DD just started using potty - how do we get out of the house?

[Vegan Princess]

DD is 28 months old and has been resistant to using the potty, until yesterday. Since she woke from her nap yesterday, she has used the potty for all but 2 accidents. So she's probably peed 10 times and pooped once. Today went only left the house for playgroup. I put her in big girl panties and pants and she had an accident 10 minutes after we got there. I also brought her potty and she chose to stay naked for the rest of playgroup, but wouldn't use the potty. We do naked time at home. She cannot manage to get the panties down on her own yet.

My question is about going out of the house. I don't mind bringing a potty along in the car, but should I keep her in big girl panties and ask her all the time if she needs to go and just deal with the accidents. Or do I put her in pull ups? I hate the idea of buying disposables after using cloth this whole time. But I also know I can't drag the potty into target for a long shopping trip or into the doctors office for my appt tomorrow and expect her to be able to go. I know we could run out of target to go but I'm sure she'd pee by the time we got there. And I am more concerned with her not going when I give her the chance and then just peeing bc she isn't thinking about holding it. I am thinking of buying a portable potty ring - but I'm not sure she'll go for that yet. I feel like having accidents might help teach her not to go in her panties -  but I also am not looking forward to dealing with a ton of them all over everything. So did you do pullups or not? Should I be using pull ups at night or just keep with the diaper at night for now?

Thanks!

Cindy

[elisheva]

First of all, 28 months is still pretty young. I'll also be up front and tell you that I firmly believe in letting the child lead in terms of potty training. With one of my boys, we stayed home for 4 days and let him be naked to get used to going. He never had an accident out. With my second (who potty-trained himself at 28 months when I wasn't even *thinking* about his pottying yet...) he always used the potty at home but still had frequent accidents out for months. I had no patience for soiled everything so I used pull-ups. At about 30 months, he was totally in undies.

IMO, you have to decide what you are willing to do. I would tread extremely carefully with this issue at 28 months if she's not showing initiative herself. I've seen it turn into a power struggle too many times with disastrous and long-term results (my friend who started her daughter in undies at 18 months then bribed/punished her - he daughter still has accidents every.single.day at 4.75 and it's become a HUGE power thing as there is apparently nothing wrong medically). My ds2 was a fluke, I think. I honestly had nothing to do with it. My first didn't train until 37 months. I'm not planning to start my daughter until she shows interest and even then we'll work slowly.

[Vegan Princess]

I think she is ready. In the last day and a half she has used the potty for every need, except for one pee and one poo accident. Prior to this, she had gone here and there, but mostly just held her pee for hours if she was naked. She used to say she didn't want to use the potty, now she does want to and goes on her own even. Also she is happy to not wear diapers now, whereas she used to say she was a baby and still needed diapers. I think bc her best friend is wearing big girl panties now. So I do see a change and I do see that she is taking initiative on her own. I am rewarding her with some chocolate and stickers. But even the bribes didn't work before. Anyway, I do feel like she is ready and that I'm not pushing more than I need to. I don't think she would potty train herself without some suggestion from me - she just doesn't strike me as the child who would do that before getting seriously old. 

Cindy

[KayPea]

You can get cloth trainers - just enough padding to hold one accident and waterproof on the outside. I call my DD's panties as well, so she won't think of them differently than panties (though she still does, treats them like diapers.) Might be worthwhile for outings, though really, if she's ready, doing undies for outings will help the whole process go smoother, I'm told. We're not there yet, we're just starting to do no diapers at all at home (at DD's insistence) and I haven't ventured out without a diaper yet, though DH did this evening, and all was fine.

Oh, and DD is 25 months, and definitely taking the initiative on this whole potty thing, so I don;t think 28 months is too early. Every kid is going to be different. 

As for the potty ring, DD pooped in the big toilet at a restaurant the other day and was so into it that she now refuses to use her toilet ring at home, which is so funny. I was nervous that she'd become attached to it, and I didn't really want to bring a portable one with me. But maybe start using one at home first? DD loved to use her special seat before now, and would far prefer it to the potty. 

[LaughingHyena]

I still used nappies out and about till the child could tell me (preferably with a bit of notice) that they needed to go. Then we started playgroups and places where I knew I could get them to a toilet quickly in pants, supermarket trips and other places where finding a toilet may take a while we left till last.

I did sew some absorbent liners (think panty liners) into a couple of pairs of undies for DS, though there are plenty of options for buying them. I also used to dress them both in thickish trousers.That way even when the inevitable accidents happened there wasn't a puddle to deal with.

In the car I used to stick a cloth nappy underneath them. I know you are not supposed to have anything under them but I figured last week the same nappy was there, just under the child's clothes.

We stuck with nappies for overnight till they were getting up to use the loo in the morning themselves, then switched to pull ups. With DD that only lasted a few weeks before she was waking dry and we gave them up all together. For DS it's taking rather longer, though he can take off his own fuzzi bunz now so we've gone back to cloth.

[Vegan Princess]

Thanks! I was checking out some of the cloth trainers last night. I am leaning toward the ones that are just thicker, not water proof. Don't you think they might prevent her from learning too though? I do like that they are not obviously diapers like pullups are (and not disposable). I guess they may be preferable on longer outings. I wish I could buy them locally, instead of having to wait a week for them to come in the mail!

Cindy

[sapphire_chan]

Also, look at how often she was actually peeing/pooping, and time trips for right after she's gone a good amount.

A potty in the car will let you offer the potty when you arrive and leave from stores, etc.

[Everrgreen]

Hey!

DS continued wearing diapers while out when he was first learning and it didn't seem to affect his progress.  I started trying diaper-free outings once he got consistent with using the potty while wearing undies at home (he was still having some accidents, but mostly he remembered).  I still make sure he goes before we leave and I keep a potty in the car.  If it's a long outing with multiple stops I will ask him between stops if he needs to go.  Just today he announced in the middle of a Target-like store that he had to go potty, I made sure to keep reminding him to hold on until we found the potty.  I first took him to the bathroom there but he refused so then I took him out to the car to use his potty, he managed to hold it the whole time - and it was a big pee lol!

[Vegan Princess]

Well I think I've def decided to skip pullups. This morning she peed for me before we left. We spent 2 hours out at target and babies r us looking for various potty related paraphanalia. She sat on a potty in the car a few times coming in and out of stores but never went. But she also didn't pee her pants and used the potty as soon as we got home. Yay! I also bought a Potette that folds down and fits in my diaper bag so I can lug it all over easily. She didn't like sitting on it all that much in the car, preferred her other potty - but it will be fine in emergencies. I also bought a piddle pad for her car seat so if she has an accident, her car seat won't get ruined.

Cindy