Go read the Disclaimer again. I am not a doctor. This is not medical advice. Seriously.
I first ran across a reference to infant potty training on Amazon. I was looking at a list of recommended baby gear, including a fairly deluxe changing mat that I was thinking of getting rather than a changing table. I thought it would be nice to have the same thing for diaper changes at home as when out of the house. Mentioned on the list was Infant Potty Training, which immediately offended me. However, looking at the reviews, it became clear this was not abusive early potty training. I called my husband and described the idea to my husband, who said it sounded like what his sister encountered when she was in Africa. Concluding once again that my husband's parenting style was considerably more evolved than my own, I bought the book and read it.
We talked about it some more, and decided we'd have some disposables on hand, some cloth diapers, and we'd try the infant potty training after a few weeks, but not worry about it right at the beginning. In the event, I had a C-section, and my inclination to attempt to get the baby to an appropriate potty location was thoroughly extinguished. My husband, however, was a trooper, and caught many pees, and even a poop or two in the sink. We had that changing mat set up next to the sink, so even if one was in progress, the rest could be caught.
When Teddy was between two and three months old, we bought a small, clear potty and set it up on the counter on the other side of the sink. He was not able to sit up on it on his own, but it was easier to hold him there than over the sink. We did still hold him over sinks and toilets when we were out and about. Teddy had been pooping very rarely (once every week or so). When we got the potty, he pooped in it the first time he sat on it, and seemed to become more frequent since then. The potty, even needing help to sit up on it, was a more comfortable position for him.
At around three and a half months, I picked up Ingrid Bauer's Diaper Free, which is very compatible with Boucke's ideas, but has some further suggestions on how to do it. At around five months, Teddy was able to sit up on the potty by himself, and while we do not stray far from him, we do not hold him there, because when we do, he tends to use our hands to climb around on to get at the light switches, medicine cabinet and sink. We went through a period of time where tried to stand up. We discouraged this by holding his feet in our hands. My husband put some non-skid stuff under the potty so it wouldn't move around when Teddy moved around.
We do not catch all pees or all poops. Night time, however, he is consistently dry and has been (except when he isn't feeling well) for a few weeks (night time being defined as between around 10:30 p.m. and around 6 a.m.). If we are prompt, we can get him on the potty before he is wet in the morning, and he pees a vast quantity of darker urine. During the day and in the evening, we don't always pick up on Teddy's signals right away, and some days are better than others. On the whole, however, it makes cloth diapering less of a hassle by cutting down on the number of diapers used considerably. Now that he is trying to crawl, I think he is surprised to be wet sometimes.
Other parents have noted that by doing Elimination Communication/Diaper Free/Infant Potty Training they've been able to figure out what some of their baby's inconsolable crying really means. What we've noticed is that having done this more or less from the beginning, Teddy really expects us to take him when he needs to pee. If he's breastfeeding, he'll thrash about a lot, coming on and off the nipple rather painfully, when he needs to pee, sort of glaring at me until it occurs to me to take him to the potty. Sometimes he just needs a little assistance with a burp; sometimes he needs to work some farts through; a lot of the time he wants to pee, and occasionally he wants to poop. I learned all this the hard way when I developed mastitis after initially thinking a lot of the thrashing was a problem with breastfeeding.
While Teddy continues to be nighttime and naptime dry unless he is not feeling well due to illness or stress such as jetlag, we were no longer able to put him on the potty other than after naps after he was about ten months old. I believe this happened partly because we pushed a little too hard to catch all pees and poops in hopes of having him out of diapers for our move in September 2006. Our child care at the time knew we were doing this and was even more insistent than we were. There was a nursing strike, some constipation and other drama, and I pulled the plug on furthe efforts. We continued to catch many morning and post-nap pees and little else, altho we often know when he is about to eliminate.
We put the small potty away when we moved and at 18 months I bought the larger Bjorn potty chair and some potty books. I also ordered a dozen more all-in-ones, to make getting him in and out of a diaper faster. Our plan is to not travel (at least not air travel) for at least six months, and to establish as calm, and routine a life to support Teddy learning to use the potty.
It's really, really, really easy to feel very discouraged about this. However, a lot of people who did things in a more typical way are dealing with frequent night time accidents with their 3-, 4- and older children. It is what it is; we could find ourselves in that situation as well.
A General Discussion of Toilet Learning
Elimination Communication Gear
General Discussion of Diapering
Copyright 2006 by Rebecca Allen.
Created February 3, 2006 Updated February 22, 2007