Thursday, January 21, 2010

Dear Mother Ship - The Turd!



Erin & Kelly Asked:
Okay I HAVE to know more about the baby potty training. How did you get that to work? Share your secrets.

Early Potty training ... works! Basically EC works because you tune into the child's wants and needs. There is a basic dialogue between baby and momma. The baby tells us when it is hungry or tired or wet. So since we are already communicating these basic needs why not learn about toileting? I bet a lot of you know mom's who can tell when their child is pooping. If they are mobile children they stop their activity, pause, squat and make a funny face then they resume their activity. What if you tune into this body language and catch them before this?

We started with Finley at 4 months of age. I began to notice what times of day the breast fed baby would have to drop a deuce. I tracked it for about a week and then I bought a Baby Bjorne LITTLE potty. It fits her little body well. It's a small potty. I take it with me when I travel too.

I began putting her on the potty at every diaper change. While she sat there I made a ssssssss sound while using the ASL (American Sign Language) sign for toilet. This prompts a pee.

As an Aside: I happen to have an arsenal of signs as my nephew only speaks in sign. It's how we converse! I plan to teach Fin so she can chat with her cousin Aaron.

Back to potty training ... I then sign toilet and say poooooooo and grunt. (No joke. I DO THIS EVERY DAY.) Low and behold the kid poops on the potty! In the beginning it was like a magic trick. I screamed in awe. I made Steve come up to look at the poop in the potty. We clapped for Finley. She did it again and again. Soon I went from washing 6 poopy diapers out of 12-15 to one and then none. Now Finley has regulated and poops once in the morning as soon as she wakes up on her potty. If she does not go then, I try her on the potty at every diaper change until she's ready to go and I "catch it." Am I trained or is Finley aware of her need to move her bowls? She is aware. She signs potty. She has since she was 6 months old and at the right time. I am still amazed!

Is it always perfect? No this week she got a little backed up. We tried the potty several times over two days and then the dam broke. She signed potty at me & Steve and then we raced her UPSTAIRS to the potty but she was done. This happened four times in one day! Ahhhhh. Guess what? Today another potty arrived. I purchased from DIAPERS.COM they are awesome have the best rates and offer free delivery on most items. I now have a potty for the upstairs and downstairs bathrooms. I have tried her on the toilet but she won't sit there, she wiggles too much and won't pay attention to her jobs.

There is a link for DIAPER FREE BABIES on my side bar and you can read TWWLY's blog she is my friend who has practiced EC with a daughter and a son with success. She writes a good chapter about EC on her site. She was a good source of help for me and likely will be for you too!

I think a lot of cloth diapering parents will begin to use EC. It really does not take more time than changing a diaper. I don't make a point of talking about infant potty training amongst strangers as I really don't care for the comments of skeptics. I have already heard that "I AM TRAINED" and been looked at funnily, but I can take it! I am not cleaning sh*tty diapers. That's good enough for me and our environment!

E.C works! If nothing else the child should not be afraid of a potty and we'll be out of diapers more easily and sooner.

5 comments:

Erin said...

That's amazing. Methinks I'll try this with our next one.

The Accidental Pharmacist said...

I'm listening to my husband on our first poop in the potty attempt with our 4mos old. We've done okay on the pees so this is stage 2. We also got the little Bjorn potty. We were able to figure out the pees because she'd look at us and cry out. If we put her on the potty right away and made the shhhhhh noise, she'd go. I swear she knows what's going on. People think we are nuts but it beats tossing diapers, or in our case, cleaning poopy cloth ones.

Laurie said...

Enjoyed reading your ec adventures. We used it with our third and enjoyed it very much, were delighted to start and finish sooner than we had with traditional delayed toilet learning. That was 30 years ago and now our grandchild is using infant poty training too :-))

Here are a few links for anyone wanting to read up on the practice:
http://www.TimL.com/ipt
http://www.pottywhisperer.com

You are most welcome to add one or both to your sidebar too.

Cheers

Twwly said...

Try the BUMBO potty seat insert. It's AWESOME, worth every penny, IMO.

xx

Twwly said...

You're "trained" to pee and poop them just like you are "trained" to put a sweater on them when they are cold, rock them to sleep, and stick a boob in their mouths.

I've had that one too, doesn't go far.