Category Archives: Parenting

Potty Training

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Stages of potty training

The process of moving from eliminating only in a diaper to being fully potty trained can be divided into several stages. These stages, and the approximate age when children may be ready for them are:

1. Body awareness: Learning what pee and poop are, noticing internal cues that they need to eliminate. Children in this stage may not seem to notice elimination or only notice after it has happened and their diaper is wet or poopy.

  • If a family has practiced elimination communication (aka diaper-free) since birth, potty training may come quite early, because parents are used to watching for their child’s cues, and the child is used to going to the toilet as soon as they have an urge to eliminate.
  • For families that diaper, you may have talked to them about these ideas on occasion since infancy. Discussing it more as they near potty training age will help with this stage.
  • Teach them words for their body parts and products, and help them notice when they have eliminated: “your diaper is wet because you peed.”

2. Potty awareness: Learning what a potty is and what it’s for. Children learn by talking about it and by watching others. You might also read them books or show videos that discuss toilet use.

  • Many children have a surge of interest in the potty around 16 to 24 months. That is a fine time to buy a potty and start practicing, with no real expectation or pressure to begin using it.

3. Practicing: Trying out the potty on a regular basis, with occasional success. A child’s physical maturity and readiness skills (see below) generally appear between 18 and 30 months. Once your child is having a reasonable chance of success when using the potty, and is showing many of the readiness signs, you’re ready to move on to potty training in earnest. Many experts recommend that, if they have not already done so, parents begin a focus on potty training around 2½ years (30 months)

4. Potty training till child is primarily using potty: Goal is that during the day the child used the potty, with support from parents, and with only occasional accidents. (At night time, diapers are still used.) The average age to be potty trained is 29 months for girls, and 31 months for boys. 90% or more are independently toileting in the daytime by 36 months. They typically need help with tasks like wiping after a bowel movement for longer than this.

5. Independent in the Day / Dry Overnight. Overnight bladder control is typically the last step. When a child’s diaper is dry most mornings, it’s a good time to move away from diapers completely. This may be age 3 for some children, but may be longer for others. By age 6, 90% are dry all night every night.

All the time estimates above are only averages! When a child is ready, and how long potty training take depend a great deal on the temperament and developmental skills of the child, and also depend on the temperament and energy of the parent.

Is your child ready?

It’s important not to push a child to do it before they’re ready. You may remember taking a basic psychology class at some point, and learning about Erickson’s stages of development. His second stage, experienced at 18 months to three years is Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt. If children are given encouragement and not pressured, they gain a sense of independence and competence. If pressured to achieve, and scolded for ‘accidents’, they suffer doubt and shame.

Signs of readiness. Here are some signs that tell you your child may be ready to potty train. These signs are a more important indicator than their age!

  • Cognitive:
    • Imitates adults and older children
    • Desire for independence – wanting to ‘do it myself’
    • Wants to put toys and possessions ‘where they belong’
  • Communication skills:
    • Able to understand and follow simple directions
    • Can communicate in simple sentences
  • Physical / motor skills
    • Able to dress and undress himself with help
    • Can hold her urine (keep diaper dry) for two hours
    • Has bowel movements at regular, predictable times of day
  • Potty and Body Awareness Stages – the more of these skills they have the easier training will be
    • Has words for urine and bowel movements, knows what they are, and where they come from
    • Shows interest in the toilet and what it’s used for
    • Is aware afterwards that he has urinated or had a bowel movement
    • Is aware when she is “going” – may tell you or may hide in a corner or behind a couch
    • Is aware before he goes – may tell you he needs to go soon, or may be able to answer a question about whether he feels like he needs to go.

Parental readiness

Before starting training, you may want to consider: Do you have the time and energy for it at this time?

  • The American Academy of Pediatrics says a parent should ask him or herself: will you be able to devote up to three months of daily encouragement to your toddler?
  • If you choose a “One-day” method: are you willing to pay very close attention to your child for the next week or two, really monitoring them, and are you willing to clean up accidents?
  • Is life fairly stable right now? It may not be a good idea to start at a time the child is experiencing major life transitions like a move, major vacation, or the birth of a sibling.

Steps to Potty Training:

Up front, it’s important to talk about roles: Your role is to create an environment which enables your child to move from eliminating in a diaper to use a potty. Your child’s job is do the actual work of learning how to do this… as the saying goes, “you can lead a child to the potty but you can’t make him pee.”

And learning to use the toilet is a hard job! A child has to learn to notice sensations they’ve been ignoring, and then remember to head to the bathroom, and then manage to get their clothes off, and then figure out just how to make all the right muscles work just right, on demand. It takes a while to figure it all out! The potty training books say children usually figure out bowel control earlier, as the urges are not as urgent, and it’s easier not to push out poop than it is to hold in pee. Anecdotally, parents may find that their child has bladder control earlier.

Here are some steps to potty use. Once they have some mastery of one step, move on to the next.

  1. Teaching the language of potty awareness and body awareness.
    1. Talk about elimination: yours and theirs. If you’re comfortable, let them join you in the bathroom when you use the toilet. If they have friends who are potty trained, ask the parent if it would be OK if your child accompanied theirs on a potty trip to observe a peer using a potty.
    2. Help your child notice when they’re peeing or pooping.
    3. Teach them the names of their body parts.
  2. Get a potty. When they show interest:
    1. Get a child-size potty or a potty seat to put on an adult toilet. Most children feel safer on a small potty where they can rest their feet on the floor. If they are using an adult toilet put a step stool nearby so they have somewhere to rest their feet when having a bowel movement.
  3. Have your child sit on the potty, with clothes on, to play or to look at a book.
  4. Have your child sit on the potty with clothes off, with no expectations that anything will happen. A natural time to do this might be during the diaper changing process.
  5. Show them where poop should go. When you change a dirty diaper, let your child see you dump the stool into the toilet. Then have your child sit on the potty for a moment and talk about the idea that their pee and poop could go there.
  6. Watch for opportunities to poop in potty. Watch your child for signs of concentration or pushing. Take him to a bathroom right away, take off the diaper and let him finish in the toilet. As you’re doing this, talk about how it feels when they need to poop, and what they should do when they feel that way.
  7. Go pants free for learning to pee in potty. Spend time at home when your child is diaper-free, place potty near where she is playing so she doesn’t have to stop what she is doing to use it when she has the urge (being diaper-less helps children become aware of the fact that urine and stool come from them, and it’s also faster to get on the potty which is better for the greater urgency of the need to pee.) Expect to be cleaning up some accidents.
  8. Once your child is managing to use the potty, transition to training pants or underwear for daytime, making sure to dress your child in clothes he can easily remove when needed, but continue to use diapers or pull-ups at naptime and bedtime.
  9. When ready, phase out bedtime diaper.

Steps 1 – 5 can happen any time, whenever convenient, with no pressure for anyone.

Steps 6 – 8 can be taken slowly, worked around the convenience of the family’s schedule and energy level. Parents offer the potty when it’s convenient (they’re home with time to spare) and let the child just use diaper to eliminate when the potty is not convenient (when they’re out and about or in a hurry to get out the door.) This method can take a few months to complete. The older they are when you start, probably the faster the process will go.

OR you can try the “Big Day” option, which is often promoted as “One Day to Potty Training” but may more likely be two weeks or so. (Unless your child is really really ready.)

There are variations to this Big Day plan, but here are some ideas:

  • Talk to your child about it in advance.
  • Prepare by getting big kid underwear or other item which your child can ‘earn’ by using the potty.
  • Make the day a celebration. Also, give your child PLENTY to drink that day to increase the chance that they will need to pee when you sit them on the potty.
  • On that day (or days), you may just let your child run around naked, and have them sit on the potty at short but frequent intervals. Or you may encourage them to sit on the potty for extended periods of time (e.g. 15 minutes on, 5 minutes off). If you choose the latter option, make it a pleasant experience by reading books together, or watching a movie, or playing with puzzles on a nearby table.
  • Celebrate every successful potty trip. Calmly clean up after accidents.
  • Plan on sticking close to home with extra changes of clothes easily available for the next few weeks as your child masters the post-diaper reality.

Whether you do the extended-time option or the condensed Big Day option, your goal is to get your child to primarily use the potty not the diaper. But we’re not yet getting the child to be totally independent! Expect to actively monitor potty needs for several months, suggesting that they use it at regular intervals, providing hands-on support with undressing, wiping, dressing, hand-washing and so on.

Expect that there will be accidents. Clean them up in a matter-of-fact way, talking about how your child could do things differently in the future. You may want to have your child help with clean up so they see the consequences. But don’t punish or shame child when accidents happen!

Expect set-backs and regression. There may be times where your child uses the potty for weeks, and you’ll think you’re done, and then they go on a potty strike for weeks and you’ll think potty training will never end! 80% of children have setbacks – which means they’re part of the normal process!

If potty training is really not working, stop, and try again in a few months.

Some More Tips:

  • Increase interest and appeal:
    • Try showing your child potty training videos, or reading books about the potty.
    • Have your child take a doll to the potty. There are specially designed potty training dolls who can pee which help to reinforce learning.
    • Make diaper changing boring and routine. Make potty time fun and interactive.
  • Timing and opportunity:
    • Suggest potty trips several times a day. Instead of asking “do you want to go potty”, try just saying “let’s go to the potty now.” That may meet with less resistance.
    • Try at times when your child is likely to succeed: first thing in the morning, when she has been dry for a while, just after a bath, or just after a meal.
    • Try setting a timer and taking your child to the bathroom at least 6 times a day. Once they are having less than one accident a day, start giving them freedom to decide if they need to go.
      • Most children pee 4 – 8 times a day, and have two or three BM’s a day. (Though some can skip days – know your own child’s pattern)
  • Make potty time a pleasant experience. We can’t relax our sphincter muscles when we’re stressed!
    • Read books, or sing a special song, or give a toy to look at. But nothing TOO distracting.
    • Don’t force your child to sit if he resists – don’t turn it into a battle of wills
    • Don’t require sitting on the potty for long periods of time (e.g. 5 minutes). Let her leave when she chooses. (Note: some behavioral modification methods have the child sit longer than this.)
    • Fill a bowl with warm water and a few water toys (like rubber duckies). Set it next to the potty, and encourage your child to play in it while they sit on the potty. The warm water may inspire them to pee. They can play with the toys for as long as they sit on the potty, then when they’re ready to get off the potty, you put the toys away.
    • Praise your child for cooperation with the process, and for trying, even if they don’t go.
  • Logistics:
    • When training a little boy, teach him to urinate sitting down. Standing up while urinating is a more challenging skill to teach later on.
    • When children are using an adult toilet, they may find it easier to balance sitting backward.
    • It is easier to train in summer when your child can run outdoors, bare foot and bare bottomed.
    • Consider training pants rather than pull-ups so they can feel when they are wet.
    • Underwear or other ‘big kid’ options (e.g. special toy) may be a good reward for potty training.
  • Attitudes and Family Values
    • Your child may want to touch urine or feces. Discourage this without over-reacting or shaming.
    • Your child may want to touch or examine his or her own genitals on the potty. This is a good time to teach proper names for body parts, and to discuss family standards for when and where touching is appropriate. This exploration is normal and natural behavior, and again, no need to over-react or shame the child.
    • Use simple and straightforward words for bowel movements (BM, poop), urine (pee), and body parts (e.g. penis, vulva.) Don’t use negative words like stinky, dirty, etc.

Reward System?

I have a full post on whether to use rewards when potty training and how.

Sources on Potty Training:

Understanding Your Child’s Temperament

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From the day they’re born, our children are individuals, with distinct preferences and unique ways of being in the world and interacting with others. One way to understand and explore these differences is through the lens of Temperament. Temperament traits are the inborn, instinctive way that we respond to stimuli and environments. As parents, understanding our child’s temperament helps us both to accommodate their needs – helping our day-to-day lives go more smoothly – and also to gently challenge them to learn flexibility and other ways of responding.

There are three steps to applying temperament to our parenting:

  1. Learn about your child’s temperament
  2. Learn about your own temperament and about whether you and your child are naturally a “good fit” or whether you’ll need to work harder to understand each other
  3. Tailor your guidance and discipline methods to find a parenting style that suits your temperament and meets your child’s needs

One caution before we get started: Avoid “labeling” your child. Distilling all the joys and challenges of your child’s personality down to one label means missing part of the magic that makes them unique and special. Also, once a child is labeled as “difficult”, or “shy”, or “hyperactive” it tends to shape everyone’s interactions with the child, and may make it harder for the child to move beyond that label to develop all the sides of her personality.

9 temperament traits

In the 50’s, Chess and Thomas developed a theory of 9 inborn traits. Think about each of these, and where your child falls on the spectrum of that category.

Activity level: is your child always on the go, so full of energy that it’s hard to keep up? Or is he more laid-back, likely to sit quietly, and move slowly?

Regularity / predictability: In terms of biological functions, does your child eat, sleep, and have bowel movements at the same times each day? Or is there little pattern or predictability?

Approach or withdrawal in new situations: Is your child bold and enthusiastic, always willing to explore, try new activities and meet new people? Or is she shy, clingy, hesitant to try something new, and only comfortable with something after many exposures / much repetition?

Adaptability: Does your child move easily from one activity to the next and adapt quickly to changes in his environment? Or does any transition in activity, or disruption to his daily routine, upset him?

Sensitivity / Threshold of Responsiveness: Is your child easily startled by sudden sounds or disturbed by bright lights, uncomfortable clothing, and unusual smells? Or is your child blissfully unaware of things that trouble others?

Intensity of Reaction: How strongly does your child respond? Are all her reactions big – either ecstatic or miserable or outraged? Or is she pretty mellow and low-key – content or bummed or annoyed?

Quality of Mood: Is your child generally happy and optimistic, smiling and laughing easily, recovering quickly from disappointments? Or is your child moody, negative, serious, or difficult to please?

Distractibility: Is your child easily sidetracked, and easily distracted from what she’s doing? Or does he tend to stay focused on one thing for a long time, ignoring what’s happening around him? (Remember that for a toddler, a “long time” may not seem very long to us as adults!)

Persistence: Will your child pursue the same activity for a long time – even if he’s frustrated by something, he’ll keep on trying? Or does your child lose interest in things quickly, moving on right away if something starts to frustrate her?

After reading through this list, do you have a better sense of how your child reacts to his world?

Please remember: A child’s temperament is neither good nor bad. For example, a persistent child can be exhausting as parents try to distract him from things like electrical cords, but that same child may someday excel in school, pushing through any difficulty until succeeding at an assignment.

Understanding your child can improve your interaction. For example, if you have a child with low adaptability, who struggles with transitions, and with a tendency to withdraw in new situations, then you adapt your parenting. For example, if next week you’ll be going to a company picnic at a park your child has never seen, you could talk to your child about it in advance, bring along familiar toys to comfort her, give her space to retreat back to your reassuring arms, make sure she’s well-rested and well-fed, and so on. You could even go to the park this week and get familiar with it without the added pressure for her of meeting several strangers at the same time. These steps accommodate her temperamental needs. But, you won’t give up on taking your child new places! You’ll need to gently challenge this child to grow and build the skills to be more adaptable and more adventurous over time, and give her the tools to calm the anxiety she naturally faces in these situations.

Your temperament

Once you’ve examined your child’s temperament, think about your own. (And your co-parent’s temperament.) Where are you similar to your child? Where are you different?

Goodness of Fit:

Sometimes a child’s temperament is a good match for his environment, which may make him seem like an “easy” child, and make it easy for parents to feel successful – this is “goodness of fit.” Sometimes a child’s temperament is not compatible with the expectations of her environment, and this makes her seem like a “difficult” child and makes the parents feel overwhelmed and incapable of good parenting.

The child’s ‘environment’ is composed both of the social rules and expectations of a particular setting, and the people around him, who all have their own temperaments which influence their interactions. If a child with a high activity level and high intensity level is on a trampoline with his high activity level parent, that’s a goodness of fit, and everyone has a good time with peals of laughter. But, put that same child at library story time, or pair that same child with a low activity level parent who has a high level of sensitivity and is easily overwhelmed by noise and activity, and nobody has a good time.

If you often feel like your child is hard to manage, or you’re often frustrated by behavior that just doesn’t make sense to you, it may be that you and your child have a temperament mis-match. Learning more about your own temperament and about hers, and thinking about how to adapt your usual approach to better match their needs may lead to less conflict. For example, if you really value your own persistence and enjoy focusing on one thing for a long time, but your child is very distractible and gives up and moves on to a new activity whenever anything is challenging, you may find yourself frustrated in the moment, and also worrying about long-term issues like success in school. Can you shift your expectations for how long your child will stick to one activity? Can you learn to appreciate what she gains by moving through a range of experiences? (And yes, over time, you will work with her to gently build her attention span and persistence.)

If, on the other hand, you generally feel like your child is easy to relate to, but certain situations really set him off, consider whether some aspect of his temperament is at play. For example, your child may be happy and easy-going most of the time, but whenever you go somewhere that is very loud and busy, he clings to you or tantrums or hits other children. This may be a child who tends toward withdrawal in new situations and is highly sensitive to his environment. You could reduce problems with some creativity: for example, you might go to a fair as soon as it opens in the morning, leaving before it gets crowded and loud. Or go to the zoo on weekdays when there will be fewer people. Or take your child to the special “mom’s day at the movies” screenings – they turn the volume down lower than it is typically played. When going somewhere for the first time, you may need to accept that your child may only want to be there for a short time before he needs to retreat back to home territory. As your child gets older, you’ll work to help him learn ways to cope with being over-stimulated, and how to calm himself in those situations, but you won’t try to do that on a day when he’s sick or tired or hungry!

Understanding the influence of temperament on how your child responds to his environment and how she reacts to the people she encounters can help you smooth things over when needed, and guide you in understanding where your child most needs your help to develop skills that don’t come naturally.

For more information

Recommended overviews

Tips for creating a “Goodness of Fit” between a child and his parents and environment: http://centerforparentingeducation.org/library-of-articles/child-development/unique-child-equation/temperament/understanding-goodness-of-fit/

This summary worksheet from Amiable Home is a really excellent overview of temperament types and ways that parents can respond to their unique child: https://gooddayswithkids.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/38588-temperamentchart.pdf

Guides to Supporting Certain Personalities

Recommended online quizzes

The Ready for Life temperament quiz (www.readyforlife.org/temperament/quiz/start) not only allows you to score your child’s temperament traits, it then yields a collection of customized parenting tips. For example: “Tips for Working with a Child Who Is Very Persistent: Alert teachers that she often needs some notice to be able to stop her activity and move on. Encourage family members not to give in to her wants all the time. Allow him to keep unfinished projects somewhere to complete after dinner, chores or other activities. Repeat and continue songs, games and books until she is satisfied. Remember he is not stubborn, just persistent and that can be a good thing!”

The Infant Toddler Temperament Tool (IT3) http://www.ecmhc.org/temperament/index.html. Scores both you and the toddler. Then gives you customized “Goodness of Fit” Recommendations. For example: “Your child is less adaptable, you are highly adaptable. Here are some ideas to support the fit between you… Try to establish a normal daily routine. Try not to introduce too much too fast. A new child or teacher in the classroom might be scary or confusing for him, so react sensitively. Allow him to not participate in a new experience if he/she is having difficulty adapting.”

I will list the rest of my sources in my next post.