Every Single Potty Training Mistake

Potty training: the stuff that makes up my worst nightmares. Even my recurring velociraptor nightmares don’t compare to this. I was determined to go through potty training as quickly and painlessly as possible. I researched every Pinterest article, every mommy blog, and every natural parenting suggestion on how to potty train your toddler in one week or less. When Olivia was 12 months old, I already had it all planned out:

1. The summer she turned 2 we would start during a heatwave
2. We would choose a week where we didn’t have any other obligations
3. We would have a potty, treats, and be nakey all day
4. We would live on or next to the potty for three days
5. At the end of one week she would have the gist of it down and after 2 weeks she would be done with diapers

Looking at this now I think, “Adorable. And you really thought it was going to go just like that.” What actually took place was dramatically different.

Olivia was 19 months, almost 20, when one day she woke up and I changed her diaper. However, this time when I went to put on the new diaper she said, “NO!!! Mami, no diaper!”

“No diaper? What, are you going to go pee on the potty?”

“Yes!”

Then she hopped off the bed, walked over to her potty, sat down, and peed. I was shocked! And conflicted. I had always believed in baby-led anything so her giving me a clear sign that she was ready now made it hard for me to say no. However, this was the end of February. It was freezing cold! Our little apartment can stay pretty warm, but what about going out? What if she gets wet while we’re out in the cold and she gets pneumonia (by the way, that happened to me, although it wasn’t because I peed myself)? Even though I wasn’t ready and it wasn’t convenient for me, I decided to go for it because she seemed like she was ready for it.

The first day was okay. Accidents and actually making it to the potty were a 50/50 chance. I think it wasn’t so bad because I expected the first day or so to be rough. The second day was worse. So much worse. No progress and it seemed like she had no connection to the potty or that that was the place to pee. The third, fourth, and fifth day were all a blur of the same treachery. I would make her sit on the potty. She would fight me and say, “No! No potty!” and then stand up and pee on the floor not 10 seconds later. Of all the times she peed in a day, maybe 2-3 times would be in the potty. We would then celebrate and be excited and treats and the whole nine yards. Then, 10 minutes later, another accident. It was grueling. I think we hit progress on the 6-7th day. Fewer accidents, although it was still rough, but it seemed she had started to connect peeing with going to the potty instead of just standing where she was. What made this all so miserable is that she would pee every 10-15 minutes. Even after I stopped giving her liquids, for another 2-3 hours she was peeing every 10 minutes or less! How??? I think we started to get the hang of things towards the end of the second week when I made my first major mistake:

Mistake: Travel

When Olivia decided to have her first day of potty training we had already made plans to travel to the Netherlands. Me, in all my optimism, believed that she would be done and proficient in the ways of the toilet long before that trip happened. I was wrong. Very wrong. When we came to that trip Olivia was still having regular accidents. It was just not possible for her to have accidents on an airplane. Nor was it acceptable for her to be having accidents while we were staying in a hotel. It was cold, we would be out all day, her clothes couldn’t be washed, they wouldn’t dry out, I couldn’t pack an entire suitcase of extra clothes for her. So I said, “We’ll go back to diapers as a safeguard, but we’ll still make all potty breaks we normally do. Plus, when we’re in the room, she can be without a diaper and go potty in the bathroom.” I got the pull-up diapers so that we could act like we had underwear on, but still go to the potty easily. It didn’t work. We didn’t take all the breaks we thought we would. Toilets are just not always available when you’re traveling. It was only four days, but when we came home we were back to square one. Literally as if she didn’t even know what the potty was. Unbelievably frustrating. Then it happened again. Two weeks of exhausting potty training, little progress, then we leave home. This time we went to Denmark. Another place that’s cold as death. It was the same thing all over again. Me thinking we could do it because she had made progress. Then her going back to day one once we got home.

Solution: Once you start potty training, don’t go anywhere until that child can go the whole day with no accidents and can tell you he/she needs to go to the potty.

Once we came home from that trip I was committed to not leaving to go anywhere until we were totally trained. Every day there was an entire load of laundry to do that consisted of nothing, but clean up rags and Olivia’s went clothes. Imagine an entire day of wiping pee off the floor. Do that every day for several months. It was miserable. I tried being super positive. I lost my cool and got really stern. I pleaded and begged. I bribed. It didn’t matter. Eventually, I began to see light at the end of the tunnel. Naturally, this was the time to make another terrible mistake.

Mistake: Taking a toddler at their word

Obvious, right? This is one where I had too much faith in my 2-year-old. Since she was making small steps towards progress I would ask her, “Olivia, do you need to go to the potty?” and she would always respond, “No.” She said it with such certainty that I let her be. In the end, I paid the price. Most of the time the question prompted an accident. Like, she suddenly thought about it and then did actually have to go.

Solution: Never ask your trainee anything. Don’t give them options. Rather, say to them, “Let’s go to the potty!” and if they refuse make them sit down anyway, but do it with a smile.

I made that mistake and the next one throughout the entire process. It’s like I lost part of my mind through all the clean up and washing.

Mistake: Slacking off at the first sign of progress.

I repeated this one so many times it’s sad. Only when Olivia was accident free 90% of the time did I realize what I was doing wrong. For whatever reason, as soon as Olivia made progress something in my mind thought, “Yes! Finally! She gets it. Whew!” and then I would rely on her for everything. I really dropped the ball on her. Looking back, we probably could have been done potty training in 2-3 weeks if I had paid attention to this one important detail. Interestingly, her first sign of real progress was that she would tell me every time she needed to poop. It’s probably pretty common that kids don’t like the feeling once they start potty training. Once she consistently told me, “Mami, kaka!” then I assumed she would tell me when she needed to pee too. She never did. But this was a great step forward.

Solution: Stay vigilant until trainee freely comes to you to tell you they need to go. For each child it’s different, but for Olivia it meant a potty trip every 15 minutes no matter what for more than a month.

Another major error in my ways was something I really did put effort towards, but struggled nonetheless. And that was the Holy Schedule. We tried this schedule and that schedule. Eating, drinking, sleeping schedules.

Mistake: No consistent schedule

Because we live a fairly active lifestyle and because this affair dragged on and on over several months I eventually had to get on with life. I have a very flexible work life, which should have been helpful, but ended up being a burden because every day was different and I treated it as such. I tried to have a strict routine for our mornings and then the rest of the day completely fell apart. A meeting here, a playdate there, an errand over there, and the day just went all over the place. When Olivia was little this was fine. She ate and slept whenever and I changer her on-the-go and made it all work. Now, things were different. It started with bedtime. She had a week where she was going to bed every night after 9pm and I had had it. She was waking up every day inconsistently too: sometimes at 7:00 and sometimes as late as 8:30. That part was nice because I got a lot done in the mornings, but also unpredictable. I sat down and created our daily schedule and stuck to that and it really helped.

6:30am if she wasn’t awake, then I’d get her up

6:45 breakfast

8:30 snack

11:00 Lunch

11:30 nap time

3:30 snack

6:00 dinner

7:00 brush teeth and read books

7:30 in bed, lights out

I made sure to be home for nap time, but otherwise we could be out. This helped immensely with our progress.

Solution: Create a plan that you can follow every day of the week and do not deviate from it for any reason.

Let’s just roll through these next few…

Mistake: Not being thoroughly prepared when leaving the house

Now that we had a schedule, our life became easier to calculate, but since Olivia was still having accidents I needed to bring extra clothes with me. This was something I was constantly miscalculating. Generally, the best pack for us was 2 changes of clothes and 3 if we would be out all day (especially underwear, pants, and socks), a plastic bag for wet clothes, a small towel for the carseat, another small towel for the stroller (if we were going to be using it), and, of course, our snacks and water bottle. This is an absolute necessity.

Solution: Pack your essentials and keep an emergency pack in the car.

And finally…

Mistake: Lack of response consistency

Given how long the entire process was, I have to cut myself some slack. In the beginning when Olivia was having accidents I was patient and took the positive approach with smiles and rainbows:

“Oops! No problem, lovey! Next time we go to the potty.”

Then after a month or so, on a day when she peed on the bed for the 3rd time that day, my patience wore out and I tried some sternness:

“Olivia, this is NOT okay. It isn’t okay to pee on the bed! We only go on the potty.”

Of course, this didn’t spark any behavior reformation. Then I tried the pleading angle, which, when I look back, is really a form of manipulation, I’m sorry to admit:

“Olivia, sigh oh no. Why did you go potty on the floor? Now I’m so sad.”

I definitely can recommend you do NOT do that.

The best approach to any child in almost any situation is calm, caring consistency. Once I got myself together (because this was really my issue, not hers) then I decided what I wanted my reaction to be. Not every day was perfect, but it got better. I wanted to be calm, realistic, positive, and move on quickly.

“That’s okay, honey. Next time just tell me and we’ll go to the potty, alright? Let’s clean up!”

I did start making her help with the clean up and I think that helped some. Now she realized there was work to this.

Solution: Get through potty training as quickly as possible, but know that not all children learn equally.

What I Got Right

There were a few things I eventually got right. The biggest of which was when I stopped caring about the public opinion. This was good for both Olivia and myself. A huge block in our path was the inconvenience of looking for a toilet. Once I stopped caring about what others would say or think, I started letting Olivia pee anywhere necessary. My logic was, if a dog can pee anywhere, then my potty training child can too. Any other mother should understand this. Luckily, we live in Europe, and especially this corner of Europe, where they could care less about these sort of things. I was never approached or given an evil look from anyone. If anything, a few times Olivia squatted in the middle of a busy path, let it flow, and there were a couple of onlookers who had a good laugh and gave me a gracious smile. When I made this leap, our training made enormous progress. You gotta do what you gotta do, parents. This is your kid and your life. It’s been about 7 months since the beginning and it’s not at all what I imagined it would be, and that’s okay because that is essentially what raising a child is all about.