Step 3: P-Day - First day of Potty Training

Potty training all boils down to being able to catch their pees and poops in the potty - being able to properly time their pees and poops with putting them on the potty. If you know your child's timing, this should be easy.

For children that are regular and poop or pee x minutes after eating or drinking, then you simply put them on the potty around that time for 10 minutes or so to catch them in the act. I had tried other people's suggestions of going to the potty every 30 minutes, but that didn't work for her because she didn't go regularly a certain number of minutes after eating or drinking. As a matter of fact, it seemed like she would hold it until she got off the potty and then she would go.

But what about if your child doesn't go regularly? Since Madeleine wasn't regular, we spent most of the entire first day just sitting her on the potty. Fortunately my 4 month old was going through a growth spurt and slept most of that day.

Tips to train an unregular child...

• I had to confine her eating and drinking to one-time events, rather than give her water or juice whenever she wanted it (which is how it had been). For us I confined it to 4 times a day: breakfast, lunch, a snack, and dinner. That won't make them regular, but it will certain help a bit.
  
• Write down the exact times your child eats/drinks and then note when he or she pees or poops so you can get an idea of the time you can expect her to have to go... eg: 8:00 - breakfast - 9:00 - pee 10:15 poop.

Going Pee...

• As soon as she got up I took off her diaper, told her we will be wearing soft new panties now, and I put her on the potty for 15 minutes to try and go. (She didn't).
  
• She had breakfast like normal, but with a lot of juice to drink.
  
• About 20 minutes later I put the potty in front of the TV and did everything I could to keep her there - new DVDs, snacks, drinks, etc.
• About 2 hours after breakfast when her poor little tushie had a red ring from sitting on the potty so long, she finally peed.

After she goes
Once she peed I went crazy with excitement (everyone says, and I agree, that this is key). I jumped up and down, sang a potty song, danced around, and basically acted like a cheerleader on Red Bull going crazy cheering for her. AND I gave her "a bowl full of M&Ms" to eat after she washed her hands. There were really only like 7 in there, but it was in a special bowl and sounded like a lot, so she was excited about it.

Then I showed her how to wipe herself, she flushed the pee down the big potty, washed her hands with special new yummy-smelling soap and gave her the M&Ms.

After that she took a half hour to 45 minute break from the potty and then went back on it.

We did that the entire day (eating, drinking, and doing everything else on the potty) and by the end she had started to get the hang of it.

That night I put her in pullups to sleep.