Potty training newborns???

Amanda - posted on 04/10/2010

All I can say is I couldnt imagine cleaning up breastfeed baby poop out of a potty. Eww LOL!!! What a mess, but whatever works for you do it.

Alison - posted on 04/09/2010

I don't think those babies are actually trained to know when to potty. I bet the fact they were sat on it with a neaked butt just after a feed is what really caused them to go at the right time. I don't think it hurts to sit a baby on a potty though. It helps prevent diaper rash, protects the environment and saves money. I can't understand why people would be disturbed by it.

Johnny - posted on 04/09/2010

That reminds me of the time my dad was babysitting for a few hours and decided he wanted to try doing EC with my daughter while I was gone. I would have never even suggested it, but I guess he was curious. I made the mistake of not being specific enough describing her cues, I said something about her getting a "far away look in her eyes." Well, he took me too literally and at the time she was about 6 months. He ended up with her on the potty every 5 minutes. Oops.

April - posted on 04/09/2010

another reason i won't be using EC is because i'm terrible at it!! it also doesn't help that my son has always had a really inconsistant pattern too, even now.

how i save the planet and on some diapers is i do cloth diapers in the afternoon :)

Minnie - posted on 04/09/2010

Ditto to Carol's post.



This is not potty training, as has been reiterated ad nauseum. And babies most definitely DO know what's going on. I have first hand knowledge, since we have practiced EC since my daughter was 6 months.

Teresa - posted on 04/09/2010

I find it weird, but if it works for you or is needed (like where there are no diapers)... do what works. I, personally don't wish to try and predict or control another person's bodily functions. ;)

Amy - posted on 04/09/2010

my son is breastfed and does not spit up. they spit up because stuff we eat or stuff in formulas upset their intestinal system. non natural foods upset babies. simple fact. So, that takes care of the spit up in comparison.Not all babies spit up - all babies poo. But as far as it being disgusting or cruel to put poop and pee in a sanitary place and keep baby clean - what's the big deal? It's like saying it's oh so cruel to strap your child down to eat a meal. well, they need to learn where eating is to take place, yeah? and to do it safely with supervision. why not going potty? although i do agree that it isn't really needed if you can do diapers or doesn't fit into your lifestyle, but i don't see anything wrong with parents sharing information or pictures of something they are doing that is working for them. The child didn't look upset. i'm not sure about control, but my son knows he's going to poo and gets off his butt to make it easier to go. he must know something is going on. ?? as long as they aren't forcing the child down - which is apparently not the case, then i don't see an issue with guiding them towards doing something sanitary.

Johnny - posted on 04/09/2010

Christina, you really need to learn to employ more tactful language when writing about other parent's parenting choices. Just because they are not like yours does not mean that they are torturing their babies. You clearly have not bothered to do any other reading (or perhaps even finished the posted article) on the concept of elimination communication.

If you had, you would know that it really isn't potty training. Parents are not expecting their infants to have control over their bladders and bowels. The parents pay close attention to their child's voiding routines and cues, and are able to expect when their child will go to the bathroom most of the time.

My daughter seemed to get a kick out of sitting on her potty and we used a potty designed for the purpose http://www.babybjorn.com/en/American/pro... Until one day when she decided that she didn't feel like doing it anymore, she appeared to enjoy it very much. She loved poopie time because she always got to read a book. Many parents start earlier than we did, but we decided to wait until she could sit up on her own. I don't know how I would have handled it if I had needed her to be diaper free (if I couldn't have afforded diapers) and she had began resisting, but I'm sure people do have a way of working through it. Frankly, it just didn't matter that much to me. I was more concerned that she maintain her positive attitude towards the potty.

Like Lisa said, this is the normal practice for many parts of the world. Where I live, it is not uncommon for families from other parts of the world to continue to utilize this approach when they come to live here, because it has worked for their families for generations. When I was a family support worker, I was quite surprised (because I'd never heard of it before) that a few of my families used this method.

I did not find that it fit all that well into our lifestyle. And I can't imagine trying to do it with a second child and another running around. And there's my carpet. But I fail to see anything at all wrong with the practice. And I'd encourage parents to give it a try if they feel that it will fit in with their life.

C. - posted on 04/09/2010

How can someone think that potty training a newborn is potty training when the child is ready?? That child doesn't even understand what they are doing! Yes, I'm sure that they know something is going on unless they have lost all feeling in their diaper area, but they don't know what it is exactly, so how can they "be ready" to potty train? I just think it's a load of BS, if you ask me. And I also think it's a load of BS that infants have control over their bladders and bowels. If that was true, wouldn't they also have control over their stomachs and NOT spit up? But I suppose they just spit up on mommy and daddy just for the hell of it.. My apologies. /sarcasm

Jackie - posted on 04/09/2010

I didn't do this, but I don't see any problem with it. I have heard alot about it, especially on COM...I think it's a different theory. But there's plenty of other ways to let a baby be a baby...you odn't have to keep them in diapers forever to do that. I do plan on potty training my daughter as soon as humanly possible I do know that. I agree with many posts I have seen before about seeing 4 yr olds in diapers. Dont' get me wrong, I know all kids train at different ages, but I know many people whose 3 y/o's have still been in diapers solely b/c mom hasn't spent the energy to train them yet.

The only thing I would have an issue with is pushing the kid before they are ready, but only b/c the research says that can slow the potty training process down, not necessarily just b/c they don't like it. THere's goign to be ALOT of things they don't like over the next 10 years...but that's why we are the parents.

Shavaune - posted on 04/09/2010

I don't think its disturbing, just a little silly. I have 4 kids so I can't imagine having the time to drop everything and run with a little baby to the potty every couple minutes. They pee so much when they are little it would be all the time! It would save on diapers though and some kids have very sensitive skin and get rashes all the time so maybe it would work better for those kind of cases. I would never bother with it though.

Minnie - posted on 04/09/2010

OK, I just looked at that web page and it seems completely harmless. I don't see a crying insecure baby being forced to sit on a potty. I saw a happy six month old sitting by himself taking care of his waste needs, and I saw a parent holding a newborn over the potty to relieve himself- and the look of contentment as he did so.

It is a family who wishes to reduce their impact on the planet and take care of their infant's hygiene needs without the use of diapers. They aren't putting it up there for funzies or to show off, but for the purposes of letting other parents know that diapers aren't the only way to go.

C. - posted on 04/09/2010

The baby was not crying in the pictures, but the fact that the people were posting pictures of the baby not just sitting on the potty, but actually going to the bathroom (making the faces and everything) lead me to believe it was out of sheer enjoyment for them.



Also, it's not just OUR culture where they use diapers. And it's only disturbing if you let your baby sit in the waste w/o bothering to change them.

Emma - posted on 04/09/2010

Call me lazy but after the mess i just had to clean up .....
my son who is potty training so runs around naked most of the time just carped everywhere other than in the potty yuk !!!
very glad they invented nappy's, but saying that if he had learnt from infancy he would of been potty trained long ago. and milk poo is not quite as stinky gross and lumpy as toddler poo lol

Minnie - posted on 04/09/2010

Was the baby crying on the potty Christina? If not I would venture to say it was not cruel.



I did not look at the website- so I don't know if they were doing it for their 'enjoyment' or not. But there definitely are many families who practice natural infant hygiene as a matter of course- it's just their way of life. It's not a matter of lack of access to diapers though. Go to another culture where mothers care for their infants this way and they will be taken aback at how mothers in our culture let our infants sit in their waste with it right up next to their skin- they think THAT is disturbing.



So I can understand that this concept might be strange to you- it's not what you're used to. And I do agree that mothers should not do this for kicks. However, putting an infant on a potty is not cruel, unless it is going against the infant's comfort.

C. - posted on 04/09/2010

A mother can be sensitive to her baby's signals w/o putting that poor newborn on a potty chair! To me that just seems cruel. It's different if you don't have access to diapers, as someone else has pointed out, but when you seem to be doing it for your enjoyment? That is what that website looked like, like those parents were doing it for their own enjoyment. And to me that IS disturbing.. Quite sick if you ask me. A baby shouldn't be put on a potty and pictures posted all over the internet to be a spectacle!



There may be some people who don't do it for enjoyment, rather they think it's the best way for them, however the people on the site seemed to be the former, not the latter. That is why I thought it was disturbing. Definitely not something that I would do.

Minnie - posted on 04/09/2010

Most people in western culture indeed do things differently. I was responding to those who say that it was disturbing and disgusting. I guess I don't see a mother being sensitive to her baby's signals that he needs to relieve himself as 'disturbing.'

Lady - posted on 04/09/2010

What other cultures do doesn't always fit into our way of life - like extended breatfeeding aswell. I'm not saying either side is right or wrong but we do live very differently and need to find ways of doing things that fit into our life styles.

Minnie - posted on 04/09/2010

While I didn't look at that particular link so I don't know what those people are doing- you all should know that elimination communication, or natural infant hygiene, is how mothers have cared for their infants' elimination needs for as long as humans have existed.

Infants from birth have an amount of control over their bladders and bowels, and are most definitely aware of their need to empty them.

It's not 'potty training'- there is no coersion or pushing involved. It's simply the mother being intuned to her baby's subtle signals that he needs to relieve himself. And thus she takes him to where he can go.

Nothing more than this. It's not 'disturbing' or 'freakish'. It's what has been done for millenia. Believe it or not, diapers have not been around for forever, and most of the world does not use them.

Emma - posted on 04/09/2010

Its not a new thing its very common in Africa as mothers don't have assess to nappies, they have there babies strapped to there back's and take them down to poo or wee, So it must work as i have ever seen one of these woman with wee or poo running down there backs. I know when my daughter was a new born she would make a fuss before relishing in her nappy. i think as our culture has changed and the invention of some sort of nappy we have become lazy as it where.

Johnny - posted on 04/08/2010

I suppose I am the disturbing freak around here then. We started doing EC with my daughter at 4 months and stopped when she was 8 months. We did not go the no diaper route (we have carpet), but instead followed her cues, put her on her little potty when she woke up from naps and about 5 minutes after a breastfeed. We did end up catching most of her poop and about 75% of the pee. And she didn't get a diaper rash until after we stopped. We didn't take it too seriously, we didn't consider it potty training (it's really "parent training") and we had a few amusing incidents. At around 8 months, she whined & squirmed when it was time to go on the potty. We decided she wasn't happy with it anymore, we stopped, and put the potty away in her closet. A few months ago, she found it, dragged it back to the bathroom and began sitting on it when I use the toilet or am at the sink. I could tell she still was not close to ready for traditional potty training yet, but she is starting to tell us when she's peeing and pooping, so she is getting there. I did the EC more out of curiosity than anything else. It definitely wasn't as "convenient" as they make it out to be in that article. I wouldn't bother doing it with a second child. It does work, but it's really pointless from my experience.

Chloie - posted on 04/08/2010

different loL!

April - posted on 04/08/2010

i don't plan on using the elimination communication method with my son or any future children. i have always held onto the belief that a child who is ready does it in a week or less, and with infrequent accidents.

Kathy - posted on 04/08/2010

Like Christina, I found this very disturbing, and I certainly didn't think the baby on the potty was cute, I thought it was a sad picture! It seemed to me that the couple in the article were doing this very early potty-training thing more for their own convenience and their environmental concerns.

C. - posted on 04/08/2010

Good grief that was disturbing to see.. I have heard of this before.. In fact, I heard about it many times on CoM! Moms on here were actually talking about how they were potty training their newborns and babies (I think the oldest one mentioned was 6m). It just really disgusts me to think that people are actually doing that. I mean, for Heaven's sake! Let a BABY, be a baby! Sorry, but the way I see it is if you didn't want to have the responsibility of being a mom/dad and have to change diapers, why didn't you skip that altogether and adopt a potty-trained child???

Also, my son was allergic to a few brands of diapers, so he had gotten a pretty bad rash from them. Switching diaper brands and using Desitin Creamy worked WONDERS. So I don't buy the whole severe diaper rash theory, but that is just my opinion I guess.

Amy - posted on 04/08/2010

guess i'm lazy about that. i don't want to spend my day watching to see if my son's going to potty while i clean the house, haul in firewood,laundry, basic chores, take care of my daughter as well and cook all our meals from scratch. interesting concept though. if i had one kid, np dogs, chores or had a live-in maid i'd be all for it. we cloth diaper a lot.

Amanda - posted on 04/08/2010

My cousin did this with her little boy. I don't know the success rate of it, all I know is it didn't work for them. Her little boy now at 4 years old in March tells her, "I like pooping in my pants. I prefer it."



I personally don't see how it could possibly work as a baby, but I have heard that in orphanages in 3rd world countries train the kids SUPER early, like a year old, to bring down the cost of diapers.