Do you like the title of my new book? Sounds official and smart, huh? I would like to write a book about how to quickly and painlessly potty train children entitled this, however I can't because it would be one big fat lie. I've done nothing. Literally nothing and Ellie is potty training herself. I'd love to chalk this up to her amazing genes, her progressive development, or my incredible parent skills (I really hope you caught the humor in each of those things), but I think she's just ready. She's done with diapers (who can blame her?) and ready to be a big girl. Sounds good to me!
Potty training has been on my "to-do" list for about a year now when she started showing interest last spring. At that point I thought, "well - I'm going to wait until summer when she can run around outside with no diaper on and we'll work in out then." That quickly turned into, "I'm waiting until she's two so I don't do it too early and it takes forever." I would offer her a chance to use the potty and say she could get 2 M&M's if she went, but that's as far as the encouragement, support, and training went. Then, honestly, I completely forgot about it or got too overwhelmed thinking about strategies that I put it off. At times it would cross my mind and I would think, "I think I'll start that on Monday", but that never happened.
Skip past several Mondays and you have this past week. Ellie apparently recognized I wasn't going to get on the ball with this and decided to take matters into her own hands. On Sunday she only wanted to wear "big girl panties" to some friends' house for dinner. In order to not discourage such behavior (no diaper), we allowed it and prepared for potential disaster at a place other than our home. (no worries, these are really close friends!) However, Ellie did great. She followed suit of the older kids and decided to go "both types" of "potties" on the toilet. INCREDIBLE. All of the adults responded with dropped jaws and quickly praised her for a job well done.
Then today she kept a dry diaper all day (I had to force her to wear a diaper this morning against her desires because we were going to church. A close friends' house is one thing, church is different!). We joined some friends at a restaurant for lunch and Ellie told me she needed to go potty. Honestly, I tried to ignore it at first. I mean, really, she could just go in her diaper, I was probably too late anyway, and I didn't want to deal with it at a restaurant. But, mother-guilt got the best of me and we headed to the restroom. Sure enough, Ellie's diaper was dry, I say her on the pot, and she went! Crazy!!
I'm not saying she's potty trained yet and I am sure as heck not taking credit for it, but I'm kind of excited about this trend. And all I can say is that Child #2 has a high expectation placed on him or her. :) However, given my luck with Ellie's potty training, it probably just means #2 will take over a year of aggressive training. Oh well, I'll be happy for now! :)
6 comments:
Yay Ellie! That's so great that you aren't having to fight her with potty training! You're obviously doing it right if she's transitioning so easily, maybe because you aren't making a deal of it??
No other way to put it. AMAZING.
Brant was sort of that way, Sarah. I told him I was stopping diaper service one week and he obliged by never needing a diaper after that.
Hooray for Ellie!
That's so wonderful! LIly was easy to potty train too. Be thankful for it! And it's so good to be done with diapers before baby #2 comes! Congrats!
Go Ellie!! That's awesome!! potty training goes much easier when they are wanting to also!! I still carry the potty training chair in my car with me though, b/c we have had a few times already where there is NO bathroom, say at a park and she really has to go...that's when that comes in handy!
Congrats!!!!!
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