Potty Training: First Day

source

All said, it was a good day. Not perfect, but good. First, let me assure all of you with young babies that this blog isn’t going to turn into “all things potty training.” I do want to keep you all up on my struggles through it, though. It is my first time doing potty training.

For me, potty training has been a lot like CIO was. The whole process is greatly unknown to me. I expect it to be difficult and long, but secretly hope it will take little or not effort and he will just have it.

We started the day going through the process with the teddy bear from start to finish. When it was Brayden’s turn, he was not excited to get out of his diaper. He told me, “Sorry, I don’t want to.” I told him he needed to. Then when it was time to sit on the potty, same thing. “Sorry, I can’t!” But he did. He saw it wasn’t that bad. And he didn’t do anything in it.

By 9:30 AM, he hadn’t had any accidents, but he also hadn’t gone potty. I knew he was a time bomb. I was putting him on every 30 minutes. I do have a 9 month old to take care of, so I can’t sit and watch him every minute to get him on the potty when I see he needs to. Between 9:30 and 9:45, he had an accident. We cleaned him up and it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. It was just on his underwear and pants. So with that out of my way, I pressed forward.

Brayden really started to understand the idea of treats and he knew what was in store for him if he went potty on the potty. As I nursed Kaitlyn for her 11:30 feeding, he suddenly decided he was going to get that treat. He sat down on the potty and said he was going to get his treat. He insisted on sitting there until it was time for lunch. He ate, then went back to his potty. I tried to help him go, he was trying so hard. I told him to push the pee out. I even put his hand in warm water…yes, I was trying to think of something. Never-the-less, no potty.

I decided to put him in a diaper for his nap because I knew he would need to go in that time and didn’t really want to change all of his sheets and everything. After his nap, his diaper was only minimally wet.

So when he went down for his nap, I was feeling stressed. I was worried about him not being able to go because it is a problem I can’t see a solution to–at least one I have direct control over. I talked to my husband who assured me he would get it and to just be patient. I asked groups online, and was assured he would get it and not to worry. I talked to one of my best friends about that and life in general, which was really good because I needed to just chill out. I was too wound up over it.

After naptime, I was ready to go and ready to relax. I’d had an accident and it wasn’t so bad. I looked at all of the positives of the day. He went from being reluctant (to put it nicely) to sit, to sitting on his own will. He was able to hold it for a long time, so his bladder is capable. We were getting in a rhythm. I took my own advice and decided to keep my “oh well” philosophy in mind.

Between nap and bedtime, he sat on the potty several times, but no go. But also, no accidents. He is back in a diaper for night time.

With that, I am quite pleased with today. I always figured the hardest part for him would just be going somewhere other than the diaper. For over a year, he has requested to get out of the tub and get his diaper on when he needs to go. I know he doesn’t like to go out of the diaper. An advantage for avoiding messes, but disadvantage for going in the potty. He should get it, though. I am exhausted, but ready for another day. I think things are looking good for forward movement, and it probably went better than I expected–just worse than I secretly hoped ;).

Tomorrow I think I will encourage more drinking to provide more need to go. He can apparently hold it for a long time.

1 thought on “Potty Training: First Day”

  1. My oh my…just started today training my little guy. I'm whooped! My baby girl is in her crib crying and my son wanted to go down for another nap (he must be exhausted from this too!). Glad to hear someone else thinks this is tiring as well!

    Reply

Leave a Comment