Need your opinions about potty training!

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Need your opinions about potty training!
3
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 12:32am
I have no experience potty training a boy....both my dd are 15yrs old and 11yrs old and my son is 19 months old. I had no trouble with the girls...trained in a week with the both of them. I am expecting a baby in July and would like to start potty training my son...do you think it's possible to potty train at 19 months or should I wait til he is actually 2yrs old to introduce it. I really don't want to wait til the baby is born because he might totally refuse the idea because his whole world will be rocked. I have no idea what to do....if you have any suggestions, I would GREATLY appreciate them!!!

Kim

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-29-2003
Fri, 05-21-2004 - 1:02pm
not impossible. my friends son was trained at 23 mo.... it is easier closer to 2, but just put out a potty seat and let him use it..... i feel if you give them the idea early on, when their bodies are ready, they will train easily.that is how it happened with all 3 of my girls...i put a potty seat in the bathroom when they were about 20 mo. and just let them use it while i was in there,,,,just dont...what ever you do...let him stand until the bowel part is done, i know waaaaaaaay too many moms who think it is cute and easier to let them stand to pee, and belive me...after watchiing allllll the boys i know.. HAVE to stand to poop.....and not bowel train until they were close to 4..... make em sit til he has it all down pat..... THEN... he can start standing to pee later...
iVillage Member
Registered: 07-30-2003
Sat, 05-22-2004 - 2:20pm
My DS is just over two years older than my youngest. For some crazy reason, I thought he needed to be potty trained before the baby came. What a NIGHTMARE!! I ended up putting him back in diapers (the lesser of the two evils at the time) and waited until he actually showed signs of being ready to potty train. He ended up staying in diapers until about a month before he turned three. He still didn't show any signs of wanting to potty train, but I tried again just to see. It turned out that he was completely potty trained before his birthday. I was surprised he learned so quickly. I was so glad I decided not to let comments from other people budge me in my wait for him to be ready.

Also, I don't think any pregnant mother should worry about potty training a toddler. She has enough on her plate just being pregnant and being a mother to a toddler. Another thing, most pregnant women don't want to admitt it (I didn't either), but emotions DO run high when you are pregnant, and you don't want it to affect your son's psychological health (not that it definitely would, but you hear enough extreme cases involving a potty training toddler, you don't want to be in any situation that can escilade to being compareable to these nightmares).

Also, I don't think post pardom mommies should have to potty train a toddler! LOL Sounds kinda like you have to choose one over the other, huh? If I were you, I'd wait until your baby was around 6 months old before trying to potty train a toddler. One time when I was trying to (unseccessfully) potty train my DS after my DD was born, DH came home from work and I was almost in TEARS. He asked me what happened, and I started to tell him how much I HATE POOP!! My DS had taken his training pants off, and probably three different times, left piles on the floor in the SAME day, one time he had walked in it and smooshed it into the carpet and smeared it all over the room. In the middle of that, I was convienced that my new baby had absolutely NO USE for a diaper, because no matter what I did, she pooped up to her ears ANYWAY, several times a day. PLUS, I was still wiping my preschooler's butt because I was conveinced it was better to do that, than to have HER with poop all over! LOL It was HORRIBLE! You know what DH did? He LAUGHED at me!!! I swore, if I had a messy diaper right then, I would have thrown it at him, and not nicely EITHER!! LOL I felt like I had my hands in poop all day, so should he! UGH! I'm sure it wouldn't have seemed so horrible if I wasn't still so emotional after having a baby.

If you'd wait unti he was closer to 2 1/2, then the baby won't be so little, and 2 1/2 isn't very old at all to start potty training. He will be more likely to be ready for it too. BTW, I completely agree with the stereotype that boy's are more difficult to potty train than girls. Girls want to be like Mommy, boys usually can't care less. Both of my girls were interested in potty training at a much younger age than my DS. BUT, when it came down to it, he potty trained rather easily...just a little older than my girls were.

HTH!

Angie

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-16-2004
Sat, 05-22-2004 - 9:45pm
i would be worried that even if you managed to get him potty trained before the new baby, that he might regress once baby is there. Then all the work and tears that you put into it would be for nothing and youd have to start over. id wait if it was me.

sara