Potty training etiquette when out

[MeadowHay]

Just in the very early days of trying to potty train 26m old DD. What do you do when out and about? E.g. if we took her to soft play unless she's mega reliable by then I'd imagine I would need to put training pants on her? And then if she uses the potty, do I have to take her to the toilets to do that? Can a child of that age hold it long enough to make it to the toilets?! (she definitely can't at the moment!) Sorry if this is silly questions just Im struggling to see how early outings work?! Or can you just not go anywhere like that for however long it takes til they build their ability to hold it long enough to reach the toilets?

Any recommendations of a good travel potty? I was going to purchase a carry potty but I’m unsure whether there’s a better alternative.

I really wouldn't bother at 26 months unless they're showing exceptional signs of readiness and can communicate and recognise their need to go

26 months is a perfectly fine and unexceptional age to start potty training if the child is ready.

DC2 is 26 months and has been toilet trained for at least 3-4 months. Not my decision, she just copied her slightly older sister who also toilet trained herself at around 20 months old as she wanted to be like her older cousin.

No drama, but I also didn't carry a potty around with us. Just made sure we went to the toilet before leaving anywhere, regular reminders and trips to the toilet (even little bums can balance on a full size toilet seat) and took plenty of spare clothes and a plastic carrier bag with us for a few weeks. Was less of an issue with DC2 as it happened during lockdown.

@Shinysilverlamp
My little girl loves the Potette Plus we use out and about. These days, we mostly use it on top of the loo seat, but during lockdown, when there were no public loos open, it was so useful as an actual potty. We’d just find a discrete bush/tree to crouch behind, then chuck the liner bag in the nearest bin.

@shinysilverlamp we have a potette which is great and fits in my bag. Really useful even though mine have been potty trained a while we still use it when out and about, discretely of course! I'd rather that than use public toilets in the current circumstances.

I'm surprised at the number of people who seem to think using a potty when potty training will mess their kids up and make them think they can just pee and poo anywhere really hasn't been an issue for me or anyone I know who has used a potty.

@pastabest

I really wouldn't bother at 26 months unless they're showing exceptional signs of readiness and can communicate and recognise their need to go

26 months is a perfectly fine and unexceptional age to start potty training if the child is ready.

DC2 is 26 months and has been toilet trained for at least 3-4 months. Not my decision, she just copied her slightly older sister who also toilet trained herself at around 20 months old as she wanted to be like her older cousin.

No drama, but I also didn't carry a potty around with us. Just made sure we went to the toilet before leaving anywhere, regular reminders and trips to the toilet (even little bums can balance on a full size toilet seat) and took plenty of spare clothes and a plastic carrier bag with us for a few weeks. Was less of an issue with DC2 as it happened during lockdown.

Of course some are ready at that age, but for those that aren't I just don't think it's worth the stress when still so young.

Nobody is suggesting children of this age who aren't showing signs of readiness should be toilet trained though are they?

We have a carry potty but only because it was a hand me down worked well today and now DD has decided she just wants to use that at home too rather than our Ikea potty

I really wouldn't bother at 26 months unless they're showing exceptional signs of readiness and can communicate and recognise their need to go
As we all know, all children are different. Some children will be completely toilet trained and never have an accident at 18 months. And some will be much later than that.

So, if the child is showing signs of being ready at 26 months, I probably would bother to help them on on their way to using the toilet. Why would you not? My 3 were all reliably dry by 26 months.
And, yes, nursery should support your dd in using the toilet. If she is only just starting to use the potty, of course she will need extra support from them, to be taken to the bathroom and helped with her trousers and pants, but I don’t think that is beyond my expectations for a nursery nurse. If they weren’t doing that, they would be having to change her nappy, it’s a normal stage of development, so completely part of the job description.

It doesn’t matter if she is 26 months or 36 months, she might still need support at the start of the journey.

26 months is not too young to potty train. My DS was potty trained and only the odd accident after a week. If they are showing signs that they want to do it why would you not do it? So much nicer than being in a nappy.

As others have said regular trips to the toilet when you are out so that she is not going to long between toilet breaks and becoming desperate and unable to hold on.

My DD was stubborn and didn't want to 'try' she wanted to tell us when she was desperate. We preserved taking her even if she said she didn't need to go and lots of praise when she managed to have a wee.

I really wouldn't bother at 26 months unless they're showing exceptional signs of readiness and can communicate and recognise their need to go

26 months isn't young at all, loads of kids are out of nappies at that age. My DD was only a month or two older than that and she got the hang of it in 2-3 days and has had very few accidents since. I wouldn't say she was showing "exceptional signs of readiness" either tbh, we just gave it a go and it went fine. Sometimes you don't know until you try.

At the moment there seem to be lots of parents who wait until their kids are older, it's great if that is what works for them but it doesn't mean everyone has to do it like that.

We had a travel potty and used it mostly in outdoorsy places when miles from proper loos. With such a little one it looks like they're just sitting unless you look closely.

Just don't whip it out in shops etc!

I think her tantrum accident tonight actually showed me she can hold it for a couple of mins at least. Because she held it from when she first asked to DH racing up and down the stairs again with the potty she wanted and then another couple of minutes until I guess she couldn't hold it anymore and weed herself. Which was not a nice situation but at least showed me she can physically hold it for a few minutes so I might be panicking over nothing on that front.

She had a second accident not along ago when I literally left her in a room for about 30 seconds and came back to her standing by the potty and looking at it and I asked if she needed it and she said yes so helped her onto it and she weed. But she had a small amount of wee in her trousers/down her leg so she must have done a tiny bit before I got her on. Typical but also my fault as if I'd been with her it presumably wouldn't have happened.

Re what the right age is to train, ive no skin in this game. DD is my first and who knows how this will pan out. I certainly didn't set out with some burning ambition to train young, though I do agree that 26 month is only young by the current standards where people do seem to be leaving it later to train. Which is fine obviously but I do think it skews perceptions of what age children are capable of learning. In hindsight my daughter may have been capable a few months ago and I kind of wish I'd tried then but I got sucked into thinking she must be too young and didnt bother.

Whilst I get that whipping a potty out next to a table in a cafe is obviously gross I definitely don't have any real issue with people seeing her on the potty or anything. She's 2 and if she remains in nappies she gets her nappy changed in the park/in front of strangers in the toilets and all kinds so I don't see a difference just if she uses a potty.

I think I will try underwear on her tomorrow with bated breath as I presume nursery will require her to wear it. Wish me luck. She will have her nan looking after her tomorrow afternoon as well and might go to her house for some of that so more challenges eek.

DH and I took time off work (so me the first half of the week and him the second). Stayed home and day one and two the potty was in the room without and DS didn't have any pants on. Day 3 we used pants and slowly moved the potty into the toilet rooms across the rest of the week.
Tool travel potty when out and about for about 2 months as he hates the toilet.
We only used nappies for bed and avoided places like softplays until we were confident that he would let us know if he needed to go.
He nailed it! Just do what works for you.

We’ve recently trained dd who is 26 months. She’s been dry for about 2 months. We spent the first 5 days at home. She was dry in 3 days but I wanted to be sure we could make it to a toilet in time before we went too far.

When out and about, I just pop to the toilet most times we come across one. Although they’re a lot that aren’t open still. I do have a potette in the car, but it’s only been used 5/6 times.

She’s very good at telling me she needs to go and she can hold well, I’d trust her to hold the majority of the time for over 5 mins, but we have built up to this.

No way did she need to wait any longer to potty train. And ideally I certainly wouldn’t have wanted her in nappies at 3 plus.

Ooh another thought, what about swimming? Should I still use swim nappies as a precaution there? I'm presuming her classes will restart sometime over the next few weeks and for non-toilet trained kids they need to wear a swim nappy with a happy nappy swim nappy over the top.

Swim nappies are just to catch poo, they are irrelevant to wee, so that one depends on how much control you think your DD has over her bowels really.

At 26 months I can be pretty confident that my DD knows when she needs to poo and wouldn't contemplate doing it in a swimming pool, but every child is different.

Ah ok - I'm also confident she wouldn't poop in the swimming lesson, she never has before and she can only poop if she has some privacy too like even at home she send us out of the room so she can poop alone

I'm feeling cautiously optimistic today, no accidents so far and she's been wearing underwear without issue as long as she chooses which ones to wear. Her nan looked after her for a couple of hours and that was fine and now she's taken her to hers so fingers crossed that will go ok. I guess I'm just concerned about nursery still as she can't take her own underwear and trousers up and down and I'm worried she might not feel she knows who to ask to take her the potty etc. I am going to ask them to take her first thing tomorrow morning and get her to have a try if they can and explain what she needs to do if she needs a wee etc. Fingers crossed...she woke from her nap earlier than usual this PM and was crying and when I went to her the first thing she asked for was the potty and then did a wee straight away too bless her.

@MeadowHay I know this is nearly a year ago but just wondering how things went in the end with toilet training. I'm finding we're now in an almost identical situation unexpectedly started toilet training Sunday and we have a 4 hour car journey on Saturday!!!

Aw, it's crazy looking back at this now!! We got on pretty well - the first couple of weeks of nursery she was having the odd wee accident say one a week but the issue was she started soiling herself at nursery. She was soiling most days for a couple of weeks but the staff were amazing they said not to put her in training pants and she'd get it and they spent ages making her feel comfortable there and making a big deal out of her when she did poo on the potty so she felt so proud and it took a few weeks and then she had it nailed.

She did have a regression in January until about March or even April though with her wetting frequently, but not at nursery, only with us. This coincided with me being seriously unwell with hyperemesis and her hardly seeing me as a result, as I gradually got better she also gradually got more reliable and it sorted itself out. Was pretty frustrating at the time though especially for poor DH having that to deal with on top of everything else.

For a long car journey I would definitely use a training pant though. We hadn't done any since we toilet trained her until a few weeks ago we were doing a 2hr drive for a hol and we ummed and aahed but decided to go with a training pant because if she woke up from a nap on the motorway nowhere near services I'm not confident she could hold for long enough. We did stop once en route and she toileted and was completely dry but it was good for the peace of mind. Then the way home we stopped too but later she suddenly needed to wee and we were nowhere near services so she ended up wetting the training pant and then falling asleep! So I would definitely expect to use training pants for any long car journeys. We will be doing 1.5hrs next month and will probably put her in one for that too tbh. I figure it's in everyone's interest that if she does wet at least she won't be soaked and sitting in her own wee and wet car seat and all that.

If she can't hold it long enough to get to a toilet then you're trying too early.

Starting early just makes it waaaaay more stressful with a lot more accidents.

Once she's ready she'll crack it in a day or two with very few accidents.

You should get to the point where they can kind of hold it and let you know if they need to go within a few days - so staying at home with just short outings for a few days is best. If not, she’s probably not ready. Occasional accidents will always happen. Kids also like seeing the toilets in various places so get quite good very quickly when asking to go when out. I’ve never taken the potty anywhere.

Oh no, such an old post oops. glad it all worked out OP

I waited til my DD was really ready to toilet train, then did it on a week we really didn't need to go anywhere. She was dry in the day within 4 days and overnight within a couple of weeks.

I just did the same as the poster above 😆 read most of the thread.and posted before I realised it was an old thread, sorry!