While potty training a youngster it’s probably not a good idea to try and catch a catnap on the couch.
I’m just saying…
Wizbang Parenting Tips – Potty Training
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Kevin
Kevin founded Wizbang in 2003. He still contributes occasionally and handles all the technical and design work for the site.
Sounds like a potentially messy situation.
But that’s the stink of the situation.
If you succeed please tell me your secret. I am ready to throw in the towel and just plan on my daughter wearing diapers until she graduates college…
Oh and another good idea is not to try to go anywhere in the car…
While not related to potty training, my son, when he was about 12 to 18 months, decided to fingerpaint on the wall and picture window after I had fallen asleep one morning.
The problem was we didn’t have any fingerpaints…
That’s ok, Jinx, because neutrals are coming back.
I come here looking for secret potty training tips and all I find are references to fecal finger painting.
Nope, but give him a handfull of froot loops and tell him that it’s his next target and you can sleep away, kinda, until his next “urge”.
Sounds goofy but it works.
It’s not the nap that’s bad, it’s what you might wake up to.
Having done it twice (mine are 6 and 4 now) I feel for ya brother. My daughter was cake – my son apparently enjoyed feeling shit ooze down his leg into his shoes.
I have 6 kids, and let me tell you all the secret to potty training….
Pretend they are dogs.
No, I am serious. Dogs are highly food motivated. A dog that knows how to sit but refuses to do so, will be amazingly obedient if you have a handful of cookies.
Kids are the same way with treats. Say, M&M’s. Put them on the potty, toilet, whatever. When they go, they get an M&M. Even if its just a little squirt, you hear the noise, they get an M&M. Potty or Toilet trained in just a few days.
Remember, just one M&M per session..
It worked my my kids, my goddaughter and her twin brother, my neighbours 4 kids and my cousins little boy. It works.
Oh yeah. Don’t fall asleep with the M&M’s in your hands…. 🙂
Kevin, I would like to second Mr. Haryett above. Use little treats, like M&Ms or froot loops, as chum. Or you can do what we did, which was to make a little chart with a slot for each day that you can put a gold star in when the child makes it to the potty with a successful splashdown.
Gold stars & food. When the kid gets 6 or 7 stars in a day, they get a chocolate treat.
Bribes work best with kids & food.
good luck
With my youngest, we did the chart-thing. When it was full, he could have a lego version of Lofty (from Bob the Builder). He could only hold it when he was on the toilet (what is this with adults using the term ‘potty’ with each other?). When the chart was full, (5X5 grid, he was 4), the habit had been established.
Now, there have been the occasional ‘acidents’, but they were infrequent. And we are still trying to get through the night (I take him to the toilet before I go to bed, and he doesn’t even wake up when I take him now).
But let me just say this. My daughter was easier. She practically toilet-trained herself, and was done before she turned 3.