When and how to potty train?

[Chaosofcalm]

I was reading the mile stones in the ‘birth to 5’ book and it says by 2 years a child should be potty trained but maybe unreliable.

DD is 20 months and I am not sure when to start to what to do.

My ds had absolutely no interest. And you can't do much to force an interest tbh! But a potty, leave it handy, wait for some signs!! Ds was happy to sit on it and 'try' for a wee at 2.9 months and mastered it by 2.11 months. Def worth waiting for him to decide!! Why waste months /years if they aren't ready?

Thanks. We have a potty and she puts her toys on it and they me they have a had a wee or a poo and she wipes their bottom. Twice she has asked for her nappy off to sit on the potty but she always changes her mind straight away.

Yeh, def wait for your DD to decide. DS did it in 3 weeks when he decided to start. If your DD is showing a bit of interest you could try some nappy free time but if she's not ready just wait. DS potty trained at 3, he was nowhere near ready at 2, so don't worry if she's not ready yet.

We decided to try ds the May half term as we were off work, and then if it didnt work we could try again summer holidays. He started Preschool the september after that. So he was 2y7m when we tried. He had shown no interest prior. I wasnt expecting it to go well.

We got up in the morning and checked the nappy box "ah none left lets put some underpants on". He was also told if he did a wee in the potty he could have a chocolate button.

We had accidents all morning then at 1pm he did his first potty wee. Since then he has been trained. No accidents. He is now 3y 3m. We tried him at night nappy free on his 3rd birthday and he was dry through the night, though his nappy was dry overnight for weeks before that.

Dd was less reliable through the day, started at the same age but roughly one or two accidents a week. She was wet overnight every night til her 5th birthday.

I waited until DD1 said she didn’t want to wear nappies anymore, by which time she was nearly 3. No accidents at all, she just got it! I think there’s a lot to be said for leaving it a little later.

A sensible person recommended to me to wait as long as possible so they get it quicker. Also it helps if it's summer so that washing can dry. I thought that was good advice worth repeating.
Dd1 was nearly 3 and kept taking her nappy off when she needed a wee- that's how we knew we couldn't really leave it any longer.
We prepared with a book (princess pollys potty). Then we went for it and just wore pants one day. I picked a long weekend when I was off work and we could mostly be home. Some successes, several accidents the first day. Second day she had the hang of it.
From then on she was potty trained at home, tho still had accidents at nursery where there were fewer adults per child and she was more distracted, so there was a fair bit of extra washing for a few months.
Ds is 2 and 1 month and I'm hoping to stave it off for at least 6 months.

It’s all about the individual child and situation

My children didn’t really get it until 3 at the time I was stressed out but the truth is they were dry day and night well before they started school and I think this is the key target to go for

At one point first my son went to a local playschool - they accepted children from the age of 2 then made a big fuss if they had to change nappies In the end we switched nurseries and he just got it and in hindsight I see it was unreasonable of the first place to be funny about doing nappies if they wanted to accept 2 year olds etc

I'd recommend the Oh Crap potty training book as a good read. It's also good for making you think about whether your child is ready etc.