Hey Mom's! We need your help!
Increasingly over the past two weeks, our adorable almost three year old twins have discovered a new talent. Nearly every morning, every afternoon (after nap), and every evening (before we go to bed), we find these two adorable almost three year old kids NAKED in their rooms. Occasionally they just slip off a shirt or pants, but usually, its everything right down to their bare bottoms. The problem here is obvious, the question here is what should we do? We've gotten really upset and yelled, we've shaken our fingers in their faces, we've tried calmly explaining, we've tried putting their clothes on backwards (zippered PJs mostly), we've tried being very sad, very disappointed, I think we have tried everything... HELP! I am so tired of washing sheets every day since I don't really know how much pee pee is in them. Sometimes we catch the clothing removal early, but usually its been an hour or more before we discover it.
In case you're wondering, potty training continues to be a non event. The kids know what the potty is, what it is for, and how to use it. They don't ask to sit on it, they don't tell us when they are wet, and seem perfectly content having yuck diapers. They have Big girl and boy underpants, but seem completely unmotivated by it. They sit on the potty for "colors" (m&ms), but generally don't sit long enough to actually do anything nor do they sit there when they really have anything to do. Jon has learned to recognize some of Livi's poop cues, but I don't see them. Since I am at home with them the most, it's not really helpful to have Jon know even just one. They typically poop when they are sleeping, be it napping or at night.
So... ADVICE???? I feel like the removal of the clothing is a cue that they don't want to wear diapers, but I also feel like they don't want to potty train. So any recommendations? Anyone survive this? How long did it last for you? What did you do about it?
Jon and I are both loosing our patience, any advice is welcomed.
Us
Wife, Parent, Nurse; my life raw and real, as I see it.
3 comments:
put their footie pajama's on BACKWARDS!!! (you can cut the neck to make it more roomy in the back if you need to, but put them on backwards and twist the legs to make the feet work, you can also cut just the bottoms of the feet outand put socks on. Also, if they learn to help eachother, you can put a safety pin through the end of the zipper pull and pin it to the neckline of their pj's.
ok, sorry, you already tried that. I was tired, and kids were crazy, pin the zipper up. also, with two peice jammies you can pin the top to the pants. For naps and night time, they can wear snug onsies that snap only at the crotch and you can pin that too.
They only get colors if they sit on the poty for until the timer goes off (two to three minutes). They get a color for every time they go in the potty (two if the trip is productive) and if they go for a whole DAY dry, they can have icecream or whatever extra special treat will motivate them to work REALLY REALLY hard to stay dry (current trick for my DFD, if she goes poop in the toilet she gets icecream (breakfast, lunch, dinner, or anytime in before/between) if she poops in the toilet, we stop what ever we are doing and go directly to the icecream whether at home or stopping by McDonald's -she has severe toileting trauma or something, HATES poop).
Rather than pull-ups, I like to put her in training pants with the padded diaper and vinyl cover. They leak more than pull ups, but no where near as bad as regular big kid underwear. Also, not as many choices, pink or blue at walmart, but the covers match.
Don't fool yourself, the removal of clothing is a sign of learning independence and autonomy, and developing the skill of getting (un)dressed... If they were fully potty trained, they'd still be stripping. It's just what you called it, "a new talent"
We're still working on potty training, I don't remember how long it took me to train my sibs, I think a couple months for one and then the other about nine months, she DID NOT like the toilet... DFD is a tougher case, she'll have days when she feels like a beg girl, she'll ask for panties and usually go a long time dry, when she's feeling insecure or like there is any chaos, NOT A CHANCE.
Julie,
Try the book, "Potty training in less than one day". I do not remember the author but a bookstore should be able to tell you who wrote it. I never had my children take their clothes off so I can't help you with that. Praise,Praise, Praise everytime they sit on the potty and even more when they do something on it. Peeing will come first, but the poop thing that is Freudian, they do not want to give that up. I had kids pooping everywhere for a while except in the toilet.
Linda
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