Yes, you correctly read the title to this blog post. Peanut potty trained herself. Now, I had heard of this ‘mystery child’ before. In fact, there was one little girl in Munchkin’s gymnastics class that did the same crazy thing at about 15 months! I was completely baffled!
I guess I now have the same (OK not 15 months but 18 is pretty cool too!) crazy child!
So before you go all, “She forced her baby to wear undies and beat her into peeing on the potty” please note she made this choice. I honestly would have been quite content about NOT starting this process until around 2, like we did with Munchkin.
Except this happened, the week before she was 18 months old:
Me: Peanut, come here hun I need to change your diaper.
P: NO.
Me: Come on sweetie, come here.
P: No, I NO diaper.
Me: Well then you have to pee-pee on the potty.
And then she did…. and so the potty training began!
We didn’t really use any ‘method’. We rewarded every attempt and asked her to go whenever we remembered. Sometimes she earns a gummy.. other times she continues on with out asking even after a success.
Potty training the second child is both easier and more difficult than the first. There are more things going on with two kids but having an older sibling makes it easier because they have someone to ‘watch’.
Potty training doesn’t happen over night, at least not when they train young. They have to learn by mistakes. We have a very nice rug shampooer and make good use of it!
Peanut did really well… mostly just ‘dribbles’ before she would run. The first month she would ONLY use a big toilet without a potty seat. Which meant a parent had to be there to help EVERY time! She is about the size of a 12 month old and getting on even with a stool is impossible! After about a month the dribbles were less and less.
Finally, I convinced her the little potty was OK and she uses that with no help. We were only really having accidents in the car. We did our best to avoid these by having her go before and after any car trips! We also invested in a Summer Piddle Pad. Without going into details this works very well and washes well too!
Summer Piddle Pad
One of the things about my ‘method’ of potty training we say goodbye to diapers during ALL awake hours. We did the same thing when we PTed Munchkin. Only that time we packed the cloth diapers up and said bye bye. This time I sold those suckers!!! No more bitty babies for us meant I could sell them to buy some cloth pull-ups.
I have several pairs of the Gerber cloth trainer undies and plastic pants. These are mostly what she wears on a daily basis. I have the 2t size because that is what Munchkin wore in her training days. They are HUGE on Peanut but you can’t find 18 month size in the stores around here. Since she is finally wearing 18 month clothing they are getting a bit better.
Some of her ‘thicker’ more absorbent undies are Super Undies!
They are really awesome we have a blue pair and a pink/purple pair! I can’t explain how great these are at catching full on accidents. Most cloth trainers will help but there is usually still a mess. These rock my socks! I will probably invest in a couple more. I am thinking about buying a couple of there over night ones too! If I do, I will be SURE to review them! They are by far my favorite cloth pull-ups.
This process has been going on for about 2 months. She is about 95% day trained. She has the occasional accident (usually when she is tired or just plain stubborn!). Most of those accidents are in the car, but she is getting MUCH better!!! She is about 50% dry or naps and still wears either a pull up or diaper. We won’t even attempt over nights for a WHILE!
Just so you know, I am 100% aware of how untypical potty training is at this age. However, expose your little ones to the the potty early. Watch for their cues. If you know the grunt, hiding spot, ect. then grab them and stick them on the potty! Reward successes and as HARD as it is… don’t get frustrated when your cute kid pees ALL over your freshly cleaned (because you just shampooed after the last accident) carpet.
If you see signs of potty readiness then try. If it is obvious that your child isn’t ready just try again in a few weeks. However, once you have a couple days of good solid effort (a bunch of successes) put the diapers away! Switching back and forth really confuses kids.
Potty training is quite possibly one of the HARDEST things I have done as a parent. I will be SO thankful when I can say Peanut is 100% done! 
