potty training in much (much) more than three days

OK, let's be honest this is not a how-to potty training method blog post. First, let me say that I call BS on the potty training in one day or even three days for that matter and am glad I never spent any money on a potty training book. I went into the whole potty training ready to dedicate an entire weekend to indoctrination. I read mom blogs. I bought treats. I set a timer. I pumped my child full of juice and salty snacks. I even bought Dora underwear! You know what happened that weekend? I about lost my mind and Little Miss J peed on the floor more than once. I learned that the only sure fire way to prevent accidents was to hold her hostage on the toilet with an iPad. She wasn't learning about going potty, she was being trained to learn that the only way she got to play iPad was to sit on the potty and well, she was OK with that. She could (and did) sit there for hours and watch Diego. She did, however, learn what chinchillas and crocodiles were during that time. So there's that.

After realizing that Little Miss J only wanted to sit on that froggy potty because she wanted to watch Baby Jaguar, you know what we did? We stopped. We stopped asking her if she wanted to go. We stopped putting her on there every hour. We stopped abandoning her in the bathroom with only an iPad for company because literally I didn't have the patience to sit in the bathroom with her for hours. I watched my dollars go literally into the garbage with each little pull-up. You thought diapers were expensive - the pull-up thing takes it to a whole new level.

Finally, Gus and I just decided it was time to go cold turkey. I bought my last pack of pull-ups and we started telling Little Miss J that when she they were all gone that she would have to wear underwear. Well, those pull-ups lasted until last Thursday and when they were all gone, Gus asked her what she was going to do and she said "wear underwear." The next day, we packed up 6 pairs of underwear and 6 pairs of pants and sent her on her way. The first day we had 4 accidents and the second day 2 accidents. This Thursday marks her one week anniversary in underwear and so far we've had two full accident-free days.

Given that Little Miss J has never been a textbook baby/toddler, I'm not sure what possessed me to think that any other parent's potty training method was ever going to work on her. She's her own little person and she will do things on her own schedule. I still bribe her to "try" because sometimes in the throes of insisting that she doesn't have to go she actually pees her pants. But for the most part, I'm feeling pretty confident that progress is being made.

My friends with older children tell me the freedom from the diaper bag is indescribable. At the moment I still carry it around with extra pants and underwear - but I see the light at the end of the tunnel.