"Must-Try" Tips for Potty Training

I’m  not sure I’ll ever tell my son this, but he had to be one of the hardest children to potty train that I have ever met! He resisted it every step of the way. There were tears and tantrums, fits and breakdowns. It took us months to get to the point that he was potty independent, but we pushed through.

Once I make a commitment to something, it’s pretty tough to talk me out of it, and if you’ve been following me for a while now, you probably know that “follow through” is one of my main mantras.

But what if your child’s been potty trained for months and just can’t seem to make it through the night?

Here are my five tips for nighttime success!

1.  Evaluate your expectations.

It seems that for some children, the moment they learn how to control their bladder during the day, it transfers to immediate nighttime success – but that scenario is rare. The truth for most children is that nighttime dryness takes weeks to months to follow suit. So the first thing to do is simply relax. It’s fine to keep your little one in nighttime pull-ups until she has a few days of successfully keeping them dry.

2.  Implement rewards.

If you feel like your child could use a little incentive to try to keep his pull-up dry (after two months of daytime success) then a reward chart can be a good place to start. One thing to keep in mind about rewards is that in order for them to be effective, the reward must come as immediately as possible. So, for example, if your little one wakes up with a dry pull-up, the reward would be given the moment he shows you his success.

3.  Monitor nighttime sleep hours.

Overtiredness can be the culprit for many things, including bedwetting. Have a good look at the number of nighttime hours of sleep your child is getting, and if it’s any less than 11, try adding to it. When a child is overtired, the body tends to sleep more heavily, which could be interfering with the body’s messages to the brain that would encourage a wake-up to use the toilet.

4.  Celebrate success.

Children love to please. Even if your little one manages to keep her pull-up dry just one night, that accomplishment deserves a celebration! Make a really big deal about her success by calling a favorite family relative or having a special celebration breakfast. Once she gets the hint that keeping the pull-up dry at night is a big deal to everyone around her, she will be more motivated to keep up the good work!

5.  Go diaper-free.

Occasionally children just take the easy way out, no matter how much coaxing and rewarding a parent does. For some children, staying dry at night is just not a priority, and they won’t do it even though they can.

So, if it’s been at least six months since your little one mastered daytime dryness, and you’ve tried the above suggestions many times over, then you may need to test your child by going diaper-free at night. Be ready to wake a few times in the first week to change sheets and PJs, and also put a plastic mattress cover on for protection.

Try it for two weeks. If you see your child moving in the direction of progress with more and more dry nights, then you know you are on the right track. If, however, there is little to no success, then trust that it’s more a matter of biology than stubbornness and go back to the pull-up for a few more months.

It’s never wise to punish a child for nighttime accidents. One in 10 school-aged children still has trouble controlling his bladder at night, so it’s more common than you’d think. It’s not your little one’s fault, and it’s just a matter of age and biological maturity before success comes.

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Plus you can get a pretty sweet discount on the whole system by using this link:

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