Pants, pull ups and nappies
N’s now 2 months off 3 years old, and is still no closer to being toilet trained. I say no closer, but we’re not so far off in the other direction.
In the mornings when he first wakes up he’s perfectly capable of telling me ‘mummy, I need a wee’ and dragging me off so he can sit on the toilet for a ‘big morning wee’.
He’ll also wee on the toilet prior to his bath, or before bed. It’s like anything as part of the routine is fine, but during the day he’s not fussed and doesn’t seem to recognise that he needs to wee or poo.
Sometimes he’ll ask at nursery to sit on the toilet, but not much happens when he does, at home at a suggestion to try the toilet during the day, and we usually get ‘no, don’t want to wee’. If you take him anyway, sometimes he’ll go, although never poo.
So we’ve got a total mix of pants, pull ups and nappies going on.
Nappies at night although he’s mostly pretty dry at night by morning, unless he’s guzzled loads of drink quite late. Unfortunately he’s drinking less now he’s more involved with his play, so it gets to tea time and he goes mad for drinking, so we’ll definitely need to get him drinking more in the day so he doesn’t need as much in the evenings.
In the day he’s in pull-ups. I initially wasn’t fussed about doing the interim stage, but he came home from nursery in them one day, and seems quite keen on the fact he can put them on himself, and that they’re more like real pants.
Today though he was turning out his drawers and found all the (millions of) pants I’d been stocking up ready for him to be potty training. And wanted to wear a pair. Over his pull-ups wouldn’t do.
So after a wee on the toilet, pants were on with pyjama top for a breakfast and a bit of play. I asked after a while if he needed to wee, he replied no but did manage to do a little bit on the toilet.
Of course 5 minutes later after I’d popped to the loo, and he’s coming in, complete with trousers he’d put on himself (the right way round as well!), to tell me he’d poo’d. Nooooo. Actually, he’d only wee’d but 5 minutes after he’d been sitting on the toilet anyway.
Of course after cleaning him up, we discussed that wearing more pants would mean him having to tell me and go straight to the toilet if he needed to go. He looked at me like that was the most unlikely thing that was going to happen, so it was pull ups on for going out.
At the moment I’m fine with him just going to the toilet whenever, and hopefully he’ll get a bit more aware while he’s playing as well. I think at the moment, he just concentrates too much on other things and doesn’t really want to lose the pull ups. I’m hoping that Christmas will be that month down the line and he’ll be ready then to try properly when I’m off work for over a week.
After he got dressed in his pjs this evening, he found a spare pair of pants in his room, and decided he wanted them on. So he’s been wearing them quite happily over his pjs while playing. Nice superman look!
How did your children cope with the move from nappies to pants?
We’d been in pull ups for quite a while as my son figured out how to undoe nappies after pooping – not pleasant! In the end I went cold turkey and straight to pants all day, and I took him to the toilet/potty every half hour whether he needed a wee or not, I could tell when he needed a poo as he would go and hide, so I’d quickly get him on the toilet/potty. I can remember the first two weeks were hell but I stuck to my guns and he cracked it. Every child is different though which is the nightmare!
We’ll have to go cold turkey too. My only concern is how to get a decent slog of time where I’m not in work and we don’t have plans. I hate being stuck in the house, especially when it’s precious holiday time. Otherwise we have to make sure 2 different nurseries will do the same as we do. Here’s hoping he’ll do it over Christmas.
Boo was a similar age when I started her training, and I’d say it took her a couple of weeks to get it (most of the time!). We went straight to knickers & potty, which meant quite a few initial clean ups! Luckily, it was summer so I didn’t mind her waking round in barely any clothes! It is interesting how unconcerned they can be, and if she’s engrossed in playing, she’ll still have the odd accident now, nearly 18 months later. Best of luck to you. At least he likes his pants!
I think once we go for it properly he’ll be fine. I just need a few days where we can stay inside. At the moment that’s just not feasible with my mum being ill. I think the OH’s keener to get him trained than me, but as he works 7 days a week, he’s not the one who has to do the cleaning up, reminding and being stuck in until he gets the initial hang of it!