Asher was potty trained around two and a half years old, and it was torture. I spent five days almost exclusively in the bathroom. He did end up potty trained in less than a week, but it was a miserable experience for both of us that involved gallons of juice and water and trips to the potty every 15 minutes. I wanted to give up multiple times, and I had convinced myself I didn't care if I had to change his diaper when he was in college. After spending a week in Potty Training Hell, changing diapers for the next 18 years really didn't seem so bad.
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| Asher just before we started potty training |
So I'm not exaggerating when I tell you that as I gazed at my precious, newborn second son, Asa, soon after he came into this world, I thought to myself with dread, "I'm going to have to potty train him some day."
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| Oh no - this means I'm going to have to potty train again! |
Thankfully, I heard about a different method from a friend that claimed you could potty train your child - boy or girl - in three days flat. Normally I would see something like that and instantly think, "Yeah, right," but since I knew several people who'd had success with it, I thought I'd give it a try. It's called 3 Day Potty Training. The author says the ideal age for potty training is 22 months old, but I waited until after Asa's 2nd birthday.
Now, I won't divulge exactly what this method entails since it's offered in the form of an ebook you can purchase from the website, but I will say that we had tremendous success with it. I would highly recommend it, but only on this condition: that you are willing to dedicate three entire days to being right beside your child every second he or she is awake, without any distractions. This is key to the entire method, and if you can't do that, then it's not going to work. That means finding someone to watch your other children, planning meals ahead of time, getting laundry and chores done beforehand, and not letting anything distract your attention from your child such as visitors, phone calls, or Facebook.
So I changed Asa's diaper for the last time when he woke up last Friday morning. Friday was a long, tiring, traumatic day for him - I won't lie. It was traumatic in the sense that his world was turned upside down when the diapers were gone. We had not done ANY potty training before the 3 Day Method. He never sat on the potty before. He wasn't interested. So when we suddenly started, I'm sure it was foreign and traumatic for him, and he fought it initially.
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| "You want me to do what, where?!" |
But then, he had his last accident on Saturday morning - which is just one day after starting the training. By Sunday night, it was official: my 27-month old was potty trained. He hasn't had any accidents since six days ago, and we've been going about our normal activities out of the house. He's got it.
To say I'm pleased would be an understatement. This method did not require me to force Asa onto the potty at all. It discourages putting the child on the potty "just to try" and then making them sit there until something happens. I didn't have to spend days in the bathroom. He didn't need to run around naked. It was a million times more bearable a process than what I did with poor Asher. And I think that was for a number of reasons in addition to the 3 Day Method.
First of all, I felt pressured to potty train Asher. He was my first, and I had it in my mind that I wouldn't need to even start potty training him until he was three. But suddenly, everyone around me with kids his age was suddenly potty training their own children. I felt like I should be potty training, too. I felt like Asher would be behind the others if he was still in diapers when other almost-three year olds weren't. So, grudgingly, I potty trained him. I didn't want to. I was miserable; we both were.
With Asa, I felt ready. I had read the ebook and knew exactly what to do. I was doing it because I knew Asa was ready, and not because I felt pressured into it. I was excited to try out this method and confident I could carry it out.
I was also more relaxed with Asa's training. When I say relaxed, I don't mean nonchalant. I did follow the 3 Day Method exactly. What I mean by relaxed is that I wasn't stressed out about it. I had the support of my husband (who also read the ebook and knew exactly what I was doing). My parents took Asher overnight so he was busy for two days, and then my husband took care of his needs the rest of the time. I was confident and ready for the job.
And now I get to put Asa in tiny undies:
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| Have you ever seen such tiny boxer-briefs? |
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| We've got Spiderman, Mickey Mouse, Pixar, and Thomas the train undies. Size 2T. |
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| Spider Butt! |
My baby has conquered another big kid milestone and left another baby stage behind. It's bittersweet to think about, but now that he's out of diapers I can't say I'm that torn up about it. :)
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| My two big boys |
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