Potty Training a 20 month old girl!

[lea_lpz]

So, I have always been on the better late than early camp and potty trained my older kids close to 3, but my baby who will be 20 months has been telling us when she goes to the bathroom a couple of months and is now telling us before she goes and then right after. A couple days ago she's told us she has to go and we've checked and told her she doesn't have pee or poop and a couple minutes later she goes and then has decided to take her own diaper off! This is with pants on. She takes those off, too. She's also always asking everyone when they go to the bathroom if they are pooping (kids included). So I am wondering if I should give it try. It seems like potty training a younger toddler would be easier.

Edited November 21, 2015 by lea_lpz

[freesia]

Sure.

My youngest trained at 21 months. And you have twins coming, right? It's worth a try.

I sent my olders to Grandmas. I had her check for dry pants every 15 minutes and rewarded dry pants with salty snacks and juice (to make her go more). I rewarded even sitting on the potty every hour with a sweet. Producing gott extra. I only used pull ups at sleep times. She was day trained in 3 days. Good luck!

[Mimm]

When they're ready, they're ready, go with it. My first took forever to train so I thought that was a drag and was going to wait till Spring to train my second (she turned 2 in October) and instead she trained herself right around the time she turned 2.

 

#3 just turned 2 and willingly pees in her potty but never tells me she needs to go, so it's all on me. So I might wait till Spring when it's easier to go without pants.

[Rachel]

I potty trained my daughter when she was just a bit younger, she was ready though.

 

My good friend has a daughter that potty trained herself at under a year. It was the strangest thing, but she was ready.

 

If a child is ready, they are ready. It won't hurt to potty train her and if it doesn't go well, wait a few months and try again.

[KatieJ]

My girls were both potty trained before that age. And no, they didn't have accidents. They were ready.

I would go with it now.

[SKL]

Yes, I would try it.  I think it is the kindest thing to do since she obviously doesn't want it on her bottom.  :)

 

My kids were out of diapers 24/7 before that age.  It isn't crazy to give it a try.

Edited November 21, 2015 by SKL

[zoobie]

Go for it! We put a little IKEA potty in the bathroom so they could DIY more easily.

 

Be prepared for regression when the new babies arrive. I can't see when you're due, but someone said twins? Congrats! :)

[DesertBlossom]

At 20 months I'd be inclined to ignore it. I mean, let her sit on the potty if she wants to. But I wouldn't be switching to underwear and doing full-blown potty training until later.

[Desert Strawberry]

Please respect her need to not soil herself. She's being very clear with you. 

My 10 month old uses the potty every morning. It's not crazy at all.

Edited November 21, 2015 by Desert Strawberry

[mom2bee]

This little girl is being very clear with you, please give her the opportunity to use a toilet and do at least a serious trial of potty training.

. I can't imagine why you would ignore all these blatant signs. She does not want to soil herself and she is aware enough to communicated all of this with you.

 

How would you feel if you were denied access to a toilet when you expressed a need for one?

 

[ktgrok]

My oldest was totally trained by age 2. It happens. My next one was closer to three, and the third was 2 1/2. 

[barnwife]

The internet will tell you that the average worldwide age for potty training (that is peeing and pooping in an acceptable location) is 18 months. (The US average age is 36 months per the internet.) 

We are "better early than late" around here. All of ours have been pretty much trained by 2. We put potty chairs all over the house and they do the rest.

[Shellydon]

Most of my kids were totally trained by the time they turned 2.  I started between 18 and 20 months. 

[duckens]

Disclaimer: These are suggestions.  This is what worked for us.  You do not need to do any of them that you are uncomfortable with.

1) Try putting her on the potty first thing in the morning (if she can wake with a dry diaper) and again after nap (if she wakes with a dry diaper. 

2) Consider letting her go pantless and underwearless around the house. 

We always had the discussion that if company comes, we put clothes on.  If you go with this choice, be prepared that your dc may have a few accidents on the floor.  Sometimes kids ned to see the poop and pee coming OUT of their body to say, "So THAT'S how that works!"  One dd of mine was pee-trained months before she was poop-trained.

3) Buy a second little potty and put it in the living room (or closer to where she plays).  You want it to be as convenient as possible for her.  Will there be accidents?  You betcha.  When she is potty trained, shampoo the carpet.  In the meantime, I had good experience using baking soda to absorb pee accidents, absorb smell, sweep up (after dry), then vaccuum up.

4) Set her on the potty at bedtime.  She sits through ONE story of her choice.  Either she will go or not before bed.  No stress either way.  It just gives her one more opportunity before bedtime.

[nd293]

Sure. Just swap the diaper for training pants, use as few clothes as you can around the house and give her access to the potty. It's easiest to start with bowel movement, as they tend to be able to predict that better. We never did any rewards or anything, just praise and encouragement. Both children were out of diapers before 2.5yrs.

 

ETA: we moved the potty around the house as the children moved, we did not restrict the potty to the bathroom until the learning process was complete, we kept a mop / old towels on hand, and we kept them as undressed as possible for the weather (when at home). Treat night training separately.

Edited November 22, 2015 by nd293

[Starr]

Dd was trained by 20 months. It happened pretty quickly. 

[MomtoCandJ]

Dd2 is the same way, if she says something I take her in. She's starting to wear pull-ups so she can be fairly independent yet I don't have to worry about accidents.

[Guest]

It has been a nightmare here. My two year old wanted to potty train and we let her. But she is inconsistent and often has accidents, which has been very stressful. I much prefer older kid potty training. This is more like her training ME to make her go regularly, because she is dodgy on her signals.

 

She is potty trained about 80% during the day.

[Luanne]

My niece trained herself at this age. It sounds to me like your daughter is ready. I'd give it a shot of I were you.

[Tsuga]

So, I have always been on the better late than early camp and potty trained my older kids close to 3, but my baby who will be 20 months has been telling us when she goes to the bathroom a couple of months and is now telling us before she goes and then right after. A couple days ago she's told us she has to go and we've checked and told her she doesn't have pee or poop and a couple minutes later she goes and then has decided to take her own diaper off! This is with pants on. She takes those off, too. She's also always asking everyone when they go to the bathroom if they are pooping (kids included). So I am wondering if I should give it try. It seems like potty training a younger toddler would be easier.

 

I am in the gradual is better camp, and if you're going gradual, it's best to start early. I think starting three months or even six months before you enroll them in a no-diapers YMCA activity or pre-school is hugely stressful and when it doesn't work it's crazy-making. It's less the age that I think is important than giving the child time to grow and develop good habits (and not develop bad habits either). Easier said than done, right?

 

Both my kids were night trained naturally--they woke up with dry diapers--at around 3 months, and obviously that was totally genetic because you can't make that happen. But for day training, I would say I took them 1x/hr, or before/after activities, until about 12 months. Then I'd have them sit on the potty before going out and as soon as we came home. They would also sit on the potty and "read" (look at books) every night while I made dinner.

 

They were able to fully get themselves to the potty, take off pants, and wipe butts around the normal time (two years) but they were diaper-free from about six months on except of course on long car rides or in public places where it would be a sanitary issue if there were an accident.

 

That worked for us.

 

We also used a lot of Duckens' methods as well. Potty in the play room (just the little one) which--I should not have to say this but apparently, uh, not everyone does it this way--I would empty as soon as it was used.

[nd293]

We also used a lot of Duckens' methods as well. Potty in the play room (just the little one) which--I should not have to say this but apparently, uh, not everyone does it this way--I would empty as soon as it was used.

This made me laugh, but also reminded me to add that you might want to remove potty-like objects for a while. Dd caused uproar at a relatives house when she found a doll's potty, brought it into the living room and proceeded to use it as one would expect 😄.

 

My experiences potty training a boy were more unusual. Apparently both ice cube trays kept in low kitchen cupboards and indoor pot plants can remind one of a potty...

[Melissa in Australia]

All of my bio children were toilet trained well before 2. In the days of cloth nappies everyone toilet trained their small children as young as they could, before 2.

 

twins came to us not toilet trained at 3 1/2 they were already in the habit of going in their nappy. boy was it a battle. one would scream and scream when not in a nappy. it was very trying. I sent many :glare:  :glare: :glare:  thoughts to their former foster carer, who had had them for over 2 years but couldn't be bothered to train them. 

[Kathryn]

Are your kids verbal or able to express their need to potty in some way when you train that early? Both my boys trained at 2.5yo and didn't really talk before then. My daughter is 18m and doesn't talk--well, not enough to indicate pottying needs. I don't understand how it works.

Edited November 22, 2015 by Kathryn

[Tsuga]

Are your kids verbal or able to express their need to potty in some way when you train that early? Both my boys trained at 2.5yo and didn't really talk before then. My daughter is 18m and doesn't talk--well, not enough to indicate pitying needs. I don't understand how it works.

 

My kids both toddled over to the little potty (you know the kind, the plastic training potty), pulled down, and went. Before going out, I would say, "time to go potty before we go!" and they'd go potty or I'd set them on the potty. If they needed to go I paid attention to non-verbal signals which most parents must eventually learn if they are toilet training a child who doesn't like to be interrupted, like fidgeting, holding themselves, etc.

 

I wouldn't wait until a child talks to toilet train. You never know when that's going to happen... for some people it never happens but you can't have a child in diapers through speech therapy until they're 7.

[SKL]

Are your kids verbal or able to express their need to potty in some way when you train that early? Both my boys trained at 2.5yo and didn't really talk before then. My daughter is 18m and doesn't talk--well, not enough to indicate pitying needs. I don't understand how it works.

 

One of my daughters would get my attention and then put her hand behind her rear to indicate she wanted to use the restroom.  The other would take my hand and lead me to the restroom if she wanted to go.

 

I did take my kids to the restroom fairly often regardless.  They were able and willing to go when they had the opportunity.  When we went out, I'd take them to the restroom upon arriving at a public place, and then I knew we were safe for a while.  ;)

[foxbridgeacademy]

I trained my oldest at 22 months (took 2 weeks) because I was due with DD2 at the end of those 2 weeks.  It went so well I made the mistake of thinking they all would be a piece of cake. :banghead: (boys, IME, seem to be the most difficult). 

 

[IfIOnly]

I would give it a try! She sounds ready, and it would be a huge blessing to have your toddler potty trained before the twins come. 

[Desert Strawberry]

Are your kids verbal or able to express their need to potty in some way when you train that early? Both my boys trained at 2.5yo and didn't really talk before then. My daughter is 18m and doesn't talk--well, not enough to indicate pottying needs. I don't understand how it works.

All of kids were trained fully by 2. I started them very early. Only one could talk before 2, one not till three.

I put Luna on the potty every morning when she wakes up. She pees and poos. We try again before and after naps, before and after meals. 

I did the same with the others. We went pantless at home for a while. Once they were reliable, we added pants back.

[abba12]

In my personal (and blunt) opinion, continuing to have her use her diaper when she is obviously wanting to use a potty and not have a wet/soiled diaper on is training her INTO using her nappy without complaint, and training her INTO learning to ignore the soiled/wet feeling, and training her to not want, and perhaps even fear, the potty. It's teaching her to keep playing and ignore the feeling of needing to go. You're teaching her to ignore the very signs you'll need her to recognize later on by insisting that she continues wetting herself. 

 

I am neither early nor late. I am 'when the child is ready' and have lived both extremes of that, and your daughter is definitely seeming ready, at least right now, though interest can come and go. 

Do be aware that the average potty training age in the US is FAR higher than the rest of the world. The idea of waiting until they are 3 or 4 would be frowned upon in much of the world. 

 

My eldest struggled with the potty, ignored all my efforts to train her and would only go if I took her, every single time. We gave up and assumed the better late than early people must be right. Then, a little after her 3rd birthday she spotted the little potty, pulled it down, went potty in it and then came and got me to show me. She has used a potty with only a handful of accidents ever since that point, she woke up in a diaper one day and fully trained the next, very unexpected! (however, this same child will not night train. She is out of nappies but requires us waking her every evening before we go to bed to take her potty)

 

My second child, however, used the potty for the first time around 18 months after having watched her sister use it. She wanted to, and tried to. And she was trained, with accidents no more than once a week, at about 18mo. She took work, quite different from my first who trained overnight once she chose to. I needed to do the teaching and reminding and soda and salty snacks and treats, but, after about a month she was what I would call trained. Then we hit a point, I think her younger sister becoming mobile and her older sister starting 'real' school, and she regressed. She decided she just didn't care anymore. She began having one accident a day, and I didn't make a big deal of it which I regretted in hindsight, because she decided it was no big deal and got to the point of never using the potty at all, 4 or 5 accidents a day for a week or two. We tried everything! Eventually, we just had to say, no, you're going to wear diapers again until you're ready to use the potty, which was not a good experience for anyone. (remember, we know she was totally capable of using the potty at this point, she had done so almost perfectly for months before the regression). At about 2.5 she decided she didn't like diapers after all, and when she decided that, overnight, she was accident free. 

 

You'll see with both these children, the pivotal moment was when THEY decided they wanted to. Oldest saw no need or purpose in training until she was 3, youngest wanted to, and did so almost perfectly, at 18mo, then decided she didn't want to, and when she finally decided she did again, it happened overnight. I think potty training is less about teaching them how, and more about teaching them why and making them want to. That's just my personal experience. Do be aware of the possibility of regression when the babies come though. 

 

Youngest began showing interest and readiness at 16 months, but when we pulled the potty out she didn't get it at all and lost interest. She follows me to the bathroom and sees her sisters use it, and plays with sitting her baby dolls on the potty, so I'll keep up the exposure, and I'll pull it out again when she begins to show an interest again, whether that's at 20mo or 3yo. 

 

Regarding them letting you know, my eldest was talking by 3 when she finally decided to go, so irrelevant. My second was an early talker and could speak sentences by 18mo so no issues there. My third doesn't talk yet but is very expressive in body language, she will come and take my hand and pull me places, or point and say 'eh', or pull at her diaper strap so it makes that velcro noise without actually pulling it off. She finds ways to communicate. 

Edited November 22, 2015 by abba12

[Monica_in_Switzerland]

Both my girls chose to potty train around 22 months.  They just woke up one morning and told me they wanted to go to the potty.  My son was around 2.5, so I was definitely not giving them any pressure, they just chose to.  It worked out great!  I am of the "bottom half naked" potty training camp, and we just stuck close to the house for a week or so until they seemed to have the hang of things.  

[Carrie12345]

I've always tried whenever my kids showed interest.  It didn't get any of MINE there early, or even "on time", but I felt it was worth a shot.

[Soror]

I trained all 4 of mine before 2, my last 2 around 18 months or so. No, they weren't perfectly free from accidents but it was their leading and it worked well for us. I think using the cloth diapers really sped this along

[DesertBlossom]

It has been a nightmare here. My two year old wanted to potty train and we let her. But she is inconsistent and often has accidents, which has been very stressful. I much prefer older kid potty training. This is more like her training ME to make her go regularly, because she is dodgy on her signals.

 

She is potty trained about 80% during the day.

 

This is why I wouldn't push. My dd has been giving signals for a while. I always let her sit on the potty when she wanted to, I just didn't encourage it. We started pt for real when she was 2y4m and they first few weeks were a dream. She caught on quickly and didn't have an accident foe several weeks. Then the novelty wore off and she doesn't seem to care when she pees her pants. Most of the time she doesn't even tell me. I cringe to think of all the places she's peed that I don't know about. She sometimes stops herself mid-stream and runs to the bathroom. Thankfully she hasn't had a poop accident, but she's all over with her reliability to make #1 in the toilet unless I'm on her all day. It's been months of frustration. She's too far to put back in diapers, but the wetting her pants is driving me nutty. I should have waited to potty train.

[SKL]

I agree, the American way as far as elimination seems to be to teach them that the diaper is the right place to potty.  I have actually seen a mom spank her tot for begging to use the toilet when he was in a diaper.  Then when the parent is ready to commit, it's a matter of undoing the "go in your pants" training, often at an age when it's difficult to get kids to cooperate.

 

Personally I didn't wait until my kids asked, but if my kids ever did ask I would do all I could to accommodate their using the potty.

 

There are plastic-lined underwear for those who are afraid of accidents.  We had a collection of really cute ones.  :)

[Dmmetler]

Go for it-but with one caveat-it's not expected in the US at that age, so you may not get support if you need outside care. My DD basically toilet trained herself as soon as she could get to the toilet-she has sensory issues and I think the feel of a diaper really bothered her, but her 2 day a week daycare provider wasn't set up for potty trained 1 yr olds, and they couldn't put her in the 2 yr old room due to her age since that would have required a higher staff/children ratio. DD worked it out on her own-she figured out that if she asked the 2 yr old teachers on the playground, they'd take her, and I took her as soon as I picked her up, but they still insisted she wear pull ups there (which she hated) and it was extremely frustrating. As soon as I could find her a spot elsewhere, I moved her.

[SKL]

Right, dmmetler, I visited a daycare where they didn't have a toilet available to kids under 3.  I asked about it (my kids were 2+ and had been out of diapers for a year) and you could tell this was a new question for them.  Thankfully the daycare I chose did actively potty train their age group, so my kids had a toilet available.

 

I got some weird looks from the nannies I interviewed 1.5 years earlier.  Ultimately our nanny did what I asked because I paid her.  :P  She was pleased with the results.

[mamakelly]

My dd was potty trained at 19 months. It was definitely unusual, as both my boys were around 2.5 when potty trained. It was so much easier with her being younger, she wasn't afraid and it wasn't a big battle. The hardest part was finding teeny tiny panties lol.

Edited November 22, 2015 by mamakelly

[Mom22ns]

My ds was almost 3 when he potty trained, but dd trained at 18 mos. She started asking to go and I let her. She never had a daytime accident - ever. We switched to underwear for days and a diaper at night. It was a long time before the night diaper was consistently dry, but she fully potty trained during the day pretty much immediately when she decided to.

 

We did have a bit of an issue at church. She was in a class for kids 18-24 mos and she was the only one potty trained. The teachers looked horrified when I told them she was in panties, but she never had an accident and they soon chilled.

 

I never played the take the kids to the bathroom every "x" minutes and reward them for sitting there or using it game. I took them to the potty when they said they needed to go and praised them for going for a little while, which soon faded to taking it for granted. Neither was ever inconsistent.

 

I do think it is important to wait until they are ready, but I would say she is. Give it a shot!

[Okra]

My DS who was 20 months wanted to use the potty.  I told him he had to wait until after Christmas, about 6 weeks.  I don't remember him ever having an accident when we finally went to underwear.  

 

That child was the easiest kid ever to potty train.  Then, came my third child next, who was extraordinarily difficult to potty train.  

 

Be excited that she will most likely be super easy.  Yeah!!!

 

 

Edited November 23, 2015 by Okra

[Upward Journey]

Five children here, all but one were completely trained by 26 months.  It was fairly straight forward and easy, except that one ;)

[mom2samlibby]

My DD trained at 18 months.  It was a piece of cake.  She decided she wanted to wear underwear and she did fine.  I think we maybe only had one or two accidents.  

 

Your DD is telling you she is ready!  Don't miss the opportunity!  Put her in underwear and take her when she needs to go.  

[Luanne]

Having worked with toddlers for over 10 years, I have seen just as many boys train early and just as many girls train late. It just depends on the child. My own daughter was very articulate and didn't train until she was almost 3 1/2 before she was trained.

 

As far as not being able to talk first, one boy who trained at 20 months would jump up and down and point at the bathroom when he needed to go.

[Runningmom80]

My DD PT'ed around that age.  it was the same thing, she kept telling me she was wet and wanting a new diaper.  My son followed right after her.  I don't think it's crazy!  The only thing that stinks is that 2T pants are made for diapers so get ready to be frustrated about that!