Using the iPad on the toilet

[ellesabe]

Hi all,

I know this should strictly be on the potty training thread but I fear that I might not get a reply in time over there! It's rather slow-moving and I'm sure that you lovely lot will be equally capable of helping me with this!

We have just completed Day One with 2.7yo dd and it hasn't gone too badly. She won't sit on the potty but only had one accident and managed 4 wees on the loo.

The thing is, she has freakishly good bladder control and will hold it in for anything up to 30 mins after first showing the signs of needing it.

I can see that she needs it so I put her on the loo and the only way I can get her to stay there without her becoming REALLY upset is by giving her the iPad to play with. And then she sits there playing with it for 30 mins before finally weeing. I feel like I've been sat on the bathroom floor all day!

Obviously this can't continue as the iPad isn't always available (when we're out or when dh has taken it to work).

So how do we move on from this? Do I just need to be braver about leaving her longer before taking her to the loo? We're also incentivising with chocolate buttons and stickers which she does want but they're not enough to prevent her getting upset and holding it in.

Thanks in advance for any similar experiences and wisdom you can share :)

Could you try offering the ipad when the wee comes, ie take it through to the loo and allow 5-10 mins on it as a reward when you can hear the sound? If she already has it there's no incentive to get on with it. I know gina ford's book said to try tv or read a story to get them to stay on the potty/loo but this really didn't work for dt1, only thing to keep him there was a magnetic hundred square and counting to 100...

That sounds like a good idea.

I might have to resort to the endless singing of nursery rhymes while she sits there instead then

Can you try just leaving her to it, with just pants on and a potty in easy reach/step and loo seat on the loo, and see what happens?

We tried without the iPad today and she sat on the loo for ages holding it in and getting really upset so we've gone back to nappies and trying again in a month. If she asks to use the loo tomorrow we're going to let her but take her off after 5 mins each time so that she doesn't get stressed like today.

This toilet malarkey is hard !

Yes it is. Sounds good for now going back to nappies. I tried with ds at 2.3 but then waited until 2.11 which was way easier. Having said that he spent a year running to get a pull up every time he needed a poo for a year after that and needed bribery to get this going on the potty. Thankfully he has no memory and no lasting effects from the whole process!

The only thing that's really worrying me is that yesterday after going back in nappies she was still holding the wee in and crying whenever she dd eventually go in her nappy. Then in the evening she asked to go on the toilet again. I think she was confused and does actually want to go on the loo, she's just anxious about it I think.

And this morning the first thing she said to me was that she'd done a wee in her nappy.

We're going out this morning so hopefully that might be enough of a distraction to help her forget about the whole thing...