Potty Training - Clarksville, IN

Hi! Good luck! I have a couple ideas that might help....try a potty chart....she could get stickers for every time she tells you and she goes....Or try some dvd's for potty training....I think you might be able to get them at the library. M&M's worked really well for my son....One for peepee and two for poopoo...Have you taken her out of diapers? If not, I would do that....I can try to think of other things I did....if you like..

Spend this next weekend, one on one. That means, no going out- anyplace! It will be you and her. The whole weekend, you will potty, till she has it down pat. So, buy cute panties, get a jar of bright colored m7m's, and each time she goes, dance around, high five, brag, and make her feel like she just won the gold. She gets just 1 or 2 candies each time. Good luck. 3 yr olds do have accidents in preschool, so send several changes.

One way to make it "click" for her is to get one of those dolls that drinks and wets. They come with their own potty chair. They have them pretty cheap at Walmart. At Walmart or Target, have her pick out some underwear she likes. Buy stickers, juice boxes (about 12), and a small yummy treat (like m&m's).

Plan on spending one day to really focus on this. Set up her potty chair in her play area. Put on her panties and show her how the doll drinks and then pees in her potty. Read her some potty training books (check them out from the library). Start giving her juice boxes so that she has the urge to go a lot for the day. Tell her that when she feels the urge to pee (or poop), that she can pull down her panties and go in her chair, just like her doll! When she puts her pee/poo in the potty chair, put a sticker on a chart and give her an m&m. Keep this up for the day - she will get the hang of it by practicing it over and over. It will be a long day, but she is definitely at the right age to get it.

Once this initial day has gone by, expect some accidents. If she's having more than one accident each day, then her body may not be physically able to do it yet. Being able to hold your bowels requires developed muscles. Some kids develop slower than others. So, you could put panties on her for a few hours each day (when you're home with her) and do the sticker/m&m reward system for her successes. Otherwise, keep her in a pull up while she is having accidents.

Never shame her or punish her for having an accident. You do not want a child to start holding their bowels out of control. They start getting constipated and having a lot of stress around having to go. Keep it fun and give your energy to her success, give no energy to her mistakes - just clean it up and remind her to listen to her body so she can put her pee and poo in the potty just like her doll.

If there's a character from tv or a movie she really loves you can have a friend of yours pretend to be "Dora" or "Barney". When she goes in her potty for the first time, tell her that she gets to call Dora! Call your friend and have her talk to "Dora" all about her success. (This has really been a motivator for some kids).

Good Luck! Let me know if you want more help with this. I'm a parent coach. Visit my site for more parenting support at www.noblemother.com

Rewards & praise; praise & rewards (and just a little fuss over accidents. "Oh, pooey!" or "Uh-oh")! Make a plan (chart w/stickers, or whatever) that she gets a sticker or little prize/treat each time she tells you she has to go. After a certain number of times or days, she gets a bigger treat. If she has gone at least a week w/o an 'accident' before school starts, have an ever bigger prize (eat out @ a restaurant, desired toy/clothes, etc).

P.S. Read some other responses and agree that she should be wearing panties now and not pull-ups, diapers, or training panties -- especially outdoors. Have her wear bright colored pants/shorts and material (cotton) that SHOWS wetness so you can both 'see' if she's had an accident. Letting her pick out her 'school panties' also is good (been a while since I trained any girls, so I didn't think of that! Our 'baby' [girl] is 20, and I've recently helped train our older daughter's 2 sons).

Just accentuate the positive and minimize the negative. (This works for a LOT of issues in childrearing -- and human relationships, in general! LOL)

blessings 2 U

If you haven't already done so, try making a big deal about a "big girl shopping day" and tell her it is time to go pick out her very own panties. Then explain that it will be very important not to 'mess' them up....for example, if she picks out Princess panties tell her "make sure you go pee-pee in the potty and not on the Princess, big girls never pee-pee on their nice underwear." A friend took her 3 year old out along with Grandma and they all dressed up (the 3 yr. old in her halloween princess dress and one of Grandma's old purses)and they all went on a shopping spree and picked out new undies. She (the 3 yr old) only had one accident after that and was very upset that she 'peed on the princess'! If your daughter is still wearing diapers/pull ups she may think it's not such a big deal if she doesn't make it to the potty. Also, preschool may actually help once she sees that all the other kids are using the potty, and she may not want to be the one that pees in her pants! Good Luck!

Hmmm. Good luck with that lol. Seriously though, my daughter is 3 1/2, been potty trained for a year, and still will get so wrapped up in what she's doing sometimes that she wont want to go potty, and I will have to say "ok, its time to go!". My friends with children the same age have the same issues.

You might want to go ahead and speak with a teacher, explain that she is trained but like most toddlers will get wrapped up in play, and that she has certain cues to watch for and if they see them to ask her if she would like to take a potty break. Most likely they will understand, because like I said, its pretty normal.

We had this same ordeal before preschool with our daughter. What we did was take her shopping for new underwear - she got to pick out the characters and we talked about keeping them dry. It kind of backfired when she picked Ariel but she understood that it was her responsibility to keep her underwear dry all day. We still had to use pull-ups at nap-time but she was able to stay dry. Then we just had her change her clothes when she was wet. At first, she'd continue playing in her wet pants but we'd make her stop so she could change. Then she'd try hiding so we couldn't see that her pants were wet. Then she finally got tired of having to change her clothes that she was going on her own to the bathroom. Every child is different and you might check with the pre-school to see how strict they are regarding daytime accidents. Good luck!

Well I just went through this. I think if your daughter is ready then you can potty train her in a month (I tried that potty training in 1 day book) which really jump started us to using the potty but was not successful for us (I know this has worked for lots of people). I was feeling the pressure because my daughter was supposed to start a preschool program also and had to be potty trained. I am not sure what school you are going to go to but the one we were planning to use would not budge on this even though she was going about 50% of the time on the potty. My daughter was not trained by our date, and ended up going to a different school that is willing to work with me on it. We are so thrilled with the new preschool. I think you can get very stressed out trying to get it to happen. Many people do have luck with a quick training but I think that means their child was ready. My daughter just turned 3 and I don't feel she is there yet. Stressing only makes it worse. We are working hard at it but I am so happy not to have to stress over a looming date. Hope that helps.

It is summer time so you can either let her go in the buff in the backyard, or what I did was just put big girl panties on my daughter when she was 2 1/2. They learn very quick that they don't like that feeling. Even training pants are too absorbent. Good luck! M.

One thing that I did was got the training pack from Target. It has stickers like Dora, Princess, and etc. Everytime my daughter went to potty she was rewarded with a sticker to go on her sticker chart. She was so thrilled about doing that because everytime she pottied she put a sticker on that day. I did a reward for her at the end of the week if all of her days had stickers. I took her to the Dollar store and let her pick a prize for doing so good. This trick worked for me and I hope it works for you.

It took mine just a few days once I learned how to help her connect it. I didn't train mine until she was 3. And she was scare of the potty also. I'd get her to just sit on it with the lid closed (with her clothes on) for 3 seconds and cheer like crazy. Next time longer, for a day. Next day maybe open the lid, with clothes still on, and same thing... ANd charts... Then then next step was harder since the clothes had to come down but it just meant more creative and cheering and jumping around. BUT as you have heard every child it different. When she'd sit on the potty we started the sticker chart. Every time she sat on the potty for an amount of time she got to put a sticker on the chart, if she dribbled in the potty she got to put a sticker on the chart and so on. But she still wet her big girls. I felt lost. I let her pick out the big girls and all that. Then I read on-line that if you just stop taking them every 15 minutes or so and LET them wet in the big girls they learn faster. WOW! First time she had this look of "what just happened, get these off of me" then the second time she almost made it to the potty. Only took a day that way. The other way took two weeks. Maybe it was both ways that taught her. But the wetting the big girls you could see really hit home. She wanted to keep them dry. I don't know it this would help or not. But like the others... Don't stress. I know it's hard not to. Good Luck.

V. (SAHM of Two)

www.Craftlister.com/ValerieAltman
(Unique Candle Creator)

I was worried about the same thing, but the preschool my daughter is going to attend told me to send her in big girl panties anyway. Another mom at the school told me she had the same problem and sent her in panties and she didn't have any problems. I guess they want to be like the other big kids and will start telling the teacher when they need to potty then.

My daughter was two when she started pre-school also not quite potty trained but she did great because they have regular bathroom breaks. I just made her go in the morning and she did great. She did occasioanlly have a nap time accident but they understood. Don't worry!!!

Try not to stress about it. You can't put a deadline on potty training and the school knows this. She wouldn't be the only 3 year old at school who isn't fully trained. I agree with the others who say put her in panties anyway. If she has an accident at school, they know how to deal with it. If you put pressure on her, it's likely to backfire. I wish I could've taken my own advice when I started potty training my oldest. Would've saved me a lot of stress. When you talk about preschool with her, talk about all the fun things she'll be doing and don't mention the potty training issue.

Try just putting her in panties all the time for the next month. Otherwise, there's a reason you have to bring an extra set of clothes to preschool- sometimes they just don't quite make it. Good luck!

Hi J., I am on my third girl potty training. I was in your exact situation with my first and my third with the preschool timeline. Be very careful about making her feel pressure or it could lengthen the process significantly. Rushing them emotionally always makes it take longer. My main advice is as many have said, put her in panties starting today. Do not go back to a diaper, that is what she's familiar with and you need to do away with the familiar. She will have accidents obviously, and each time she does, just explain what she should do, clean her up and move on. Repetition will show results. I put a pullup on mine at night right after the last potty (mostly because I didn't want to be up in the middle of the night changing sheets in the event of an accident). I also would occasionally put a pull up on her in her car seat to avoid the huge process of washing that cover, but otherwise, strictly panties. She will dislike the wet or messy so much that she'll make it to the potty, before, in diaps, it was warm and comfy! Good luck, and don't stress. Send her that first day in panties and in a new environment, she'll pick up on it quickly and see the others going during potty breaks.