Hellobee Boards

I would definitely say wait til after LO2 is born!

I voted wait but I'd wait until things settle down with the new baby.

How ready do you think L is? If he isn't chomping at the bit to get started, I would wait. I found cleaning up pee accidents a bit easier once my huge pregnant belly had gone too. And don't let the book make you feel bad, it had the same effect on me but it all turned out alright. Feel better soon

@californiadreams: good luck to you!!

I was just tired and cranky and not patient at the end of my pregnancy and the thought of having to clean up accidents stressed me out. So my mom tried when she came to stay with us for a while before #2 and it just didn't work. For our family it just worked so much better after we were settled into being a family of 4!

I would introduce potty use now and start getting him used to it but would wait to full out train until after LO#2 is here. I think that would be a little less stressful.

I don't think there's necessarily a wrong choice here--you can make either work. But I would personally start sooner. I'll tell you why:

I am definitely not an expert, since I just have a sample size of 1. But I just potty trained my almost 2.5 year old using the Oh Crap method (day trained anyway, not over night). If you haven't read the book, I am happy to summarize, because I read a few summaries online and then actually finished the whole book and felt like the summaries were not accurate.

Block 1: naked on the bottom. (no training pants, no panties, no anything--naked!). Pro tip: expect accidents all day. Be very very very neutral and don't shame your kiddo. They are just learning. But also don't try too hard to make them think it's okay to pee/poop the floor. Just matter of factly say things like "Uh oh. You peed on the floor. It's okay because you are just learning, but pee goes in the potty. So next time, you will pee on the potty, okay?" She recommends doing NOTHING all day the first 1-3 days except sticking to your LO like white-on-rice. NO social media for you. Just play with the LO and try to get them on the potty as soon as they start to go. You will start recognizing their signs after the first few accidents.

Block 2: (notice she does not use "days", but blocks, because each kid will progress through the blocks at their own pace. This is not a "3 day" method. Pants or skirts with no panties. Totally commando! Continue to watch LO for signs and get them on the potty.

Block 3: small outings with pants/skirt but NO underwear. STill commando (this phase can last weeks, according to the book.

You can either try to train for naps, or you can wear a diaper for sleep and explain to LO it's just for sleep. This author says that overnight peeing is biological and something you can't REALLY train, but you can try setting your own alarm and waking the kiddo to pee. I personally am in no hurry, so LO still wears an overnight diaper.

Block 4: panties under regular clothes.

Potty training is going to be as much about you as it is about LO. Have low expectations. Be as Zen as possible. DO not try to bribe or force LO onto the potty. My mantra was "I would rather clean up pee from the floor than traumatize LO by forcing her on the potty". I was expecting 8-12 accidents on the first day and some kind of linear progression getting better each day. In reality, we had:

Day 1: 4 accidents, 1 poop
Day 2: 2 accidents, 1 poop
Day 3, 1 accident
Day 4-5: 1 accident
Day 6: 2 accidents, back to back in the morning. This was the moment where I actually thought, "maybe she's not ready", and I alllllmost considered throwing in the towel. But the book addresses this and reminds parents that kids are learning and we can't think in terms of "regressions", etc. They are just learning and sometimes will make mistakes. SO we pressed on.
Days 7-11: NO ACCIDENTS. We even did crazy things like taking her to see Santa in a long, long line at the mall. All while she was going commando.

Ever since then, she has maybe 1 accident every 4-5 days, and only if we are in a new place or doing something extra fun (like a play date) and she's too busy too notice her pee signals. We just completed an 8 hour-each-way road trip and had only 1 accident! (not a full on pee, but an oops-I-started-to-pee-but-caught-myself).

So my tips are:
1) be very kind and patient with LO. He is just learning.
2)expect accidents.
3)don't expect him to be "trained" in x amount of days
4) don't backtrack. Once the diaper bandaid is off,, it's off.
5)Don't force the kid to sit on the potty, or they start rebelling. They learn from having accidents. Obviously, try to sit them on the potty before doing stuff like leaving the house, but at the end of the day, kids have very little control over things in their life--and this is one little thing they can control. So let him learn how to read his own signals.
6) don't bribe. This backfires. See #5
7) keep LO well hydrated and not constipated. You want poops to just slide out super easily. Give prune juice or prune pouches or whatever.
8) reward yourself somehow when you make it to nap time and bed time each day. Watching a kid 24/7 all day long is EXHAUSTING.

So the reason I say start soon is, it's a work in progress. We were just at a Christmas party where a 5 year old girl had a pee accident (kids were too busy playing, and she didn't want to leave and waited too long). That really showed me that even with this short methods, you have to play the long game. Don't worry about a regression after baby. LO might still even be in commando stage at that time.

Good luck!

@Anagram: I agree. I would start sooner. With how close you have to watch the LOs, I would not want to have a newborn as well. I would want to be out of block 1 definitely. It took longer than I would have liked because daycare wouldn't let us do commando or even undies with accidents and I think some kids need to be commando for quite some time.

We PTed DD1 later than Oh Crap recommends as well. She was probably 3 years and 2 months and we were on a preschool deadline. The deadline is what made it very stressful but ultimately it motivated her to fully train. We took her to her new preschool for an open house and she had a great time. Then we pointed out that she has to use the potty to go to her new school. Boom! Clicked.

I will say it took 2 weeks or so for me to feel confident and she night trained herself as well. We just leave a travel potty in her room since the bathroom is a ways away.