Tag Archives: potty training

Potty Progress Report

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Cee has been experimenting with using the potty for months now. 6 months, actually. I wrote about it here, where I expressed some ambivalence about the process and pledged that I would be an easy-going, no-pressure mama about the whole thing. Although all of this is still true, I think, I’m here today to confess that I did have a secret hope that we had a potty prodigy on our hands. Based on her early interest and success, I figured that she’d potty train herself by her second birthday. Silly me.

Instead, Cee’s interest in the potty seems to have plateaued to using the potty just once or twice per week. She’s still very interested in what goes on when I’m on the potty, but she herself prefers to go in a diaper. Rather than use the potty, Cee has been reading up on the process. One of her favorite texts these days is “Potty” by Leslie Patricelli.

We have a few books by this author and love them all.

This is Cee’s favorite part of the “Potty” book:

To which she always responds, joyfully: “YES!“

Then she giggles at her own joke. OK, we giggle sometimes, too. I have a feeling that my almost-two-year-old has caught on to the fact that we like it when she goes potty, and at this stage of her life, she sometimes goes out of her way to do the opposite of what we want. And I’m realizing that we could be at this stage of potty learning for a while.

Meanwhile, Cee’s caregiver informed me this morning that Cee pees in the potty several times per day at her house. Curious, isn’t it?

Are You Ready to Potty?

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“Boop? Boop?”

“Yup, BabyC. Mama’s pooping.”

BabyC watched me on the potty. Then she pointed to her diaper. She wanted to go, too. I helped her wiggle out of her shorts and unsnap her cloth diaper. She sat down on the potty and did a little butt scoot to get comfortable.

We sat in silence for two seconds. Then BabyC hopped up to check the contents of her potty. Nope, nothing yet. She sat back down.

I sang a little made-up potty song to the tune of Frere Jacques (my go-to for made up songs):

Poop, poop, poop, poop

Pee, pee, pee, pee

Poop, poop, poop! Poop, poop, poop!

Pee-ee, pee-ee, pee pee! Pee-ee, pee-ee, pee pee!

Poop. Poop. Poop. Poop. Poop. Poop.

(In an alternate version, I substitute “psss, psss” and fart noises (how on earth do you write those?) for pee and poop, respectively. It’s OK to be impressed with me right now.)

BabyC continued to hop up and down to check her progress on the potty, then to grab a magazine, then to trade it out for a better one. The hardest thing about learning to use the potty is the sitting still part.

She did poop eventually. “All done, BabyC?” I asked. (I had finished looooong ago.)

“Naa,” she said, nonchalantly.

And so we sat, for 20 more minutes, singing and reading. BabyC was right – she wasn’t done. She needed more time, and kudos to her for knowing it. Three poops later, she finally announced, “All done!”

It was epic, I tell you. What made it most impressive was that this was BabyC’s first time on the potty in a couple of months. Continue reading →