Let the potty training begin......wait, I mean end!

I knew that my goal this summer was to get Addison potty trained. I potty train students in my classroom all the time, so I had a good idea of how to begin thankfully. Before summer began, we went to the store and picked out a Dora potty chair. Can I just tell you that potty's definitely are not made the way they used to be. These days you basically get a round piece of plastic and your lucky if the hole if big enough for your butt to sit on. I was worried about the potty having enough support for Addison. The Dora potty actually had the tallest back of all of them, believe it or not! I just knew that was going to be the one she would pick.

Once home, it wasn't the greatest potty in the world. Since she can't stand by herself, she needs something supportive enough that can take her weight for leaning and pulling down pants. This one definitely did not fit that bill. We used it anyway, just to acclimate her to sitting on a potty.


Then as the school year came to an end, I decided to bring home an adaptive potty chair from school. This one was wonderful. It actually has arms that she can stand at to get her pants down and after a while she figured out how to turn around and get herself on the potty. Much better.


So, summer was here and we began. We went and bought Dora underwear along with some pull-ups for those out and about times. It took about two days for her to catch on to the concept of peeing on the potty. From there we started using underwear at home and pull-ups away from home. Yes, she had accident after accident, sometimes we got lazy and just used the pull-ups, but you could tell that the pull-ups had the same concept to her as diapers. This went on for about a month and then I had to take a two week class which meant that Addy had to return to daycare. I was so worried that with going back to daycare that the little bit of potty training I had instilled would be lost. I was actually surprised and they followed through with putting her on the potty. She had several days of being dry all day.

I vowed that after the 2 weeks at daycare, we would start with underwear only, even when out and about. I can't seem to get her to tell me when she needs to use the bathroom:( We are still having occasional accidents, but if I stay on top of her I can usually get her to stay dry all day. She's still not telling me when she needs to go and I am hoping that this will come with time. Even when wearing underwear, she doesn't seemed phased by having accidents. Darn it....I was hoping that she would hate the wet feeling.

I even went out and then bought a toilet seat ring thinking that if she got to go through the process of flushing and watching that might entice her some more. The potty ring is harder for her physically, the only benefit is that we can actually use it in the bathroom. we have 2 very small bathrooms, so have had to set the other potty seats outside of the bathroom.


I am noticing that when I ask her if she needs to go, she will always tell me "no". I have figured out that it's because the potty routine is very difficult for her physically. It's a lot of work for not just her, but me as well. By the end of the day I feel exhausted. If we are home, I have found it much easier to leave her bottomless so we aren't dealing with the pants every time. I guess we will just keep plugging along and hope that the verbalization issue comes in time.