Like with everything we have encountered in these two+ years of parenting, there are a million ways to potty-train your child, and I don’t believe there is a “right way.” There’s just the way that works for your sister, and your best friend, and your neighbor’s babysitter, and your uncle’s step-daughter … but ultimately what matters is what works for YOU, the parent(s)/child team.

As I have mentioned here before, we’ve taken the long, slow progressive route to potty-training. Some people have told me this isn’t the way to go, but I whole-heartedly disagree. Maya has been sitting on the potty every night before her bath since she was 18 months old. It took her a good two months to get what she was sitting there to do (meaning, she peed) … but she had been showing plenty of “ready” signs … deep curiosity of the bathroom and the potty itself; alerting us when she was going to the bathroom; and she was able to undress herself (to some extent). Given these things, I felt confident in trying and just seeing where it went. And it worked.

The past few months, she has had great success with peeing on the potty, and recently has taken to pooping on the potty, too. She’s even peed at school a couple times now — including three times in one day!!! (This BLEW my mind!)

Maya is fiercely independent, and I think that’s why she has taken to potty-training pretty well. Lately, she has had 100% success in the mornings and evenings. In fact, she is now telling me when she wakes up that she wants to use the potty! I kvell! Our dilemma is that we are leaving for vacation in a couple weeks and so I am hesitant to push her (having heard about potential regression) but she is doing so well it’s hard to not want to capitalize on it …

Still, until we get back from vacation, I think we’ll just keep going with this casual, laid-back approach … which actually seems to be working counter-intuitively. In other words, the more casual we are about it, the more she seems to want to do it! (Miss Independent). And the cool thing is we can listen for her verbal and nonverbal cues to encourage her and cheer her on. And let’s be honest … like her mama, she’ll do anything for an “L&M” (how she says “M&M”). 😉