Done With Diapers

I am so, so, SO proud of my sweet girl. She is done with diapers (except for at night). Anyone who tells you that you can potty-train a child in one day has either never done it or is lying or is in that small fraction of a percent of people who have done it and had success. It took Cate about 3 days or so to really get the hang of it.

We tried to potty-train her at 2; she just didn't get it. We tried at 2 1/2; she had some major potty-anxiety (like freaking out every time we sat her on the potty anxiety). At that point, we were more than halfway through my pregnancy with Brennan, so we decided to wait until after he was born because there was a chance she could regress once he was born. Obviously the weeks following B's birth were a little hectic. At Cate's 3-year checkup, her pediatrician assured me that 3 was a perfectly normal age to potty-train and that Cate wasn't behind at all. So that week we started sitting her on the potty after every diaper change, so she'd get comfortable with it and overcome her anxiety. We did that for about a week-- until she no longer freaked out about sitting on the potty.

After dinner one night, I sat her on the potty, read a stack of books to her, and basically didn't let her get off until she went. It took almost 2 hours people! But she did it. And once she knew she could do it, we had jumped the biggest hurdle. Peeing in the potty became a breeze after about 3 days and she didn't have any accidents. It was having a BM that still scared her (she'd wait until we put a diaper on her for bedtime). And she was totally freaked out by the idea of using a toilet other than her own. Eventually though, I got the timing down, noticed when she was about to have a BM, and stuck her on the potty. Success ever since!

The last hurdle was using a toilet other than her own. We have a fold-up potty seat with her favorite Toy Story characters on it. Seeing as I'm still carrying a diaper bag for B, it's not a big deal to put that in for Cate. The first few times we went out in public, she held it-- for five hours one day! But she stayed dry. Finally, it got to the point where we were going to be gone all day. This time, instead of offering a reward (she got stickers everytime she used the potty and got two small toys for her first successful pee and BM), I told her that the toys she earned for going potty at home would get taken away if she continued to freak out in public (I'm sure the people in the bathrooms wondered what we were doing since she would continually scream "down" or "I need down" when we'd sit her on a public potty). I even had one lady tell me that I was traumatizing my child. Again though, once she had success, it wasn't a big deal afterward. She's been accident free for a week now, I don't feel like a prisoner in my home anymore, and basically I'm just so darn proud of her.

It's nice to have one out of diapers. A $7 pack will now last us a month since we still put one on her at night. She sleeps like nobody's business once she's out. BUT...she has woken up a couple of times in the middle of the night to go the bathroom and her diapers aren't very wet in the mornings. We might start putting her in pull-ups at night if this continues (I don't recommend them during the day though-- we tried it and once Cate figured out she could pee and not make a mess, she assumed they were just another diaper).

At the end of the day, I learned that a lot of it is up to the child. And that once they have one success and know they can do it, it only gets easier. I'm thankful that I had the time and the patience to be home with her to do it.

And in other news-- Brennan is sleeping through the night! He slept 7 hours last Thursday night and has been consistently between 6 and 8 hours every night since! Woo hoo!

~Melody :-)