{"id":2641,"date":"2013-09-09T09:00:05","date_gmt":"2013-09-09T13:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mayahoodblog.com\/?p=2641"},"modified":"2013-09-08T22:43:51","modified_gmt":"2013-09-09T02:43:51","slug":"my-son-potty-trained-himself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mayahoodblog.com\/my-son-potty-trained-himself\/","title":{"rendered":"My son potty trained himself"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the most talked about topics when it comes to Toddlers is potty training.\u00a0 Some parents have even made it into a sport, competing (amongst themselves mostly I presume) to see whose kid potty trained first.\u00a0 Last summer,\u00a0when my son was a few months shy of turning 2, I was in\u00a0a NYC park talking\u00a0to another parent.\u00a0 He proudly and excitedly told me about how his son was potty trained at 18 months and asked\u00a0me when\u00a0we’re starting.<\/p>\n

My husband and I have taken a different approach.\u00a0 Rather than pushing our son to use the potty at an early age or before he was ready, we were happy to keep him in diapers.\u00a0 As a family who spends more time out and about than we do at home, it was the easier option.\u00a0 Of course, we knew the day would come when he would need to be potty trained.<\/p>\n

On a whole, our parenting philosophy is based around the Adlerian approach which Alyson Schafer, a psychotherapist and our-go-to parenting expert, bases her\u00a0parenting advice on.\u00a0 According to Alyson Schafer,<\/p>\n

Body maturation and awareness comes in three stages: \u201cI peed,\u201d \u201cI am peeing,\u201d and \u201cI have to pee.\u201d …Only when they get to the \u201cI need to pee\u201d stage, which means they now are able to hold their bladder and have a chance to actually plan to get to the potty, is it time to invite them to try to use the toilet or potty.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

We noticed that our almost 3 year old son has mastered this language so we knew HE was ready.\u00a0 We took advantage of our time up in cottage country and allowed our son to spend most of the day in his “birthday” suite.\u00a0 Being outdoors naked provided him with an opportunity to pee when he needed.\u00a0 I also think it helped him become more\u00a0aware\u00a0of his bowel movements since he was lacking his usual support (i.e. diapers).\u00a0 He continuly shouted from the top of his lungs “I HAVE TO PEE”.\u00a0 This gave us a great opportunity to direct him to the potty or to pee into the bushes, the lake,\u00a0basically whatever was closest… you get the point.\u00a0 This continued each time we were up at the cottage.\u00a0By the end of July, my son had successfully potty trained himself (FYI to future cottage guests – don’t walk around barefoot around our cottage).<\/p>\n

So did my son truly potty train himself?\u00a0 I think so.\u00a0 There was no pressure from us, no crying, meltdowns or frustrations.\u00a0 We didn’t have a due-date and we would have been just as happy if our son was still be using diapers.\u00a0 I know that this might be a Laissez-faire<\/i> attitude, so it might not work for everyone.\u00a0 However, it was one of the\u00a0least stressful experiences in our short parenting gig.<\/p>\n

Besides following Alyson Schafer’s advice in this blog post: http:\/\/blog.mabelslabels.com\/index.php\/2013\/08\/potty-training-when-to-start-and-when-to-stop\/<\/a>\u00a0here’s a few of my own\u00a0tips to help you along:<\/p>\n