How do I get my daughter to go to the potty? Any ideas??

Lourdes - posted on 08/13/2009

I put my daughter on a schedule when i was training her. I had her trained in three months.
I.
Make a schedule using time intervals. start of short and work your way to longer spans.
For instance 7:00, 7:10, 7:20..... Sun-Sat, put faces to describe what happened in that time, so if you took her at 7:00 and she did potty, then you put a smiley face :-).
If she didn't, then you put a regular face :-|. If she had an accident then you put a sad face :-(.
As you keep track, you will know what's what and when. Once you see that she's going less, then you may want to increase the intervals from every 10 minutes to every 15 or 20.
The chart will tell you how much to increas or decrease. You keep doing this till she's good to go on his own.
II.
Keep his diapers on at nite but make sure you take her to do potty before bed.
After doing this for about a week or two, if she wakes up dry every day, then you can put her to bed without diapers.
III.
when going out. make sure you take her to potty before leaving, then again once you've arrive at your destination; and in intervals like i mentioned above.
When you get back home, take her to potty again. Make sure you keep his diaper on for outings. Accidents may happen and better safe than sorry.
You want to do this for about two months. once you see that she hasn't had an accident outside, then you may want to do away with diapers altogether.
IV.
Praise her when she goes in the potty. Be gentle when she has an "accident". Explain why in the potty and not on the floor or on herself.
Don't worry if you think she doesn't understand, she will get the picture eventualy.
V.
One more key, this may sound kind of yukky but it works. have her see you pee, and doodoo in your toilet. She will know then that tha's what your supposed to do in the potty.
I hope you understand all this and i haven't confused you.
Put the chart next to the potty and have her see you jot down the faces. make it fun!!!

Good Luck.

Robbie - posted on 08/12/2009

Megan,

I watched an episode of Dr. Phil about a month ago and wish I had had this advice to try with my 3 yr old when we were training. He said to go to the store and buy a baby doll that wets and you and your daughter train the doll to use the potty together. Anytime the dollie goes potty, (you have control of this), on the big girl potty you have a blow out party! Use party favors, horns, ballons... whatever you want to really celebrate the potty. The doll should have a few times that are unsuccessful as well and during those times you can ask your daughter to show the baby doll how to do it. If your daughter is able to go as well, then the party is really big and fun!

Good luck!!! I hope it works!

Robbie

Melissa - posted on 08/09/2009

Hey Meghan,



Here are some things I tried with Hannah when she started training, maybe they'll work for you, too.



We stayed home for the first week--entirely. Didn't leave the house once. And I told her about it for a whole week ahead of time, so she knew it was coming. I told her we were going to have a "Potty Party" at home for a while so she could learn to go potty like a big girl, like the Princesses and Tinkerbell and Minnie Mouse, etc.

I put her in big-girl panties and constantly told her what a big girl she was to wear them just like Cinderella and Belle and Snow White and Tinkerbell, etc. I constantly made it clear that I didn't like wet or dirty big girl panties, and how gross that would be to potty in her panties.

Then I gave her tons of salty snacks, like pretzels, and tons of juice/soda. After thirty minutes of snacks/drinks, I sat her on the potty and read books to her until she peed. Then I jumped up and down and danced and acted silly and hugged her and gave her M&Ms and generally made a huge deal about it. You could try letting her call her favorite princess or TV character (really a friend or nana) to tell them she pottied like a big girl.

That's really all I did; I did show her that I was "throwing away" her diapers, because "diapers are for babies, not big girls".

If she had an accident, I would have her help clean herself up and get on new panties, all the while telling her it's gross to pee in big girl panties, and that big girls have to pay attention so they can run to the potty in time. Then I would take her to different rooms in the house and have her practice running to the potty.



It just takes patience, a lot of it. Usually they catch onto the peeing part first..but I found it definitely helped to stay home for the first week, and to be the ONLY person working on her with it for that time. After that first week, make sure whoever else may be helping with the training handles it the exact same way as you do, so she doesn't get confused. If you do tell her you're throwing out the diapers, DON'T use them again--just big girl panties and pull-ups for naps/nighttime.



Another tip is, it's mostly up to her; I tried training Hannah around 19 mos or so, because she was telling me when she needed to be changed, and she just went against everything I tried. If it seems like it's just a battle to get her to sit still on the potty for five or ten minutes, she might not be ready yet. She definitely has to want to do it, and to be excited about it. Just talking about how characters she loves use the potty, and telling her that soon she'll learn to use the potty just like them can help get her interested.



Anyway, I hope some of this can help you out! Potty training is so stressful and seems to take FOREVER. Just hang in there and have patience and she'll get there. :)