June is National Potty Training Month and BABYBJÖRN has a fantastic giveaway for our readers – a special edition, gold BABYBJÖRN Smart Potty! (not available in stores or for purchase.) There are EIGHT ways to enter, so be sure to enter for your chance to win!
This link takes you to the giveaway!
BABYBJÖRN has also put together a list of top potty training tips from Dr. Robyn Strosaker, Pediatrician from UH Rainbow Babies & Children’s Hospital.
Potty Training Tips
When?
- Most children can be ready to start potty training between 18-24 months. Children will train easier before 24 months; some can become willful after that point.
- Both the family and the child need to be ready. Review the signs of readiness and make a plan with your significant other.
- If your child is having trouble, stop for 2-4 weeks and then try to restart.
- Find a time when you can be around during the week to start potty training. Summer vacations or holidays are the best times.
How?
- Sticker charts are great. If your child earns a certain number of stickers, they can earn a non-food reward.
- If your child still wants to go in their diaper, take them out of it. If they are wearing underwear, they will feel uncomfortable when they are wet. If you are concerned about the mess, you can put the underpants on under the diaper. For those kids who don’t like wearing underpants, encourage them to wear them for a short time and offer rewards when they keep them clean and dry.
- As a side note, there is nothing developmentally different between pull-ups and a diaper. Training will go quicker with underpants.
Where?
- If your child has a certain area of the house he/she prefers to go potty in, it might be a good idea to get a portable potty and let him/her try that.
- Put the portable potty in a room where the child typically plays to help them get used to the idea.
Other Considerations
- Most kids aren’t ready to be dry at night until they start waking up dry from naps and some mornings.
- To help keep them dry at night, stop liquids 2-3 hours after dinner, depending on your child’s bedtime.
- When traveling: take a portable potty or potty seat with you, but you may need pull-ups for long car trips or plane rides.
Click here to find out more information on the Smart Potty and see other colors available!
I like the potty, its cute. 🙂 Maybe I’ll win it for the other bathroom or for at auntie’s house.
I don’t agree with the age range specified though! In the 60’s & 70’s it was common to be potty trained by a year old, back when cloth nappies were the norm. The popularity of disposable diapers and the ever increasing variety sizes and “ranges” changed the norm, for no particular reason that had anything to do with “better for baby” and everything about making more money, Of course Pamper’s and Huggies want you to keep buying diapers until they’re 5 years old for overnights and for trainers and pullups and all the various other “needs” like swim diapers.
We started potty training at 6 months old and are 3 WEEKS in. We did prep from the time he was born. Everyone can tell when a baby is going #2, so we just asked him “Are you pooping?” (verbally and baby sign language) and made it obvious to him that pooping = that sensation when he pushes down and then has an icky, uncomfortable diaper. At 6 months we started seating him on the baby potty when we could tell he was pooping. So far he crawls to the bathroom door when he has to go #2 so he can sit on his potty. We whip off the diaper and sit him on his little potty and talk to him about how everyone and everything goes potty while he goes, we wipe him off with a wet washcloth (wipe free house due to his allergies) and tell him how good he did and put on a new diaper and set him back down right outside the bathroom. Is it hard? yes. It requires a lot of attention to his signs. It helps that he is pretty regular and goes #2 like clockwork at 8am and 2:30pm (thank goodness for a good probiotic!). Sometimes he pees at the same time.
One of the MAJOR reasons that we chose to go the old-fashioned potty training route is that it doesn’t allow them to truly get comfortable with moving around in a wet/dirty diaper, which is our nephew’s problem, he’s 4 and will literally poop himself with no signs, keep playing and hide when you mention it. When he was 3 his dad came back from the Middle East and was not the most patient with him because everyone in his family had been potty trained by 2 years old and he felt like his wife and her parents(They all lived together when he was overseas) had “spoiled” him and been lazy about it.
Babies have an instinctual issue with soiling on themselves. Its why many newborns pee as soon as the diaper comes off. Some of the other things we considered are the 2 year old mark stubbornness, the difficulty of potty training boys (supposed to be worse than girls?) and the savings/convenience/cleanliness of potty training earlier. We consulted with our pediatrician and he said that as long as we provided a way for our son to communicate it non verbally, then potty training by 1 is a reasonable goal. So far that communication is him crawling to the bathroom. I’m sure it will change as he gets older, maybe he’ll use the sign for it soon, like he does for “more” when he is eating and I’m sure there will be setbacks and accidents, but that happens whenever you choose to potty train and whatever method you use! 🙂