Miya's Potty Training Story

Just the other day I was thinking I haven't blogged about our potty training story. And now Frances of Topaz Mommy is asking for tips on how to toilet train her eldest. I hope this little blog helps her and other mommies out there.

As I've mentioned before, we introduced the potty to Miya by reading her a book about it.  But you can see that was a long time ago. It took us almost a year to completely train her. It was an on and off thing with her, this potty training. First she was taught to pee in the potty and then in the toilet. I also asked our yaya to not put any diaper on her when they're at home. So there are really times when she will pee (or poop) on the floor. I really have to thank my yaya before for tolerating this and for keeping up with our program. By September last year, we ran out of our Mamy Poko diaper*. My mother's boss had a contact with the supplier so we were able to buy in bulk price, much much cheaper than store bought diaper. Sinabay yung order namin sa order ng boss nya kaya nakamura kami! But when our stock ran out, we couldn't wait for the next bulk purchase of her boss. Cheapskate that I am I decided it's really time to really teach Miya to pee and poop in the toilet.  I asked our new yaya to do this. Make her pee and poop in the toilet when she's home. She only wore diaper when she goes to school, when she slept at night or when we go out. We did it bit by bit. After a few months, she only wore diapers when she slept at night or when we go out. Come January, we finally decided she shouldn't wear diapers at night. She was actually the one who initiated this in December last year, she didn't like wearing dipaers at night anymore. But I wanted to sleep through the night so I put it off and made her wear diapers. In January we finally did it. I've put her potty beside our bed. I'll help her pee before sleeping and tell her to wake me up during the night when she feels like peeing. In the first few weeks, there were some accidents when I would wake up and her side of the bed is all wet. I had to change her and put her back to sleep. There were nights when she would wake me up after doing the deed. And then there were nights when she would wake me up and I'll lead her to her potty and our bed will be dry all throughout the night. There were times when I find her stirring during the night, so I'll gently ask her if she wants to pee. Most of the time she will say yes and I will help her out of bed to pee. Until finally she learned to wake me up to make her pee. Now, she can last the whole night through without peeing. Hurrah!

When we went out-of-town for our birthday, my husband insisted that we let her wear diapers during the travel time. Turned out we didn't really have to because Miya would control her pee and then ask me to bring her to the toilet if she really has to go. If I tell her to just pee in her diapers, she will tell me she wants to do it in the toilet.

So I guess in the end potty training is a combination of the readiness of the kid (if she can already tell you she wants to pee or poo, that is, she knows the sensation she feels before doing the deed), the consistency of training her and practicing peeing and pooping in the toilet.

*Miya has really sensitive skin so this is really our diaper of choice. This is what really works for her. We also tried using Pampers when we ran out but in the end I just really didn't want to spend much on diaper anymore.