3 day potty training :: completed :: did it work?

This picture sums things up. Captain Underpants finally got it. I really shouldn’t say “finally”, but it was a long couple of days. BUT, it was only DAYS!  I potty trained my other two over the course of months. We stopped, we started, we had good days, we regressed. This 3 day potty training method is intense, but now that I’m on this side of it, I am pretty geeked that it worked.

One “side effect” that I’ve not read about (and yes I googled it and came up short) was that my Charlie is super clingy and for the first time in his entire life he sobbed when I dropped him off at his kid’s club at the gym. The worker looked at me and said, “What did you do to him? Charlie never cries.” Oh no, I  broke my always easy going kid! I THINK that this potty training boot camp was giving the poor kid some anxiety. 1) It wasn’t our norm for me to be hovering over him every waking minute of the day watching for potty signals. 2) We stayed home (mostly) for 3 days and went to the bathroom over and over. I think my Charlie’s world got a little shaken up. He’s like his mother, we are creatures of habit.

There was an AHA moment for us. It didn’t come until Day 4, BUT when Charlie started to get weird and clingy I decided to step back a little and add some of our normal routine back into our day. IF we had followed the book to a T, I do believe it would have been 3 days. Let me recap how our days went:

DAY 1–

read DAY 1 post

DAY 2-

It was a horrible, terrible, very sad day. The 3 day potty training book is very good about expressing the importance of positivity and I put on a fake smile, but day 2 was hard. He was getting underwear damp every 5 minutes and 32 seconds, but would not go potty on the toilet. He had the urge to go, but froze up when we got there. I fudged the rules and put him in a diaper for nap and bedtime. Besides little drops here and there, the kid didn’t go to the bathroom until he was asleep for his nap and then for the night. Bladder of steal!

DAY 3-

This was supposed to be the magical day where he was suddenly potty trained. Emotionally this was his toughest day and we backed off a bit on the frequent runs to the restroom and bribes of M&M’s if he went to the bathroom. Strangely enough, he had no trouble with #2 (so we had that success on day 3), but he was really hung up on relaxing and going #1. We’d get a dribble here and there and that was it.

DAY 4-

I sought the advice of my fellow simple moms and they told me it took til day 4 or 5 for some of their kids. It really depends on the kid. They encouraged me to hang in there. I’m so glad I did. Ok, I’m not proud of this, but I had to figure out a way to make Charlie go to the bathroom. Not dribbles, but pee like a racehorse. We went about our day and when I picked him up from kids club at my gym he said “poopers”. He went in a public bathroom like it was old hat. I made a big deal out of it, but the kid still wasn’t going #1. Soooooo……(I know, this is super terrible)…..but I got him a large coke from McDonalds and let him drink the whole thing. It was his reward for is #2 victory. It almost backfired because he fell asleep in big boy underwear in the car. However, when he woke up, he had to go! And GO he did. I saw the peace wash over his face when he realized he was using the potty like a big boy. We have the coolest secret handshake (high fives and fist bumps) when he has success, and from day 4 on we’ve had very few accidents and LOTS and LOTS of practice of our victory handshake in our tiny bathroom.

We still do diapers at night because he’s only 24 months old and doesn’t wake up dry. That’s okay, he’s got a tiny 2 year old bladder.

Sunday was our big test of our success. He stayed dry through his Sunday School class and during church. He even wore big boy undies for his nap and did great. I’ll be reviewing our favorite big boy undies from Conni Kids in the very near future.

Final thoughts would be that I’m thrilled we survived and had success. I do think I may have been a tiny bit premature to take it on when he just turned 2 since he got a bit emotional through the process, but you know your child. Give it 3 days (or 4 if you know you fudged the rules a bit) and hopefully you too will have success. If not, take 30 days to reset and access if it’s time to try it again.

I must highly recommend the toilet seat with the built in potty seat. I like life to be as convenient as possible and these are practical with a capital P! We have both of these seats in our two bathrooms and I like them equally. I used to cringe when we would have company and wonder if they were removing a potty seat before they could use our restroom. Most people don’t even notice it’s a combination toilet seat.

 

Good Luck! You’ve got this!