Day one ended with Erik clearly indicating that he did not enjoy being wet. He definitely was beginning to tell me every time he had an accident. Unfortunately, he was telling me as the accident was occurring. But … this is progress to me.
Day two dawned with a bouncing baby boy in bed with mom and dad. Mom rolls out of bed and takes baby boy to bathroom. Well, this baby boy decides that his Thomas (a baby doll we got him a year ago) needs to go potty too, and Thomas has to go first. So mom had to undress Thomas and sit him on the potty. Then, mom had to go potty too upon Erik’s insistance. Ugh, the things we go through as parents, right?
Eventually, Erik decides he is finally ready to sit on the potty and go. Hurray! Success!
Fast forward through the accidents on the couch and on the stairs …
The two potty attempts right before nap time were very promising. Erik tried, and tried, and tried to potty. He made noises. He grunted. He tried … but nothing. So he went down for a nap.
The Afternoon Where It Begins To Really Click
Immediately after waking up from his nap, Erik goes pee in the toilet. His little face was so happy and he hugged me and kissed me with joy. The rest of the afternoon was great. There were no accidents but we had to maintain constant vigilance about sitting on the potty and peeing.
So, how am I doing this? How do I know when Erik has to go? Even though my mother-in-law and roommate have been home with me during this exhausting time, I have been the primary adult working with the kid. I think what worked best, or what is really working for us, is the fact that I have been preparing the kid for this huge event for a while now.
We dabbled with watching a few YouTube videos about potty training. In reality folks, they are kind of frightening. Most of them have animals going potty, which in my opinion, isn’t very realistic for a little kid. My husband found a set of Leap Frog books that came with a small puppy, Scout, that has this sensor at the bottom that can touch the words and some pictures in the books and read aloud the content of each book. One of the books in the set happened to be a potty training book. We have read this several times including on the potty while trying to go.
In addition to reading books and watching ridiculous YouTube videos, I have been telling Erik that when day care closed for a week and a half we were going to throw away his diapers and start wearing big boy underwear. We went shopping for underwear and he helped pick out Thomas the Train, pirates and Mickey Mouse underwear. He even helped pick out the potty seat color. We chose to get something that sat on top of a normal toilet seat. For the last year, we’ve had a Bjorn potty chair that Erik has practiced on, but he says it is too small. So, now we have the Bjorn seat and it is pretty great. That’s how we began preparing for the big day.
Tomorrow, I’ll discuss how I notice when the potty is needed, how I can tell pee is in the toilet (frankly, you can’t always hear(, the clean up process and much more. So, keep an eye out for day three which I’ll post tomorrow.
Signing off for now,
Bay Area Blind Mom
Bay Area Blind Mom 
I find it rather funny that you are posting about potty training. Not that there’s anything funny about it, but that I’m in the middle of my own potty training blog post. Speaking from experience, the more you pay attention to your child, the easier and less messier the process is. I never shared my potty time fun with Marley in the blogging community, but Jackson’s story is one worth telling. Keep up the great work mama!
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