Potty Training Hayden

After much deliberation, we've decided to work at potty training Hayden. I know he is ready to be more in control of his "output." However, I've feared it will be a long process since Hayden is the kind of kid who seeks out ways to be wet, dirty, and sticky. I worried that having wet or dirty underwear wouldn't be motivation enough to use the toilet when needed. But Hayden has to learn sometime, and I figured it will never be easy so I might as well try now. So two weeks ago, I put Hayden in underwear and we had a conversation that went something like this:


Me: Hayden, it feels good to keep your underwear clean and dry like big boys do. To keep your underwear dry you need to put your pee in the potty. So what are you going to do if you are playing and it feels like some pee needs to come out?


Hayden: I'm just going to keep playing.


And that's what he did. In fact, within an hour of wearing undies he actually pooped in his pants. I know this is to be expected, but seriously, it's a pain to clean up poopy underwear. At that point Hayden said he wanted to wear a diaper anyway, and quite honestly I was relieved,


After taking several days to recover from the trauma of the poopy underwear, I decided I really need to give this potty training thing a good effort before we move to our new house in a few weeks. Mainly because I would rather have Hayden's accidents happen on the nasty floors in our rental house than on our brand new carpet in the new house. So we made potty training irresistable for Hayden...


... by offering candy rewards when he uses the potty. On the one hand, I'm disgusted because I can just picture all that sugar just sitting on Hayden's teeth (though we've been brushing more often since the candy rewards began). But at the same time, it's working! Hayden is making great progress, much more than I expected so far. It's going to take some time for him to become proficient, but I'm so pleased with how well he is doing. GOOD JOB, HAYDEN!


ps. Here are a few pics to show you why I didn't think Hayden would be interested in keeping himself "clean and dry."