Goodbye to Overnight Diapers

Grandma’s potty training tip for the day is to hold on to your baby overnight diapers for several months until your child is completing toilet trained.  Potty training toddlers is never a “breeze”, so using baby overnight diapers are still recommended while your child is still getting used to using the toilet. Potty training girls may be a bit easier than training little boys, but still, the same emotional effort and energy for both can be daunting, especially to the new mother. When I say, easier, I am referring to the obvious; with girls, there is no target practice – ready, aim, fire – and there goes another blouse into the hamper. Well, I guess you get the picture. In the meantime, for either girl or boy, it’s best to ease children into toilet training by giving them some sort of security, i.e. the diaper at night.

The subject of baby potty training was not one I was particularly enthusiastic. The first question was not whether she was ready, but was I ready to start to train her. I wondered if she would understand what the big fuss was all about, after all, it seemed only months earlier that she began to understand that she was a good girl for lying still while I changed her diapers. Potty training my girl meant that I was faced with having to undo the all the emphasis I put into diaper changing and try to explain to her that diapers were no longer acceptable – at least during the day! Wearing baby overnight diapers while your child is still in the early stages of potty training will give your son or daughter an added security, as well as take away any thoughts of failure, should he or she wet the diaper at night.As I learned with my daughter, most children will know when they are ready to sleep without baby overnight diapers. With a little bit of coaxing, she came to me when she was ready to become potty trained, especially after showing her how easy it was, now that she was becoming a big girl. I figured something would click, and that she would want to be like Mommy, and sit on the toilet, but at first, placing her onto a high seat potty seat frightened her. There was nothing for her to hold onto, like the tray of her high chair. At times I thought it would be much simpler just change her diapers, but I knew that she was ready to start toilet training. Sure, at times, it was a messy ordeal, but after a lot of practice, I had the routine down pretty well.

While I finally decided it was time to buy a potty chair, for my daughter,  I still kept her  overnight diapers until she was completely potty trained.  I chose a potty chair  that she could sit on without needing my assistance to lift her up. After a little bit of time went by, she actually enjoyed showing me how she could use her potty all by herself. I can happily say now, that potty training toddlers – girls or boys is a stage that mothers should not fear. Your child will eventually find pleasure in showing you how capable and grown-up they are, and you too will find gratification in knowing you too passed another challenging stage of motherhood.

Written by Brenne Meirowitz, BA, MA, MS