Expert Potty Training Advice Needed!

My son just turned 2 in November and we are not pushing the issue however before bath time we started putting him on the toilet because he was peeing in the bathtub and that started it for him. Once he got the concept I told the sitter, gave her underwear for him, and he is doing pretty good. About 45 min after he drinks we put him on the potty and he goes. We ask him continually throughout the day as well. Remember each child is different and as long as your consistent, build potty time into your routine, he will catch on!

It wont work until he shows some interest. Have him goto the abthroom with some "big Boys" like dad, uncle, big brother. When he sees how the big boys do it, he may want to emmulate that.
When he is showing some interest, put him on the pot 1st thing int he morning with a book to read and about 20 more times a day. Before he lays down, when he gets up, after he eats, just constantly. Eventually he will go on the pot and you can make a huge deal out of it.

Is he interested at all in training? If not, it doesn't matter what you do, it isn't going to happen.

I have a daughter so I'm not sure if the things we did would work but here goes: Our daughter's pediatrician said to have her sit on the potty for a few minutes every 2.5 hours and to put her on if we knew she was about to go. Our daughter didn't like to use the little potty chair so we got a ring and a bench and let her use the actual toilet. I guess it made sense to her because she saw us use it. We set up a reward system where if she was accident free for a week she got to either have a happy meal or go to the dollar store and pick out 3 things. Yes our house was filled with junk but we also had a child who used the toilet. She was not consistently accident free until around 3.5.

Good luck.

My son was almost 3 years old when he started using the toilet for pee and 3 1/2 before he would go poo there. It was for sure a power struggle with us even though we never pushed it too much. Seriously, I thought it would never happen b/c he was 3 1/2 for goodness sake! My daughter was 2 1/2 when she was fully potty trained but we used cloth diapers and I think that really helped (couldn't use them with my son b/c of an illness he had early on--long story)

I personally think 2 years old is really early for any child and for parents to expect them to be fully accident free. Not too early to start introducing the idea, but too early to expect it to happen fully. Just my opinion but I have had so many friends that started potty training with their kids before they were truly ready and then would get upset with them when they had accidents. Um, yeah, it's because their bodies were not ready yet to listen to their own clues (like what it feels like to know they need to go, etc.)

Check out some books from the library for tips....and for what other clues to look for that a child is ready. One that has always stuck with me is that if they can dress themselves then they are getting closer to being able to go potty by themselves.

Good luck!

I approached potty training COMPLETELY differently than anyone else in the universe.

I said NOTHING about it. Except that she saw me go on the potty and one day she asked and I said "big girls go in the potty. one day you'll go in the potty too".

One day when I picked her up from day care she said "Gabby has princess undie pants". I said "yep. Gabby's a big girl and goes in the potty. Not in her diaper. when you are ready to go in the potty and not go in your diaper anymore you tell me and we'll go get you whatever kind of undie pants you want". We had this conversation probably 4 times over about a 3 week period.

One day she said she was ready to have princess undie pants. She was a few months older than 2 1/2.

We got princess undie pants.

I asked her if she was sure, cuz we weren't going to have diapers and undie pants and so if she had an accident it would be messy and she would have to clean up and try again. She said she wanted to wear princess undie pants.

We THREW AWAY every diaper in the house.

She had a couple accidents scattered through the next couple days. There was no reprimand. No heavy sigh. Just "That's ok. let's change and clean this up. You'll do better next time". I made sure I didn't go anywhere with her that would take too long for about a week.

You can do potty training a couple ways. I chose to do it the easy way. When SHE was ready, could communicate with me and understood that the "reward" was she was a big girl who could master that skill AND have big girl undie pants. And that the 'consequence' was she just cleaned up her mess and tried harder the next day.

You can do all that other stuff if you want. reward charts and m&ms and punishments and crying and power struggle and it takes months and months. It's up to you. You can potty train yourself by putting them on the potty on a schedule. OR you can let them really understand and own the process.

Personally, I wouldn't potty train them at the same time. They aren't the same kid. Potty training is a PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT MILESTONE. It's also an EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT MILESTONE. Why would you expect your 2 kids to meet that milestone at the same time if they are different ages. Did they walk together? Talk together? No. I'm actually surprised your ped suggested that.

Whatever you choose, good luck!

Oh - ETA: I never ever used a different or special potty. What happens when you are out somewhere? Will you take that potty with you? But, I had a girl, so she could just sit on the edge of the seat and it was OK. I don't know how it works with boys!