Six months has passed since we day trained Bella.  Six months.  Where did that time go? But they said that eventually, you wouldn’t think about the potty all day long and you know what, they’re right.  I haven’t thought about the potty for awhile.  It just happens when it needs to.

That’s all going to change tomorrow.  Tomorrow, I’m going to jump out of bed the second that Bella wanders into my room in the morning, and I’m going to take her to the bathroom.  I’m going to take off her nappy and tell her that we don’t wear nappies anymore, make her throw it in the bin, and we’re going to use the toilet for the rest of the day.  And the next day, and the one after that.

There are a few tests ahead for me.

The first is going in the car.  We struggled with car travel when we day trained.  Bella likes weeing in the carseat.  I have no idea why.  She’d go in the potty and five minutes later she somehow found some more wee for the car.  So I made my own life easier and introduced “travel undies” i.e. pull-ups.  It’s time to get rid of those.  We’re going to the toddler gym tomorrow, it’s a 15 minute drive, and she’s going in real undies.

I’m going to pack a lot of spare clothes.

Then, after we get home from the toddler gym, we’re going to race through lunch, have an hour of no liquids, use the potty and go down for a nap.  Again, in undies.  Bella’s frequently been dry during naptime so I’m hoping that that is fairly pain-free.  Her bed is loaded up with sheets on top of sheets and training pad protectors.

And then.  Then, she’ll wake up and oh my goodness I am going to give her water.  After a morning of setting her up for success in her undies, I intend to let the girl drink.  They say you want to build the bladder up, so she can learn to hold a reasonable amount of liquid.  So she will have her water, and then we’ll have dinner a touch earlier than usual, give her 1-1.5 hours without drinks, a good potty, and then to bed.

That’ll be the real test.  I’ve chosen to start this whole malarkey on a Friday night for a reason – so I’m not doing it alone.  We haven’t decided yet whether to wake her up for a wee when we go to bed, or whether to leave her alone with instructions to wake us up if she needs a wee.  I suspect we’ll go for the latter (especially if the day went well) and see what happens.

It’s scary, potty training.  I don’t know why it’s so scary, other than the mess, but perhaps it’s because our children are growing up and this is actually all on us to do right.  My baby won’t need nappies anymore.  What a crazy thought.  I want to do right by her, I want to keep things calm and easy and not upset her.  I hope it all goes well.