Go Diaper Free with Ruthann Drummond, Certified Consultant & Coach

For the last 5 decades, the average age of potty training completion has been rising. Yes, this has to do with a deeply-instilled fear due to the success of the “wait for readiness” campaign. Yes, it has to do with social changes that have both parents working and with less available time to dedicate to things like potty training. Yes, it has to do with a more complicated lifestyle where we’re over-scheduled and under-rested. But there are some other more hidden aspects of our modern lives that can also hinder toilet learning, and that’s what I want to talk about today.

If you’ve seen vintage images of babies from a few generations ago, you may have noticed that both girls and boys were most often dressed in flowy gowns, which made for easy access to their cloth diapers or bare bottoms. What you may not have known is that those children, on average, completed their potty training by 18mths. In those days, as soon as you started to walk, you started to learn to use the potty. And the babies and parents were successful in this not only because they were confident in their abilities (since this was the social norm and expectation), but also because they were dressed in a way that made getting to the potty as easy as possible, removing an extra obstacle that can hinder the process.

As with anything we do, potty training, no matter what age we start it with our children, requires us (or, more accurately, our child) to dress for success! Now, I don’t mean little bow ties and cute dresses (although that would be adorable!), but rather the idea that if you want your child to succeed in their potty learning journey, you need to set both them and yourself up for the least possible hassle and fuss. This means easy on and off for quick trips to the potty or toilet, and for toddlers and older children it means clothing they can manipulate independently without trouble.

Let’s talk onesies for the younger set. Onesies are possibly the most commonly thought of baby clothing item. They’re small, easy to store and care for, not too expensive, and they don’t hike up in a car seat, stroller or carrier. They hide the diaper and look tidy under a cute pair of pants. All wins! So, what’s the issue? The snaps are the issue. Those snaps add one level of complexity – one more thing to fuss with – on the journey to the potty, and after not that long it can feel quite cumbersome to undo and redo them several times a day. It can end up being a deterrent strong enough that you just don’t want to bother doing it. Not exactly a recipe for success.

If you are practicing Elimination Communication with your baby for the first time and are already feeling a little overwhelmed by the process (or even if you’re not!), ditch the onesies! T-shirts, diaper and legwarmers are a warm and practical way to dress. This way, all you have to do is remove the diaper. There are no extra steps! If you’re going out, leave off the legwarmers and go with pants instead, but quickly yanking off the pants and having access to the diaper is still going to be easier than fussing with the snaps of a onesie once the pants are off.

For toddlers who are just beginning to learn about manipulating clothing, and for preschoolers who can manipulate some clothing, dressing for success means dressing for the easiest, least-frustrating pants on/off scenario possible (at least until they have toileting mastered and need a new skill to conquer). This means no overalls, no onesies (they come in sizes up to 24mth now!), no tight or stiff jeans, and no snaps, buttons, or zippers that need fidgeting. It even means no drawstrings (that require tying). You’re looking for comfortable, pull-on track pants, joggers, or looser leggings that will slide down easily without having to undo anything, slide down low enough to not impede sitting position, and slide back easily with nothing to have to do up.

If you are trying or intending to night train your child, all of this applies to nighttime, too. One-piece sleepers are cute and warm, but difficult to get off quickly for a parent and almost impossible for a child who is just learning to use the potty. Two-piece pajamas are absolutely a more practical choice for toilet learning – at any age.

If you’ve ever struggled to get a toddler or preschooler in the toilet learning process to the potty in time, you know how important a couple of extra seconds can be. Dressing for ease in toileting will help you and your child to achieve potty success!

Elimination Communication, Potty Independence, Potty Training

Is EC A Lot Of Work?

January 20, 2019 ruthanndrummond

This is a common question I get. Isn’t practicing Elimination Communication really hard? Doesn’t it take a lot of time? Isn’t it exhausting? Doesn’t your whole life then revolve around your baby’s toileting needs?

First off, EC isn’t hard, parenting is! EC is just another tool in the parenting repertoire. It’s goal is to enhance the communication between parents and babies 0-18mth, specifically around toileting needs, but this enhanced communication and attentiveness tends to pour over into other interactions, and ECing parents often feel more attuned to their babies because of it. Being more in sync with your baby actually makes parenting a lot easier, in both the short and long term! Are there frustrating times when you practice EC? Yes. Will it always make sense? Nope. But once you establish an EC practice in your home and it becomes normalized as part of your life, it’s not hard, it’s just routine. And in the long run, it’s a routine that makes your life much easier!

In terms of the amount of time it takes, or the “extra work” it is, that’s all a matter of perspective. Does it take a lot of time to take a baby to the potty several times a day? Perhaps. But so does changing that same baby’s poopy diaper, and I can guarantee a potty success is more fun for both of you! Does an EC family spend more time doing toileting-related things? In the short-term, absolutely. But that same family is much less likely to be changing the diapers of their 3 year old when the time comes. They are also less likely to experience power struggles over potty training that can be emotionally taxing on everyone. And they are much more likely to have a toilet independent child between the ages of 18mth and 2.5years, eliminating a tonne of diaper waste, and/or drastically reducing the laundry for cloth diapers. When people tell me that they couldn’t even think about EC because it seems like so much work, my response is to say that I couldn’t think of having to change diapers on an older toddler or preschooler and going through a later-age potty training process because that THAT seems like a lot of work and completely exhausting. Give me a toddler out of diapers and an organic path to toilet independence without power struggles any day!

All parents do a lot of work. All parents do a lot of work surrounding toileting. It’s how we distribute that work that is different. All it is, is a shift in perspective.

Those who believe that EC takes over your life, and all you ever do is think about pottying are mistaken. EC can be practiced full-time, part-time or even casually, and the process is beneficial no matter which path you choose. In fact, it is often the case that families practicing part-time have toddlers out of diapers sooner than those practicing full-time, because they tend to give their kids more room to breathe in the process, which removes any [unintended] pressures. EC also doesn’t mean you have naked babies all the time who pee on the floor. Diaper free time every day has been shown to be beneficial to all babies, but ECing families almost always use a backup of some kind, and usually that’s a diaper. EC isn’t reserved for crazy people or toileting extremists – almost anyone can practice it within their life context without it becoming overwhelming, weird, or unsanitary!

Potty Independence, Potty Training, Uncategorized

Is Early Potty Training Harder Than Waiting Until A Child Is Older?

January 2, 2019January 2, 2019 ruthanndrummond

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No. In fact, there is much evidence to indicate that it is easiest to potty train a child between the ages of 18 and 29 months. Around 2.5 years, there is a developmental shift that brings about new testing behaviours and it is much easier to fall into difficult power struggles that can derail the process. By potty training your child as a toddler, rather than a preschooler, you avoid a lot of this complication and establish toileting as a regular part of their day and a simple matter of course.

Parents build up potty training as something to be feared. They are afraid that it will take a lot of time and be a lot of work. They are afraid of accidents, especially while out and about. They are afraid they will fail and stunt their child’s toileting journey.

Potty training DOES take time and IS a lot of work, but that doesn’t change whether you start it at 18 months or at 3 years. The process requires dedication and focus from parents, no matter the age you’re starting from. All it does is change the amount of time you will be changing your toddler or preschooler’s diapers. And THAT is a lot of work!

Accidents WILL happen. It doesn’t matter if you have a non-verbal toddler or a fully conversational preschooler. Learning to identify bodily signals when you have been used to using a diaper as an instant toilet takes practice, and it’s a learning curve no matter how old you are or how honed your communication skills are. Some parents think they can wait until 4 years old and it will be easy because their child will just know what to do. In reality, older children are even further removed from an understanding of their bodily functions – their learning curve is steep and their habits are more entrenched.

Will your child have accidents? Yes. Is it something to be feared? No, it is not. Young children aren’t old enough to be embarrassed by them, and anyone who has any experience with children won’t even give you a second glance. The key is to be prepared. Rather than traveling with diapers, you will be traveling with changes of clothes at the ready. It’s a small shift in preparedness, that’s all.

Can you derail your child’s toileting journey if you start when they’re young? Well, yes. Do you have to? No, absolutely not. Parents are their child’s most important teachers and leaders in the potty training process, but they are also very capable of projecting their own stresses and fears on their children. If you are stressed about potty training, so will your child be. If you don’t believe that your toddler is “ready” to potty train, they won’t believe they are ready either. If, however, you have confidence in your child and your ability to guide them, you can move them toward toilet independence at a very early age. It just takes dedication, focus, and a belief in your and your child’s abilities. Toilet independence is just around the corner. Your child is ready now. Are you?

Elimination Communication, Potty Training

Our 18mth Old Is Potty Trained!

December 14, 2018 ruthanndrummond

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Our 18mth old is now potty trained! I wanted to share my story, to help other families feel confident in their early potty training, too.

First, some back story: I practiced Elimination Communication with both of my kids from the first couple weeks of life. Since they were newborn, they have been used to peeing and pooping while sitting on or being held over potties and toilets – at least some of the time.

With our first, we practiced focused EC part-time, tuning into our child’s toileting needs while still having him in a diaper backup, and making a conscious choice to rely on a diaper in certain situations (i.e. when in music class, on car trips, in snowsuits, etc.). He took to EC very well from the start and would sit on the potty happily for long periods of time, which increased his catches. By 11mths, he naturally stopped pooping anywhere other than the potty, and would never poop when out and about. Because of this, by 14mths I decided we would ditch daytime diapers and work on getting him more consistent with pees. This ended up being a long road, possibly because we used cloth training pants which may have slowed down his learning, and more probably because our lives got busier around that time, and we didn’t have as much focus on the process. At 19.5mths, he was still not consistent with his pees, so I planned to “finish up” his EC with a potty training experience and picked a date for 3 weeks later. But 2 weeks after that, something just “clicked” for him, and everything started falling into place. He was potty trained at 21mths.

The experience with our second has been very different (as it always is!). We started off with great success as an infant, and were very excited about how his process was going, especially since our focus and time was now split between two little people. And then, at 8.5mths, he learned to crawl. He is a very, VERY active and inquisitive boy, who was excited by his new-found mobility and was NOT willing to sit still on the potty to wait for a pee or poop, as our first had been. There were places to go, things to explore, stuff to climb! Our catches plummeted, and rather than being a typical potty pause of 3-14 days, he just wasn’t coming out of this phase. 11mths came and passed and there was still no sign of less poops in diapers. 14 mths came and passed and still there was little progress. At 16mths, I felt diaper exhausted (this was 7 mths longer than my first used diapers already!), and also discouraged by his whole toilet learning journey. We felt drained and unable to put the energy into his EC practice when we weren’t seeing results, and EC became a pretty casual thing that we were doing daily, but with way less focus. He was still learning important steps, like mounting a potty on his own, but using one was a different matter. I decided that we needed to regroup and refocus, and that this time we would go for it and pick a date for a potty training experience weekend to help things to “click.” That weekend was last weekend, and at 18mths old, our second child is potty trained!

As an EC and potty training consultant & coach, I am really excited by this, because now I’ve personally experienced success happen both organically when an EC practice is really solid, and also with a preemptive potty training “finish up,” when EC was a little more nebulous. And while I have coached families through potty training their children, it was an illuminating experience to do it with my own. I am proud of our accomplishments, and excited about my new insights and confidence in how these processes can work (both separately and together) to help our children reach potty independence sooner!

Elimination Communication, Potty Independence, Potty Training

Is There a “Right” Time to Potty Train?

December 1, 2018December 1, 2018 ruthanndrummond

Just as there is never a perfect time to get married, or the perfect time to have a baby, you may never feel like there is a perfect time to potty train.

Our cultural messaging leads us to be apprehensive of the potty training process to begin with (I’ve written about that, here). We fear doing it the “wrong” way, and sabotaging the process. We fear pressuring our kids or causing them any kind of trauma or damage. We worry our kids aren’t “ready.” We dread others’ opinions and advice (Don’t leave it too late!; don’t push it too early!) Add in our complicated lives, our over-extended schedules, and our constant connectedness through technology, and it’s no wonder parents are putting off potty training until later and later with each passing year.

So, when is the “right” time to start your child’s journey to potty independence? The interesting thing is that the answer depends entirely on you, and not your child.

Your child is ready to begin their journey now, no matter their age or abilities. For young babies, this will likely be through Elimination Communication to start, but toddlers as young as 18 months (and in some cases, younger) are fully capable of potty training. It doesn’t matter if they “show interest.” It doesn’t matter if they can “sing the ABC song.” It doesn’t matter if they can verbalize at all.

In just 2 generations, Western culture has forgotten its entire history of successfully potty training children by 18mth of age, but this is actually still the norm throughout most of the world. Read about the Myth of Readiness, if you are interested in this topic.

So, if our children are ready, what’s stopping us from doing this right now? Well, we are – the parents. It’s our stress, our worry, our investment in keeping every scheduled activity under the sun, our fear of failure and our lack of confidence and clear purpose in the process. Successful potty training requires dedication and focus, and an attitude shift that prioritizes your child’s toilet learning over other things in your life… for a very short time. In reality, it’s a tiny blip in your relationship with your child, that will give the gift of toilet independence for life.

If you are waiting for the perfect time to potty train, it may never come. You, the parent, have to make it the right time to potty train. You have to decide that teaching your child to take care of their personal hygiene needs, ditching the mess and waste (not to mention, expense!) of diapers, and completing this important right of passage is important enough to you and your child that you will make it a priority. You, the parent, have to let go of any stresses that are holding you back. You, the parent, have to proceed with clarity and confidence, becoming a teacher and guide for your child.

So, when should you start? The earlier the better, as long as you can wrap your head around the importance of the task and the commitment it requires. A casual attitude from the parent will result in a casual attitude from the child. You can have the same success in 12 days as you would have in 12 months – all without causing any damage to your child or using any coercive methods. It’s all in the attitude with which you approach it!

Give yourself permission to trust in your child’s ability as a learner, and in you as a teacher. Give yourself permission to prioritize this process for a short time, even if it clashes with your scheduled activities. Give yourself permission to take the process seriously, and to set clear boundaries for your child so they can take it seriously, too. Toddlers feel more secure and freer to explore within known limits and established expectations – give them the gift of that security. And once you’ve wrapped your head around all of that… go for it. Begin now!

Now, is the right time to start!