Welcome to Miss Jen's Potty Training Boot Camp y'all.
Positive reinforcement is going to get you better results faster. Please feel free to leave your comments and suggestions. Subscribe to my youtube chanel, leave me a thumbs up. It can be reciprocal, we'll be friends.
Here we go!
As you may know I've been a Nanny and a child caregiver for over 39 years. I've been doing this a long time y'all. I have potty trained a lot of babies. This five part series on potty training is filled with tips and tricks that have worked for me throughout my career.
Welcome to Miss Jen's Potty Training Boot Camp y'all. Please feel free to leave your comments and suggestions.
Here we go!
As you may know I've been a Nanny and a child caregiver for over 39 years. I've been doing this a long time y'all. I have potty trained a lot of babies!
This five part series on potty training is filled with tips and tricks that have worked for me throughout my career.
It's kind of a well-known fact that girls will most commonly learn faster, earlier and younger than boys. I'm not sure what the theory is on that. My belief is that it can be the same either way male or female.
I think maybe with boys sometimes it takes a little longer because we're trying to teach them how to go potty standing up. I mean it's hard for them to understand "why do I sit down for poo-poo, but I stand up for pee-pee?" In the beginning we're teaching them to sit down on this little potty and then eventually, they transition to standing up like daddy or a big brother. But it's confusing because we're trying to teach them how to go potty standing up and that's just too hard for a little one. They're not tall enough to reach up over.
Yes they do make little step stools that you can stand a little boy up taller, so he can stand up like a boy and be masculine and stand up going pee-pee. Those to me are dangerous. I've seen too many toppling incidents and falling down or falling forward and landing in the toilet and talk about putting the fear in your little one to never ever want to go near a toilet again! They fall into the water, it could even be an injury, hitting their head on the porcelain. So I'm not a huge fan of teaching little boys how to stand up to go potty - not at first right away anyway.
If daddy has a masculinity issue with that, you guys talk about it you guys work it out. But my best successes have been sitting down at first, until they're tall enough to stand up to go pee-pee like a big boy, not using a stool too much. And what's wrong with a boy sitting down? It's cleaner. There's less spray to clean up, there's less mess. I mean come on - you won't have to worry about the seat being left up!
Learning by example is one of the fastest ways for your little ones to learn from you. This holds true for potty training and going potty. If you're worried about your boy sitting down to go potty and learning how to sit down on the potty they have these little pee-pee guards. There's like a little cup that attaches to the front of the little toilet ring that you can insert on the big potty and it's just a little pee guard. I call it a spray guard or a you know... spray... a pee-pee spray guard... you know what I mean. It keeps the pee from spraying straight out. That's kind of a part of potty training for boys is that you have to teach them to maybe hold down their boy parts so that they don't go spraying straight out of the toilet. Again the more messes and surprises and catastrophes that happen during potty training, the more likely your kid is going to regress and not want to learn and they're going to just say "I just want to pee in my diaper."
If you want maybe daddy can help with this part of it. Maybe daddy has some tips on how to pee like a boy. There is a way to teach little boys how to not spray and make a mess when they're sitting down on the potty and that is to just kind of press down on their lower abdomen just right above their boy parts. Not necessarily touching the boy parts because then you're going to get a mess. But just right above it on the abdomen and just kind of pressing down. If you have a daddy or a big brother around that can maybe help out with that it would help to teach the little boy and he can learn by example that way. Keeping in mind of course that daddies have to sit down on potties at some point anyway right? I mean how else do they go number two? So daddy can show a boy how to go potty sitting down and keeping things under control and not spraying everywhere. Again the pee guard is a big help because you're not having to use hands to touch anything. Especially when you're in public restrooms.
I think the hardest part about potty training is having to go to public places like a library or outings at the playground or whatever. So when you're doing these outings keep in mind that you want to stay on that schedule for potty training. Keep your phone alarms set for the specific times or every hour on the hour. And make sure you bring all the tools and supplies you're going to need for clean-ups. Make sure you bring a pull-up just in case. Make sure you bring the wipes and the diapers and the potty insert ring. Just shove it all in a big cute little carry tote or a diaper bag and just have that ready. Including some hand cleaning sanitizer just in case you're getting yucky and touching all kinds of things in those restrooms.
By the way - side note. Every family has their own nicknames or things that they call their potty time. Whether it's number one and number two or it's pee-pee poo-poo. Or small potty big potty. Yellow potty, brown potty. There's lots of different names that you can call it and I think they're all cute and adorable and I've used them all and they all work the same. So it's whatever you feel comfortable calling it. Especially maybe when you're in a public restroom and somebody's in a stall next to you and you're like: "Okay let's make a brown potty! Let's make a yellow potty!" Think ahead a little bit before you start naming your potty... titles.
Another quick little tip during potty training: if you have your kiddo in a car seat in the car going to and from places and they're not wearing a pull-up or a diaper you might want to put an absorbent towel in their baby car seat because there is a chance that there will be a potty accident. And then you'd have to take the whole thing apart and take off the liners and the fabric and stuff and wash it to get that pee smell out. They do sell a product, it's like a sheepskin lambswool kind of material that you can put in there. It's kind of absorbent you can shove that between your baby and the car seat material to keep that absorbent layer in between them in case there's a potty accident. I'll make sure to put a link about that in my youtube video.
If YOU have any tips or advice about products to help out with potty training I would love your input! Please leave a comment down below for me thanks! There's actually even a product that is the seat cover that you can replace your existing seat cover with. I think it's called piddle-pad or something like that. Also in your little go bag make sure you bring extra pairs of underpants and extra pairs of shorts or pants. My suggestion would be to have just elastic waist little pull up shorts or pants that don't require zipping, don't require snapping. Easy loose fitting yoga pants kind of thing. Basketball shorts for the boys, whatever. Just because it's going to be quick changing in and out and you want it to be a process that's not grueling and sweaty and frustrating. You want it to be quick and easy, lickety-split, change them, dry them out, change outfits.
Make sure you have a sealable plastic bag or maybe even just a plastic grocery bag from the grocery store that you can put those wet clothes in or those soiled clothes in. Tie them up, bring them home and throw them in the laundry. Be prepared there's going to be a lot of laundry to do! Again remember, toddlers have a very short window of warning. So if you're out in public ask them frequently almost to the point of nagging them: "Do you want to go potty? You want to go potty?" "Would you like to go use the big boy potty?"
During the potty training phase you might want to also have one of those plastic mattress covers on their bed if you don't already have one. I think most baby cribs have the plastic protective cover but this is definitely a time you want to have that for the potty training process. Especially when they're transitioning out of those pull-ups and diapers into the big boy pants or the big girl panties. It might even be helpful at first to add a towel onto their bed just right on top of their mattress or right on top of their sheet that they can lay on top of. Maybe fold it double thick so that if there is an accident during the night there's some extra absorbency there that will protect your mattress. Be ready to do a lot of loads of laundry y'all.
If any of these tips have ever worked for you I'd love to hear your feedback and how it went. I have quite a few favorite potty training books that I'll list in my youtube video. In fact if you have any favorite books about potty training, leave them in the comments down below. I'd love to hear what books you've been reading! We're gonna have your kiddos diaper free and potty trained in no time!
We're going to do this together! I'm here to help! Well I think that wraps it up on the whole potty training thing. Miss Jen's Potty Training Boot Camp! Woo! We made it through guys! You're going to get through this, it's not all that hard. Sometimes we run across some extra challenges that we weren't expecting, but it can be done! Again with a little bit of patience, some compassion and a lot of love.
💗 Be sure to read Part 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 of the potty training series!
The links to Toddler Potty Training Videos parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 are down below...
__________________________________________________ Toddler Potty Training Part 1: https://youtu.be/goaxRLXdM4w Toddler Potty Training Part 2: https://youtu.be/Fmh6iymN1Ao Toddler Potty Training Part 3: https://youtu.be/Ga7TKnFOoQA Toddler Potty Training Part 4: https://youtu.be/5I-PSudPWYg Toddler Potty Training Part 5: https://youtu.be/wZ2MUhp3M9k
_______________________________________________________
Miss Jen's Favorite Potty Training products & recommendations:
Toddler Potty Training Toilets:
I’ve had experience working with Toddler Potty Training Toilets that cost $400+ (yes, that’s a thing!) and ones that are only $5 (the cheaper ones usually fall apart quickly). These are MY favorites and most reasonable in price. The kiddos love them - they are close to the ground, comfortable, sturdy and easy to get onto:
https://amzn.to/3wrYVUN
https://amzn.to/3kcp0Vk
https://amzn.to/3jXzwzR
Toddler Potty Training Potty Seat: https://amzn.to/3yDDbXO
Toddler Potty Seat: https://amzn.to/2TNoLoY
Potty Training Insert Seat: https://amzn.to/3dVDrJA
Toilet Seat with Built-in Potty Training Seat for Toddlers:
https://amzn.to/3AMwLax
Potty Training Timer Watch:
Blue: https://amzn.to/3hupSmt
Huggies Pull-ups:
Girls: https://amzn.to/2TXkb7N
Boys: https://amzn.to/3yHmvi0
Night Time Pull Ups - Goodnites:
For Girls: https://amzn.to/2TXlZO7
For Boys: https://amzn.to/3xDII0s
Toddler Underwear:
Girls: https://amzn.to/3xFyI6H
Boys: https://amzn.to/3kdipu6
Potty Step Stool For Kids:
Pink: https://amzn.to/3ks3rk6
Blue: https://amzn.to/36E1zwb
Urine stain remover & odor spray:
https://amzn.to/3BmEr3I