I really thought potty training was going to be the end of me. If there ever was an end. And then everyone said the next child would be easier. And it was… by four months.

To make it perfectly clear, it took me sixteen months to potty train my first one and twelve months to potty train the second.

The end of me.

In retrospect, it was mostly my fault. My girls would have “got it” much faster if I hadn’t botched it so royally.

For fun I thought I’d put together a list of what NOT to do when potty training. Some may apply to you; some may only apply to me and my crazy mind. Either way, I hope you enjoy, don’t take it too seriously, and most of all, don’t spend twenty-eight months of your life potty training.

1. Don’t let your child sit on the potty too long. The point is for them to learn to go when they need to; not to have “the bathroom experience” by rule of probability and statistics.

2. Don’t think that treats will train your child to go. I’m not saying don’t give them; but at least for mine, there was no connection between a reward for going and actually mastering the skill of well, you know… going.

3. Don’t switch back and forth between big kid undies and pull-ups. Of all the mistakes I made, I think this was the biggest. I am now a huge fan of going cold turkey.

4. Don’t think that buying a potty book at Barnes and Noble will aid the process either. And it gets really uncomfortable when it becomes your child’s favorite book and everyone who enters the house gets asked to read it.

5. Don’t frantically search Internet sites and help books regarding potty training. I found that most of them either said the same things or were too philosophical to actually be helpful regarding a toddler.

6. Don’t begin to wonder about your qualifications to parent if potty training is a little rough. Most people work their way through it in one fashion or another and you probably won’t be the exception.

Helpful?

If you’re really being tried, just remember there’s someone out there who messed everything up completely and somehow through it all daily gets to hear, “Mommy, I need to go potty.”

Blessed words.