3 Day Potty Training

Daniel has been wanting to potty training Connor since his second birthday. I told Daniel I wanted him to wait till after Christmas because we'd be done with our long road trips by then. So Daniel wanted to start in January, but we'd been told that kids often regress when a new sibling comes along, so Daniel decided to wait till after Allie was born. He wanted to start the day we got home from the hospital. I vetoed that. We needed more time to figure out how to be a family of 4. At the beginning of March Allie was 2 1/2 weeks old, Connor will be 2 1/2 years old in the middle of March, Daniel decided that was the time. Daniel tried to start on Wednesday March 2nd. Back when Connor turned 2 and Daniel first wanted to start, we had bought Connor a toilet lid, and a step stool so he could learn to use the regular potty. We have a small small bathroom, and there isn't room for a toddler potty in it, so at the time we thought that would be the best option. On the 2nd, after a few tries using what we had, Daniel decided that this wasn't going to work. That afternoon we went to target and bought a toddler potty. It sings every time Connor successfully goes potty :p

That night he looked up a couple potty training tips online, and discovered 3 day potty training. The idea of 3 day potty training is that it's an intense program when your toddler pretty much lives on the toilet until he figures it out. It's supposed to only take three days.

Day 1- March 3rd: Daniel put Connor in underwear and no pants all day. We set the toddler potty up in the hallway (because again, our bathroom is too small). Daniel set an alarm on his phone. Every 10 minutes Connor would go sit on the potty for 5 minutes. The first day, Connor didn't really get what was going on. He peed and pooped in his underwear, and we did a ton of laundry. Whenever Connor went pee pee in the potty he got a treat.

Day 2- March 4th: Connor understood that he had to go to the potty every 10 minutes, and he didn't like it. He would start to cry whenever we'd tell him to go sit on the potty. He had a couple of accidents, but he had even more successes. Again, we did a lot of laundry. By the end of the day Daniel had turned off his 10 minute alarm, and we were just telling Connor to go potty every half hour or so. At the end of the day he had his first moment where he told us that he needed to go potty.

Day 3- March 5th: We stopped telling Connor to go potty, and we'd ask him if he needed to go potty. Usually the answer was no. Connor started telling us when he needed to go potty. He had no accidents!! During the day we decided to go on a hike, but he weren't sure Connor could handle the hike without peeing, and we hadn't really decided how to handle public restrooms (remember, Connor is still using the toddler potty, so he hasn't even gone on the regular toilet yet). We put him in a diaper for the hike. We a great hike, went out for ice cream afterwards, we were probably gone for at least 2 hours. Right when we got home Connor told us he had to go potty. We took off his diaper and it was totally dry. He had held it till we got home. What an awesome boy! By the end of the day we knew that Connor knew how to go pee pee in the potty.

Technically that's the end of three day potty training. It was for sure a success. Connor knows how to go pee pee in the potty, he hasn't had any accidents since day 2. But, so far he has only pooped in his diaper at night, so we have no idea if he understands that the potty is also for poop. A couple of other things we haven't figured out yet are the regular size toilet, and using a public restroom. Because we haven't figured out those three things (poop, regular toilet, public restroom) yet we're still staying that we're potty training Connor. We're not sure how long until all that will get figured out.

Day 4- March 6th: Connor totally got it and was totally taking advantage of going to the potty. He'd pee in the potty, get a treat, and as soon as he was done chewing his treat, he'd go pee in the potty again and get another treat. That probably lasted for an hour, until finally, I'm guessing, he got tired of the treats. After his nap he woke up with a stomach ache, probably from all that candy :p

Day 5- March 7th (Today): We told Connor he only gets a treat when he goes poo poo in the potty. He hasn't gotten any treats yet. He is still successfully peeing in the potty. He cheers every time he pees. It's really cute. We went on a walk today and played at the park. We let him stay in underwear, and he did great. We did bring his toddler potty with us. We folded down the seats in our van, laid down plastic and made a toddler restroom for him. He didn't need to use it; he didn't pee till we got home.

Nights/ Nap: Connor is still in a diaper for nights and naps, but his naps have been waking up dry, so that's awesome. We've been told that eventually he'll just stop going to the bathroom at night, and that's when he's ready for underwear all the time. Connor doesn't want to wear a diaper any more. He loves his underwear. Right when he wakes up in the morning he says "take off diaper, take off diaper".

I'll end by saying this was all Daniel. Daniel did the research, Daniel cleaned up the poop and pee, Daniel had the dedication. I helped starting Day 2 and 3, but Day 1 I wasn't convinced that Connor could do it, so I didn't want to spend the time trying. I am glad that I was wrong.

My thoughts on 3 day potty training: Awesome! We'll totally try it with Allie when she's ready.