Parenting: 2-Year-Olds Community

What we did to start, was just to start talking about it more. Saying that when DD was a big girl, she'd use a potty like Mama and Daddy and wouldn't use diapers anymore. Do you have a little potty chair? If not, I'd get one and put in the in bathroom, just to give him some time to get used to it.

When we were ready to start PT my DD, we put her in panties and told her that she was a big girl and no longer wears diapers. We told her to tell us when she had to go potty. Of course at first, she didn't tell us. But every time we saw her starting to go, we rushed her to the bathroom to sit on the potty. Any time she got anything in the potty, she got a sticker and we made a BIG deal about it. As time went on, she started being able to control her body more and she'd sometimes stay dry until we could get her to the bathroom. It continues to improve as time goes on. We do put a pullup on her for nap and bedtime but there have been times where she insisted on wearing panties to bed and we never force her to wear a pullup in those cases.

More than anything, I would say stay positive. Potty training is HARD work for you and for them. It can be so frustrating when they keep having accidents but accidents are how they learn. I'd say we had close to 20 pairs of panties when we started and there were days when I had to do laundry so she'd have enough to get through the day.

Congrats on getting ready for this huge milestone, Kate!

Jodi has excellent tips!! I especially like that she said, "More than anything, I would say stay positive." I couldn't agree more.

This task can be frustrating for you, your family and your LO, but not getting too serious and upset over things helped for us. Personally, I could tell that my DD used her own "new power" against me with potty training at first. LOs like to test their independence in so many ways and this is one mine definitely attempted, until she realized that there were rewards for a good job (and she hated messing up the cool panties that I bought her because I would be tossing them, if the "accident" was on purpose.)

Here is some good material with tips to look over, though the other mamas may have the best tips of all!
Potty Training Directory
Toilet Training Overview
Toilet Training: How to Help Your Child

Wishing you all the best!
Amelia

I really like your idea to throw away the unders if it was on purpose. DS is 2.5 and has been using the potty on and off for a few months. We never enforced anything until he started refusing diapers. Then about 2 weeks ago, he decided its funny to poo in on buzz lightyear (he picked out he underwear). I had no idea how to deal with this since he is #1 and only LO. So I told him that if he was going to poo on buzz that he'd have to go back to diapers since only babies poo in their underwear. He wore diapers without a fit for a whole week and now it feels like we have restarted potty training. The only positive about it is now he lets us know when he is going poo so we can help keep the mess to a minimum.