Austen and the Potty

Well, we finally took the plunge. I say we because potty training, or so we’ve been told, requires a big commitment from the parents. That commitment means no matter how frustrated you get or how easy it would be, you can’t go back to diapers or pull ups.

He just turned two so many people told us we were crazy for even attempting this. We probably wouldn’t have tried but Austen attends a Montessori School during the day and they start training those kids at like 18 months. We waited until Austen was two and then we felt he was ready and we were too.

The first thing we did was strip down his crib to just a sheet, a blanket, and a stuffed animal or two. Easy to change if he wets the bed. I wanted to do this all or nothing - meaning that I wasn't going to resort to pull ups at night and have to go through potty training at night down the road. The next thing we did was have Austen throw out all his pull ups and pull out his big boy underwear.

It took one intensive weekend. That’s right. Three days of staying indoors and feeding him lots of liquids and trying to catch him in the act so he could learn. Now, I’m not going to say that he hasn’t had accidents since then. He has but not that many.

He's made great progress from not wanting to sit on the potty to actually telling us when he has to go instead of holding himself and jumping around for a half hour before he agrees to go to the bathroom. Check out this video. As I watch it again tonight, I can just see the progress my little guy has made in two short weeks.