All toddlers must eventually make the jump from diapers to underwear, and the training process may seem the same at first glance. Sure, boys will eventually learn to pee standing up, but that’s not the only thing that’s different when potty training a child. Playing with her unique needs as a child can help you start off on the right foot.
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I don’t know about you, but after I had my son, it seemed like every doctor, nurse, and nurse-in-training in the hospital wanted to come in and check my butt for hemorrhoids. Any sense of modesty I ever had was thrown out the door.
It’s time to get that feeling back during the potty training process. Sure, most moms have continued to have a complete lack of privacy, but if you’ve been excluding your child from the bathroom, it’s time to start letting him in. As much as you hate him, talk about what you’re doing and even let him take a look. This will generate interest in using the potty.
Your child should also have the opportunity to watch other children go to the bathroom. Dad is the best, but if he’s not around, other men or boys will do. As he watches other men use the bathroom, he will see that they are standing up.
Age and preparation
Many experts, such as those at the Mayo Clinic, believe that you should wait until your child is ready to be potty trained. Signs of readiness include being interested in going to the bathroom, the ability to stay dry for a few hours, complaining about dirty diapers, being able to follow simple directions, and the ability to pull pants up and down on his own.
Children reach these stages of readiness at different times, and boys generally arrive a little later than girls. This does not mean that you cannot introduce the potty at 2 years old when your daughter started. It’s just that she may not become interested until she is 3 years old or older. Pushing tends to breed resentment and bad results.
Potty Basics for Kids
It’s basic physiology. At this age, your son’s penis is just a peanut. There’s not much to hang on to and when he’s full of piss he stands up a bit. This often leads to a minor (or major) mess when using the potty. If you’re shopping for a child-sized potty or regular toilet insert, you’ll find that many have a “splash guard” to prevent these masses. It sounds like a good idea, but it’s not always. If it’s a movable splash guard rather than something that’s built right into the seat, there’s a chance you could accidentally pinch your private parts while sitting or standing. You can easily imagine the effect this could have on your potty training efforts.
Still, despite the possibility of pinching and potential mess, it’s important to start your child sitting up to avoid even larger masses. Surely you’ve had the experience of going to the bathroom thinking you just had to pee and that’s not all that comes out? Well, young children can do that more often than adults because they don’t yet know how to read their body signals. Once your child has learned to use the potty sitting down, he can switch to standing.
Potty training methods
The actual potty training methods are pretty much the same whether you are dealing with girls or boys. Perhaps the most common is to switch to training pants one day and have your child sit on the potty at regular intervals throughout the day. She offers encouragement and praise just for sitting down, but get a lot of encouragement if she really does leave.
“Quick potty training methods” (as in methods that claim to potty train your child in a few days) generally revolve around your child spending some time naked around the house, which allows you to get to the bathroom faster and easier. It does require you to be extra diligent those few days, though, as it’s important to watch for signs that she needs to go and make sure she gets to the bathroom on time.
Regardless of which method you use, many parents find that a reward system of some kind works well. For example, you can use a sticker chart or tell him that you will buy him a coveted toy after he successfully uses the potty for a certain number of days.
aiming
Eventually, your son will want to start peeing standing up like big boys do. This may be the day that things get really sticky. Little boys (heck, even some older guys) don’t always have perfect aim when it comes to peeing standing up. I think the best way to approach this problem is with a two-pronged approach.
First, you need him to work on his love. To do this, throw some targets down the toilet and have him try to hit them. This could be a few pieces of cereal or you can buy specially made targets for the toilet. Setting goals creates a game, which can help get you excited to do well.
The second thing to do is make sure it cleans up after itself. There’s nothing wrong with showing your son that once he’s finished urinating, he should grab some toilet paper to wipe up any drips around the bowl lid or on the floor. Explain that accidents happen, but a big kid cleans them up. He should also put down the toilet seat, flush, and wash his hands. If you make these things a basic part of your potty routine, he’ll do them automatically and you’ll have a cleaner bathroom.