What do you do with the wee?!

[canichange]

Toilet training my 2 year old. He's fairly good, but I'm struggling a bit when we are out and about. I keep a potty in the boot of the car, but I'm wondering what to do with the wee when he's used it.

I want to buy a travel potty, where the lid seals the wee inside until you get home. My husband says just chuck it in a hedge/down a drain. This is fine if we're out somewhere like a wood, where no one will notice, but not so fine on the school run, where we park and walk in housing estates etc.

Husband says just take a large Tupperware box to tip the wee into for these occasions. I think a proper travel potty would really help.

What does everyone else do?

Just get a travel potty, makes it all very convenient and money well spent.
We’ve got a my travel potty well worth the money, you just close it up and go. I got it as initially was carrying round a potty and then had a situation where there weren’t any discreet places to tip it. Who wants to wander around with a potty full of wee looking for a bush while also trying to keep an eye on a toddler.
Also great still for long car journeys when you think they may need a poo and you don’t know where the services are.
Still use it now a year on from being fully trained. Haven’t quite mastered a mess free outdoor wee in winter with all the layers / coveralls so I’ve just started using it again, no holding them awkwardly and hoping wee doesn’t go on their clothes, eek!

@Kanaloa

And to answer your questions about what I’d do if the child was in the ‘can’t wait 5 minutes zone’ I’d either stay home or reevaluate my child’s readiness. If they genuinely can’t wait for five minutes I’d say they’re a bit off being ready.

I also found it helpful when mine were first training to consider where we were going/where the toilets were.

I think this works best with the first child. Subsequent children are often carted around on school runs or to extra curriculars for older children so don’t get the luxury of spending a week or two weeks close to home learning the ropes and especially during restrictions where public toilets often weren’t open or shops didn’t want you to use theirs, I think carting a potty around was often the only option.

DD (2 years) often does her first wee of the day at least an hour after she’s woken up and she is fully dry overnight. I can’t make her do it first thing. Sometimes I’ve had to rush out without her having gone yet (and yes I do ask her to go before we leave but..). If she needs a wee once we get to school and she goes off into the school children’s toilets, then that’s fine. If they were more strict on who goes onto school premises still because of Covid then I’d probably still be bringing a potty with me frankly.

I honestly really can’t see what is controversial about bringing a potty out and about under the pram or in the boot of a car. Using a potty on a grassy area behind a tree is a world away from being the type of parent that would whip out a potty in the middle of the Tate Modern..

I never carried a potty everywhere 🤔, we kept one in the car but never on school runs, would just put them in a pull up, no way I’m faffing around with a potty and a toddler whilst walking to school or in town. I never understand why parents allow their child to sit on a potty in the middle of a pavement or in a shop (or outside a shop).

Always had one in the car for when we went places where there was no toilet or we were on a long drive, we live rurally so we go to the woods a lot and other places where there were no loo’s but this was mainly once they were fully toilet trained (potty for emergencies). Until they had enough control to wait to find a toilet in town or on the school run we just used pull ups.

Oh….and it’s fine to put wee down a drain or in a hedge but obviously not in someone’s front garden.

It would be awesome if people could try to remember that different people have different lifestyles, rather than saying stupid things like "Well, WE never took a travel potty anywhere, so it clearly isn't necessary. If you need to bring one, your child is obviously not ready to be TTed."

We never used a travel potty, as we live in an urban area and use public transport (we don't have a car)--there are always station toilets around, there are always open cafes and department stores around. We carried a mini toilet seat instead.

Other people don't need to use a travel potty because their car journeys are nearly always short and they are able to stay close to home much of the time---they have a big garden or most things are only a short drive/walk away, and no big age gaps.

Some people, however, need to drive long distances with their kids regularly, because of where they have to live, and/or they have an older child who have various activities going on, or goes to school a distance away. Not everyone has the money to keep buying coffees every time a toddler needs the loo, and a lot of public toilets have been closed these days, especially with covid.

Given the environmental impact of nappies, we should be applauding people's efforts to get toddlers out of them sooner rather than later, not keep making it harder by being rude about the things that people do in order to get TTing to work.

A bit of urine down a drain or on a grass verge is fine. If it isn't, we'd better start off making pet dogs illegal, since they pee everywhere and nobody seems to care.

Travel potty, there only like £25 on Amazon. DD carries it herself, got addditiinal use now when our n about as she’d developed a fear of big toilets 🤦🏽‍♀️

Yes, I agree about different lifestyles

My DS had to wee in a bottle as I would struggle to get a double pushchair into a public loo, even if there was one available.

My last two DC we used a toilet seat as well as a potty. Both trained in a few days with lots of pre-training encouragement and build up. meant they would use a toilet (with help) if needed both just turned two and DD was only a little thing (DS was not!).

I think this works best with the first child. Subsequent children are often carted around on school runs or to extra curriculars for older children so don’t get the luxury of spending a week or two weeks close to home learning the ropes and especially during restrictions where public toilets often weren’t open or shops didn’t want you to use theirs, I think carting a potty around was often the only option.

This.

You can't "stick to home" for goodness' knows how long (no, it does NOT necessarily just take two weeks, it depends on the child, it can be months for many toddlers before they are reliable enough to wait a while for the loo) when you have an older child doing things like swimming lessons.

And if you don't take your child to things like swimming lessons, you just get judged by people sneering about "lazy parents who can't be bothered to make sure their kids learn life skills" (yes, I have seen threads like this too).

Will your DS wee into a bottle on car journeys etc?

@NoContactThankYou

I have two boys. Never travelled with a potty, but after getting stuck in a city centre traffic jam for over an hour, the 'wee bottle' was born. Get a decent sized bottle with a hole they can poke their willies into and screw the lid on afterwards. No mess, no fuss and easy to pour away and wash afterwards. Cheap and recyclable too. Ours lived in the car for years (washed!).

This is exactly what I did!! Always got a coke bottle knocking around the car. Means he can go "on the go" too!!

Potette with biodegradable bags and liners - so easy. I don’t know where this “if your child needs a potty, they’re not trained” mentality comes from. Not everywhere has a toilet anywhere nearby eg beaches, walk in the woods etc.

He's not ready for toilet training of he can't manage the school run.

I don't understand this massive desire to potty train kids so fast. There's a million things you can channel your and their energy into instead.

Is it because it's a tangible milestone that can be made obvious to others?

Travel potty will get extra use as a sealable car sick bowl so not unreasonable to spend the money on it.

@Nomoreporridge872

Absolutely fine to pour wee down a drain. Wee is sterile and toddler wee doesn’t smell

Wee isn't sterile after it leaves your body.

But neither is it a dangerous liquid!

A small child wee can just be done/tipped onto/into the gutter, grass.

Anywhere a dog can wee.

I had a travel potty for my youngest. It was a god send! It was the one you fold up and it shouldn't leak.

You can also buy travel potty's you can put bags in to dispose of urine or poo!

@greenteafiend

I think this works best with the first child. Subsequent children are often carted around on school runs or to extra curriculars for older children so don’t get the luxury of spending a week or two weeks close to home learning the ropes and especially during restrictions where public toilets often weren’t open or shops didn’t want you to use theirs, I think carting a potty around was often the only option.

This.

You can't "stick to home" for goodness' knows how long (no, it does NOT necessarily just take two weeks, it depends on the child, it can be months for many toddlers before they are reliable enough to wait a while for the loo) when you have an older child doing things like swimming lessons.

And if you don't take your child to things like swimming lessons, you just get judged by people sneering about "lazy parents who can't be bothered to make sure their kids learn life skills" (yes, I have seen threads like this too).

Well, I have four. It’s worked for all bar one who has special needs and potty trained very late because he wasn’t able to verbalise himself and he struggled to get the hang of it.

So as I said, if it works for you then great, but carting a potty around is not ‘the only option.’ It’s an option for some.

And if it takes ‘months’ to be reliable enough to tell you they need a wee then how on earth is that child ready? At a swimming lesson with their older sibling it should be ‘mummy I need the toilet’ and then ‘okay let’s find the toilets.’

If it genuinely takes months then it sounds to me like what I’ve said above - a child being trained before they’re actually capable. Obviously being caught short is inevitable and happens to us all, but months of taking a potty on the school run? That’s just a child who isn’t ready.

If you need to use one your child is not toilet trained. Being toilet trained means not only recognising the urge but being able to hold it until you get to a toilet and this includes a reasonable time, not a 30sec trip down the hallway. A reasonable time includes the average school run (‘average’, before someone comes on state they have a 2hr drive).

I used to use pull ups on mine that were toilet trained when on long car trips with 3/3.5hrs in-between toilets/rest stops. After an unwanted encounter with a snake and going into a ditch disguised by long grass, we quickly learnt pulling over between toilets was not on. Additionally, a snake in a toilet once meant no kid wanted to use them anyway. So we would just collect them, bin them and hand out new ones when we got to the next toilet area. Poo was never an issue after being out of nappies as toilet trained kids go in the morning before you set out. I cannot imagine taking a potty for use even in that situation, so gross.

Will add, we had multiple kids of different ages, was never a barrier to toilet training. We never had to skip swimming lessons, any activity or school drop off/pick ups because there was one toilet training! If that were the case, they simply would not have been ready and would have still been in nappies. Never carried a potty around.

Dogs wee all over the place, I don’t see any issue with a bit of toddler wee down a drain.

I have 4 kids over potty training age and never owned a travel potty. Surely they’re only used for a couple of weeks in my training experience?

For long car journeys close to potty training I always used a back up pull up in case we couldn’t stop at the services for a long time.

My DS loved weeing on trees and bushes. He still loves it actually, but I try to dissuade him because he's too big for it now.

I bought a travel potty for my DD. She used it a handful of times, and we just chucked the wee or an out the way bit of greenery or a drain. Then she decided she hated it and refused to use it. I Ebayed it and now just encourage her to go before we go.

Unless you're likely to have another child, I'd personally skip the travel potty. Your child will grow out of it so quickly, and the amount of times a normal potty really won't suffice are so few, it's just stuff and consumption for little point. It'll probably take you longer to Ebay in the future (listing, packing, posting) than it'll save you time hunting for handy trees/drains.

We used a normal potty and carried nappies that were unused that they had grown out of. When they used the potty, we turned a nappy so that it’s absorbent bit took up the contents of the potty, cleaned the potty with antibacterial spray and wiped it out then put it back in a carrier bag and dealt with the nappy as we usually would have.

I had one child who took 3 years to potty train and two who did in a week. The one who struggled did because that child preferred playing and daydreaming to going to the loo. There is so much judgment about toilet training. If you consider your child needs to be seconds close to a potty take one with you. If you have a child that can wait until a toilet is found do realise you are in a lucky situation and please try to appreciate that!

Given the environmental impact of nappies, we should be applauding people's efforts to get toddlers out of them sooner rather than later, not keep making it harder by being rude about the things that people do in order to get TTing to work.

Yes yes yes yes yes.

I’d far rather see a child on a potty on the street outside my house than that mean another nappy in landfill for 500 years.

Eventually there is going to have to be an environmental levy on disposable nappies surely? Why can’t it be seen as better to potty train at the point they might “only” be able to wait 5 or 10 minutes and need a potty carting around than wait until they’re 3 and you’ve condemned another 1,000 nappies to the bin?

Not sure why anyone would teach a ds to wee sitting down!!

@HoppingPavlova

If you need to use one your child is not toilet trained. Being toilet trained means not only recognising the urge but being able to hold it until you get to a toilet and this includes a reasonable time, not a 30sec trip down the hallway. A reasonable time includes the average school run (‘average’, before someone comes on state they have a 2hr drive).

I used to use pull ups on mine that were toilet trained when on long car trips with 3/3.5hrs in-between toilets/rest stops. After an unwanted encounter with a snake and going into a ditch disguised by long grass, we quickly learnt pulling over between toilets was not on. Additionally, a snake in a toilet once meant no kid wanted to use them anyway. So we would just collect them, bin them and hand out new ones when we got to the next toilet area. Poo was never an issue after being out of nappies as toilet trained kids go in the morning before you set out. I cannot imagine taking a potty for use even in that situation, so gross.

How have you managed to encounter so many snakes during pee stops