How to Potty Train a Two Year Old

One of the reasons I hadn’t even started considering potty training is that Annie still didn’t use many verbal words.  I was hoping her language would develop a little more before teaching such a big skill so she could verbalize when she needed to go. 

The other reason was that Annie was still in a crib with rails.  We’d talked about moving her into a toddler bed so Ace could take over the crib. Ace wasn’t ready to share a room though and she wasn’t trying to escape, so we weren’t in a hurry.

Excuses. Excuses.

Signs of Readiness

Seeing the signs of readiness in Annie were the keys to our success.  She wasn’t actively moving to a corner or singing simple songs from memory.  She’s also still pretty limited verbally.  So I looked for other signs.  A few examples:

She knows where to put things like her toys when cleaning up.  She also knows where to find the rice crispy treats. When she wants one she will go there, get one, and bring it to me to open.  So I know I can tell her that pee and poop goes in the potty and she’ll understand that it has a place that is not a diaper.

She can follow multi-step directions like, “Go find your sippy cup and put it at your place on the table.”

While she does not often say in words what she wants, she can definitely communicate exactly what she wants.  She wanted to watch Go Buster on Netflix so she used her hands to mimic the steering wheel on a bus and pointed to the tv.  To me that was pretty sophisticated communication for someone who doesn’t use words. At that point I knew she’d find a way to communicate her need to go to the bathroom too.

The suggestion of potty training between 20 and 30 months does make sense to me though.  I can tell that Annie is starting to put together the idea that she is her own person with choices, which is great.  Knowing her though, if we waited much longer to potty train she would definitely use that independence against us.  I think we got lucky and hit the potty training sweet spot with her.

Choosing the Date

Christmas break was going to be the best option to start since I wanted as much uninterrupted time as possible to dedicate to the process.  We started the day after Christmas (to avoid conflicts with having guests over and allow some of the excitement to die down).  I even sent Ace to daycare on Monday after Christmas so I could really focus on Annie.

Preparation

Aside from the fact that I had to mentally prepare because I felt like I was losing my baby to toddlerhood, I also had to do a few other things.

First, we put the potty that had been sitting out deep into the back of the closet to make its grand debut on Day One. 

I also realized that I had forgotten to teach Annie the basics of getting herself ready like being able to push her pants down and pull them back up.  I put the book down and told Annie we were having a pants pushing party.  We closed all the blinds and Annie and I practiced moving our pants up and down.  She thought it was funny, but the actual skill needed more practice.  I wish I had started that earlier.

We also wanted to have her in a toddler bed before potty training since I had originally planned to night train at the same time.  So we ordered the toddler bed, set it up and got her settled into it, which went surprisingly well.  I was prepared for her to get in and out of it all night and to have trouble settling down, but she made the transition like a champ!  She didn’t get out of bed even once, and she goes right to sleep every night — another sign that she was ready to potty train. Although, after joining the facebook group I realized there are tons of parents out there potty training kids in cribs, so I may have put too much pressure on this, but it worked out ok.

Our Process

Day 3 – Shirt Only then Commando

We started with a shirt and no bottoms.  Again it seemed like she needed to be reminded about her new skills in the morning, but by evening she really seemed tp have a handle on it.  She did have an accident during nap time, of course not on the pee pad.  We cleaned up the mess and then did a few more hours without bottoms, but she was really getting the hang of it now.  There were far fewer tears on the potty. So later in the day we added pants commando style – no underwear.

Days 4 through 8 – Commando

The rest of our holiday vacation Annie wore pants commando style.  I would say it really clicked for her on day 4.  That’s when she consistently told us she needed to go without any prompting and, knock on wood, we haven’t had any accidents since then.  

We got out of the house a few times.  We went to my in-laws one night and brought the potty with us.  On a rainy day, we went to Bell Works for a change of scenery and she actually used the bathroom there to pee.

Daycare