Toilet training trials and tribulations

When my son was 18-months old, the doctor told me to set up a potty and start the toilet training process. Baby boy is now almost 26 months old and has successfully used the potty six times - five pees and one pooh. The pooh success was a total fluke. I was changing his diaper right as he was starting to do his business, so I grabbed him and plopped him on the potty right as he let go.

There are days where he's very open to sitting on the potty. Sometimes he'll even initiate the activity. But usually his motivations have nothing to do with actually using the potty, but rather as a means of getting me or daddy to read him a book. Among his bathroom literature are books like "You can go to the Potty," or "The Potty Book," titles that he enjoys immensely!

These books are definitely helping him to understand the mechanics of potting training. I firmly believe that if there was a Potty Training 101 course he'd ace it. But knowing the mechanics, and actually putting them into practice are two completely separate things.....

All of the parenting books and web sites talk about looking for signs of toilet training readiness. The signs are all there but for some reason after every success we go through long periods of failure. I guess we should just chalk it up to "he's not ready."

But still there are very encouraging signs, like waking up in the morning with a dry diaper. Religiously each morning we encourage him to start his day by sitting on the potty. Occasionally he'll go along with the idea. But more often than not, he'll say "no potty."

I think one of the issues is that disposable diapers are designed too well these days. He never feels wet and uncomfortable. Perhaps it's time to switch to cloth? Or maybe we should try pull ups? It's worth a try. My mother-in-law even suggested having him wear underwear underneath his diaper so that he notices when he's gone.

Everyone I talk to has a different idea. Some say bribe him with candy. Others say let him run around naked and try to catch him in the act. And, of course, there are those who say, "don't worry, he'll toilet train when he's ready."

I guess we'll just have to experiment and see what works! If you have any words of wisdom, feel free to share them on my blog.