Email From Customer:

Narmin,

I thought your website was set up well. The only thing that caused me to look elsewhere before purchasing was that I was unable to easily determine your shipping costs. I prefer to have a general idea before placing items in the cart.

I find the potty on the go an essential. Your prices on the liners were better than other sites. This is my first time purchasing the piddle pad. I have been interested in for a while. It was a convenient purchase since I was ordering other items also.

I do have a few questions.

My son, Emmett, who will be three in January, appears to have all the readiness signs for Potty Training.

However, we had our third baby about 6 weeks ago. Emmett has done great with the adjustment. It was a minimal transition for us as a family. We have had lots of visitors, but have been able to maintain our normal routine. My concern, is that is always seems as if there is something that can come up, such as my husband traveling, that can delay potty training.

We were planning on preparing ourselves and him over the next few days. My husband was going to take Monday off and we were going to have the "Big Day" then. I would expect next week to be dedicated to follow up. On Sunday, less than a week from the "Big Day", my sister will be here visiting for a week and my husband will be traveling. The next week we will have family here, including my husband's parents for a week. Emmett just adores my sister and she is fantastic with him. I thought that her positive praise along with the grandparents would be helpful and encouraging. My sister has experience with potty training, is a teacher, and has a little boy of her own also. I was hoping to have him trained a solid month before going to school in February. Is this too much going on, or is it reasonable to think that he will benefit from the positive attention?

Thank you,

Kimberly

Our Response:

Kimberly,

Thank you for taking the time to respond. I really appreciate it.

I appreciate your feedback on shipping costs. I am that way as well when shopping online so when I read your email, it was a "duh" moment for me!! I will make sure it gets added to the website in the next few days!!

RE: Your son Emmett and transitions, from reading your email it sounds like you have a great home environment and are a fairly relaxed about being a parent and a new parent on top of it!! I don't think you will have much of an issue with it. My only other suggestion would be to glance through this article. I wrote it about a month ago and want to incorporate the details into the training guide, but have not done so yet!! The info on emotional and social awareness.

It sounds like you have a great home environment and Emmett has already adjusted to having a new sibling. Everything else you describe is more or less part of normal life for you, you don't view it as a big thing so I am sure Emmett does not view it as a major thing either. You would be surprised though because for some people having visitors, holidays and having company stay over is very stressful, so for them I would not recommend it. For you, it sounds like you take it in stride and this is life and it is actually fun, so I am sure your son sees it that way as well.

Also, giving yourself and Emmett a whole month is just great. If you follow the "Potty Train in One Day" process, you should be over the hurdles of accidents in a maximum of two weeks, this means that you have to follow through on the consequences.

I feel like I am going on and on, so I would say go ahead and do let me know how things go.

Have a great New Year.

Narmin

PS - I think that he will benefit from the positive attention. I just potty trained my friend’s son before the holidays and thru the holidays they slipped back a little i.e. put pull-ups on him when going shopping and to visit family and friends, so he regressed and started going in them instead of the potty. I was talking with her a couple of days ago and he was there. When she asked him if he wanted to speak with me ( loves to talk to me on the phone ) he said no. He said I in trouble with Narmin because I am not going in the potty!! He's been doing better ever since!!

Email From Customer:

Dear Narmin,

After many delays, We finally potty trained our 29 month old last week. She's doing great with the peeing, but is scared to have a bowel movement on the potty. Any suggestions???

Overall, I found your products very useful. I think that it would have been helpful to know what age your boys were, when you potty trained them. I know that each child is different, but it's nice to have some frame of reference.

Also, did your boys start staying dry through the night straight away, or did that come later? I think my daughter is staying dry at night, but when she's waking up in t he morning, she goes in bed without thinking about it. As you can see we still have a way to go!!! Any tips are much appreciated.

Blessings,

Simone Smith

Our Response:

Hello Simone,

I do mention that I potty trained my boys at the age of 30 months for the older one and 33 months for the younger one. I guess it is on the website, but not in the book. I will add that detail in when I update the book.

Regarding: Dry at night, my younger one (my little angel), has never wet his bed. He is too particular to do that!! - he is the little organized child, clean room, easy to raise!! My older son (my strong willed child!!) did wet his bed until the age of about 12. Initially, right after the potty training, he was wetting about once a week. I clearly remember one morning, (I was working outside the home then), I was ready for work. I came into his room to get him dressed for day care and found that he had wet his bed and my response was not again!! He of course heard me and was just as disappointed with himself and told me that maybe he is not a big boy and should start wearing diapers again. Made me realize how important it was to keep my feeling in check!! Since that day I just cleaned up and kept my frustration to myself.

Anyway, after that day it did not seem as frequently, however he did wet his bed on and off until about the age of 12. As he got older, the frequency went down significantly. In the last 5-8 years, it was once every 6 months. He is now 13 and the last time he wet the bed was probably over a year ago. I hope this was helpful.

The Dr. Greene website www.drgreene.org has great information on bed wetting. Type "bed wetting" in the search box and you will find excellent information on why they wet, for how long etc.

What is your daughter wearing through the night?

You are probably right, most of us (especially as we get older!!) go right after waking up, so if she wakes up and stays in bed for a few minutes, she probably goes in the bed.

My thoughts and suggestions on the subject:

1) Try and be there to wake her up so you can take her to the potty right away. Try and do this for a couple of weeks. Not only will this help her understand what she need to do, it will tell you if she is wetting at night or in the morning.

2) If she is wetting at night and is doing it more that once a week, use pull ups, the feel and learn kind. Give both of you a break for a few months. Then try underwear again to see if how she is doing through the night.

I hope this has been helpful to you. Let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Have a great day.

Narmin

Email From Customer:

Hi Narmin,

I got the doll, thank you. My daughter is 25 months old and she just gave up her night bottle last month. I was hesitant to introduce the doll, as it had a bottle. But when my daughter tried it out, she immediately focused on how to make the doll pee rather than it going potty, she was only interested in squeezing her leg!!! Anyway, she is doing great with potty training but I gave up the doll after she only focused on squeezing her leg. She goes potty all the time but she does not initiate it, I keep trying the "practice" but half the time during the 9 practice times, by the time we get to the third or fourth time she sits down on the potty and "has to pee". I am not sure what to do about that.

I have two suggestions for the doll:

1) Perhaps she should have a sippy cup vs. bottle.

2) I found the bottle leaks a lot, so that made the doll wet vs. her "peeing" in her pants.

Thanks again,

Janice

Our Response:

Hello Janice,

I am just curious - did you do the whole "Potty Train in One Day" method with the "Big Day" and all that goes with it?

Basically, if she is not initiating, then she has not connected all the dots. She has not made the connection between the feeling of having to go potty and then going to the potty.

Are you doing the practice runs after she has had an accident? If so, does she have a small accident, and then finishes on the potty? I guess I don't quite understand what is happening with her when you make her do the practice runs and when she goes on the potty after the 3rd or 4th time.

Based on my understanding from reading your email, is that your daughter has not made the connection between the feeling of wanting to go and going, so you have to help her make this connection. The sphincter muscle develops at the average age of 18 months, so most likely she already has the control. You can help her make the connection by talking with her and then also doing the practice runs after an accident, so hopefully, she realizes that she had a accident because she needed to go, but did not and should go in the potty instead of in the underwear.

I hope this is helpful. Let me know if this helps and if it doesn't, let me know what is going on and we can try and figure out what to do next.

Take care and have a great day. Please let me know how the suggestions work for you.

Narmin

Email From Customer:

I wrote you a week ago. My little girl has been training since last Monday. She is doing wonderful. She had 4 days of no mistakes, not even a mistake at night, she would stay dry all night long and pee in the morning on the chair. Yesterday and Today she has made some mistakes. Is it normal for her to regress a bit? Seemed like she had the concept down and now all of the sudden we are back to doing our practice runs. She hates to do the practice runs but we get all nine in.

Is there a way I can teach her to tell me she has to pee pee. She can say the word pee pee and ca ca and she understands when she has to go, but how can I teach her to tell me in time to take her to the potty? We have ventured out to stores and I just take her before we shop and after, but I want to teach her to tell me when she has to go.

Once again, thanks for this awesome product, I am recommending it to everyone I know who is ready to potty train :)

Jaimee

Our Response:

Hello Jaimee,

I am thrilled to hear that your daughter is doing so well. You must be so proud of her!! I cannot remember what you told me her age was, how old is she?

I am guessing that she has regressed because she is probably just testing you to see how serious you are about all this. We are asking these little guys for a big change. All this time they could play or do whatever they wanted and go potty at the same time, no problem. Now all of a sudden, we expect them to stop all that they are doing and go to the potty. Of course, this does interfere with their fun. I am glad to hear that you did do the practice runs. You have to reinforce that you are serious about this.

Re: Getting her to tell you, you just have to talk with her and tell her that she needs to tell you. If she is going on her own, than that is just great, but I see your point that you would want her to tell you when that she has to go, when you are out and about.

You are doing so well, just be patient and work on the other stuff with her. She sounds like she knows what she is doing and I am sure when you look back in a week or two, you will actually be surprised at how quickly she is going potty perfectly!!!

I hope this has been helpful. Please let me know if there are any other questions. I try my best, I don't always have all the answer either!!

Narmin

Email From Customer:

Narmin,