Am I crazy for contemplating potty training my 2 DD's (not twins) at the same time?

[TheBeanAndTheBee]

Am thinking of doing this over the christmas holidays while I'm not at work, and they're not at nursery. There are 14 months between them, DD1 will be 2.10, DD2 will be 20 months. DD2 is showing more signs of being ready than DD1!!!

Will the competitiveness between them work in my favour, or should I not even consider this? I wouldn't have considered starting with DD2 this early but she's telling me when she has done a poo etc.

Mums with twins, have you potty trained both at the same time? Has anyone done this with kids that are close in age?

Any thoughts/tips/opinions would be appreciated...

[ImperialStateKnickers]

I did ddtwins simultaneously, the house seemed to be full of potties for a few months!

You could just suck it and see?

[shanks313]

I did it with my DDs...there is 13 months difference.Dd2 was done before Dd1 and teaching her what to do

[AitchDee]

I'd say you are out of your mind. Do one at a time. I have tried to simultaneously potty train my twins, who are now approaching twins, and almost lost the will to live.

I will be trying the consecutive approach once my sanity returns.

[ReallyTired]

I would have thought that potty training two children at once would be a bit of headache. A child needs to be able to tell you before pooing or weeing to be ready for potty training.

A lot of children at 20 months are fairly enthusastic about potty training, but lack the muscle strength to hold in their wee.

Encourage both girls to sit on the potty at nappy change times/ on waking. I think it would be a mistake to put both girls in knickers at the same time. I would tell your older girl that she is a big girl and is going to wear big girl knickers and that she needs to do her poos and wees in the potty.

Its important that she gets to decide whether she uses the potty or not. If she has an accident then say to her "poo poos and wee wees go in the potty and next time she will get a piece of chocolate if she does her poo/wee in the potty" It is vital she is not told off for accidents and just changed with minimal fuss.

If your dd2 uses the potty sucessfully then reward her, but its a bonus at 20 months.

[TheBeanAndTheBee]

Hmmm, a mixed bag of responses!! It wouldn't have even crossed my mind to try but my gut feeling is that DD2 is actually more ready than her sister... I think I may just give it a go, and try not to lose the will to live ;-) AitchDee did you feel like both your twins were ready when you tried? When will you be trying again?!

[AitchDee]

I'm not tying again til they are around three, which is January. I have four others who all potty trained by two, but it's impossible to watch two all the time to look for the cues that they need to pee.

One boy tells me before he needs to poo, I just don't have the energy to deal with it at the moment.

[brainonastick]

Is it likely that if one fails and the other succeeds (whichever way round that is), then the one that fails will feel really awful, as they have been set up in direct competition?

Personally, I wouldn't even try with either of them until they get to 3 (but then I hate hate hate potty training). Maybe do them a few months apart if you are desperate to try with both of them?

[TheBeanAndTheBee]

brainonastick hadn't even considered that, thank you....

[ReallyTired]

"Is it likely that if one fails and the other succeeds (whichever way round that is), then the one that fails will feel really awful, as they have been set up in direct competition? "

I think if parents handle the situation sympathetically then there will be no issue. I imagine that it will be harder if the younger child is trained first. Its not fair to hold back a younger child because an older child hasn't got a particular skill.

There is a lot of sense in training the children a couple of months apart for sanity's sake.

[hazeyjane]

I have 14 months between my dds, and tried to potty train them both at the same time. My first attempt was a complete disaster, as neither were ready. My second attempt was when dd1 was 3.3, it took a few days, and she had it, she was completely ready.

The trouble with trying to do dd2 at the same time, was that she is a completely different child to dd1, and needed a different approach. I also found that when i realised that it wasn't going to work for dd2, it was hard to go back and say, right we will try in a few months, because dd1 was happily skipping off to the toilet.

Dd2 took ages to toilet train after this, and was having accidents right up until the middle of reception (she still needs to be reminded to go to the toilet now, at 5). i don't know if she would have been like it anyway, but I think i did make the whole thing a lot harder for myself by having to split the attention two ways.

[TheBeanAndTheBee]

Thanks hazeyjane really good to hear about your experience, especially as you have the same age gap as us. Food for thought....

[1fish2fish]

i have twin boys, who are now 3.4. I potty trained then both at same time at 2.10 and it was VERY hard work for about 6 weeks. Insane, the amount of washing there was. I think i counted 36 pairs of trousers and pants in the first 48 hours and of course we dont own 36 pairs of trousers so i had to really be of top of the laundry!!

i say dont do it together, do it one at a time, two together is very hard in my experience. i dont know how 'ready' my boys really were tho, put i ploughed on with it and never went back but 6 months in and we still have poos in pants which is now driving my crazy but thankfully they both 100% reliably dry day and night...