Mood: Indifferent
Watching: Something on PBS
Reading:

Potty Training
2008-02-10, 5:43 p.m.

I'm not going to turn this into another rant, but rather redirect it into a general parenting topic entry. When my parents arrived earlier today, one of the very first things my stepmom said to me was to offer that she had a thought on potty training. Her idea was to simply take the diapers away. No more diapers--I guess he'll have to learn to take the alternative choice. Hmmph.... I happen to think that this would be a very, very bad idea and very, very much not in line with how we parent our children. I only said that "he's still young," and left it at that. It's my understanding that the average age for boy potty training is about 3. We still have time. Plus, even though he's doing very well, he's still adjusting to the addition of his sister. I don't consider it a good time to work on potty training now.

Anyway, honestly I'm not worried about it. Actually, I don't even think about it. We make sure that Jack understands the concept of the toilet and we offer him the opportunity to use it several times a day. I do believe he understands and he answers clearly most of the time, "No." Occasionally, he'll want to sit on the potty seat before his baths, but that's about as far as he gets--he never leaves anything in it. He's just not ready and not interested right now, and I'm okay with that at this point. As we get closer to, and especially after his birthday we'll try more tactics, but for now I believe he's on track.

We've even accidentally had a conversation about this with our pediatrician quite a while ago. Actually, the issue at the time was something like him resisting bedtime or not eating or something and the pediatrician's advice was that the general rule of parenting these situations is that "Jack can't win." Whatever it is, stand your ground and don't give in no matter what he does, etc. The one exception: Potty Training. That, he has to do on his own, in his own time. It can't be forced (technically, I guess I should say, it shouldn't be forced). I believe that my son will just suddenly take interest and just decide to do it, as we know he has done with most of the other major milestones like walking and talking.

As to the idea of taking diapers away, that is obviously a force tactic to get him to potty train. I believe it would cause more harm than good to force him to have accidents. I also believe that Jeff and I couldn't handle it anyway after the first week of having to wash every pair of pants he has daily and constanly cleaning pee off the carpet, we'd fold. He's not ready and I think it would be traumatic to him to throw him in and tell him, "swim." Maybe if he's 4 and not potty trained, I'd consider resorting to desperate measures, but he's only 2 1/2. I also kind of think it's an independence thing (or lack of, I guess). I think Jack enjoys diaper change time because he has our undivided attention and we are taking care of him. I don't think he wants to give that up just yet.

I usually don't do this, but out of curiousity, what do the other mom's who read me think?

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