never knew if she had peed or was just wet from the ocean water.  All in all she kept doing well, even despite being away from home.

My cousin also told me to put her in panties, get rid of the diapers or pull-ups.  I have done that for the most part if we are at home.  She had some Dora panties and she was very concerned about keeping Dora dry.   We’ve really played up keeping whichever character she has on her panties dry and she seems to respond to that.  I bought her some knew Ni Hao Kai-Lan and Yo Gabba Gabba panties and she gets those as rewards after peeing so many times in the potty.  She loves her new panties and really wants to keep them dry.   I have been putting her in pull-ups if we leave the house, because I’m just not that brave.  She has stayed dry lately when we are out running errands and yesterday we met my friend Wendy at the park and I brought the potty along.  She stayed dry and went pee when I took her to the potty. 

This go-round on the potty training has been SOOOO much better than the last two.  The last two times I was super anal and covered the carpet with plastic.  This time it has been so relaxing.  If she goes pee then I don’t even stress at all.  She’s all good for an hour.  Maybe she feels how much more relaxed we are and that is why we are having some success?

We are not to the stage where she tells us she has to go – yet.  I see a few emerging signs of it.  We’re doing a slow and steady potty training here.  We are light years ahead of where we’ve ever been and I have finally come around to the thinking that she will be potty trained.  I was starting to have my doubts! 

I can tell she is getting much more comfortable with the whole idea too.  In the beginning it was taking 10-15 minutes of her sitting and reading books before she’d go.  Now she often sits and goes fairly quickly.  In the beginning she was also just letting tiny bits of pee out and now she is starting to let it all go at once.  Definite signs that she is getting better at it!

We are just going to keep at it the entire summer.  It is definitely not a 3 day experience – more of an entire summer experience.  We are SO proud of her.  I’m pretty sure she is proud of herself too.  Even Will gets pretty excited and tells her he is proud of her.  Even though that is probably because he usually gets an M&M when she pees!

Besides potty training this week, we’ve had a pretty quiet one.  Lindy, Will, and I met my friend Wendy and her daughter Berkley at a park on Wednesday morning.  It was fun but hot!  We also had a picnic lunch at the park with them.  After a nap I took the kids outside and we played in the sprinklers and with the water table.  The kids had a blast in the water.

Wednesday evening we had plans to go over to Wendy’s house and watch the last Harry Potter movie.  We were supposed to start the movie at 8:30pm so we put the kids in bed early and then Aunt Jamie and Uncle Ed came over.  Our reason for doing such is that Lindy has throw up on them the last two times they have babysat.  Last night we thought we’d take care of that by putting them to bed ourselves.  We put them down and unfortunately they weren’t asleep when we left.  Will was laying down and heading off but Lou Lou was playing.  But she was yawning so I was really hoping she’d just lay down and go to sleep.  Well, she didn’t.  They said she played until like 8:30pm and then finally started crying.  And cried until she made herself throw up.  Ed and Jamie are never going to babysit for us ever again!!!  They heard her start gagging on the monitor so they headed in there, got the throw up bucket and got ready.  And sure enough she ralphed.  She definitely keeps everyone on their toes.  Never a dull moment with that girl around!  They said she puked and then laid down and went to sleep.  Go figure.

That’s our week so far.  We are looking forward to the long, holiday weekend! 

The princess on her throne!Playing outside yesterday.  She had really cute matching bottoms on, but she pooped in them.  She is SO silly!She was so serious about getting water out of the water table and pouring it on the patio.  She must have felt it was her ‘job’ for the day!Look at that tongue out!  He takes his hopscotch seriously!Perfect time for a carwash!