Potty training our twins was not something that I was particularly looking forward to. It sounded like such a daunting task, and being a first-time mom, I had no idea what to expect from my girls. I had some limited experience with a few toddlers I had babysat over the years, but figured I could mostly wing it with my own girls, which made for some interesting learning curves!
Looking back, there were a few things we could have done differently, and throughout the process we had a few set-backs…but nevertheless, here’s the story of what happened. In the end they both got potty-trained, and that’s what counts, right?
Our Twin Potty Training Story
When the girls were around 18 months we decided to introduce the potty training paraphernalia by buying two matching potties and some big girl panties. We put the potties in the bathroom and let them play with them, and sit on them while reading stories. Often they would just join me in the bathroom when I was in there and we would all sit together.
Afterwards we started implementing scheduled potty sitting times, where we would take them to sit on the potties without their diapers after naps, before bed, or whenever we would normally be changing their diapers anyway, such as in the morning when they woke up. Sometimes they would actually pee and then we would do a little cheer and happy dance, which they thought was the greatest.
After that we started changing their diapers in the bathroom all the time instead of on the change station in their room. We got them excited about putting their poops in the toilet and flushing them down even though it was quite a while before they actually pooed in the potties themselves. All of this helped them to associate what was in their diapers with where it should go.
When they were about 19 months, I did a one-day thing with bare bums where the potties were set in the main living area, but after a morning by myself with them, I was feeling pretty stressed out by all the accidents, even though I made light of it and just got them to help clean it up, saying, “Uh oh! Pee goes in the potty, lets clean it up!”
It was a bit of a disaster. So we took a break from that and just kept up with the bathroom routine part instead.
By 27 months they started taking off their diapers when they had peed in them, and putting them in the garbage can. They were starting to be able to pull their pants down themselves as well. I took this as a good sign that they were starting to actually be ready for potty training.
Twin B
That’s when Ellie (Twin B) started telling me when she had to go, so we would quickly run to the bathroom, take off her diaper, and cheer if she went. Once she was at that stage of having mostly dry diapers during the day, I happened to take them to my mom’s place for a sleepover.
My mom gave her a chocolate chip when she peed on the potty there, so then for her whole visit she only went on the potty! Mom let her go bare bum the rest of the time, so she didn’t use a diaper at all -other than naps and bedtime. She came home after two days and was good to go.
After this big accomplishment on her part, I kept encouraging her to just wear her diaper for naps and nighttime, and when we would go out in the car, or for a long walk outside in the stroller. She would wear just her pants (loose fitting pj’s, shorts, bloomer-type panties, or just a dress) during the day and when she would have an accident, she reeeeally hated the feeling of wetting herself. She very quickly caught on that she needed to get to the bathroom asap.
If I tried putting panties on she would have more accidents, felt like a diaper to her, perhaps. Once she was around 2.5 we got some cute Hello Kitty pull-ups for nap time and car rides. Right now she just turned 3, and still wears her pull-ups for naps, nighttime, and longer car rides. Currently we are working on wearing panties under her pants …for whatever reason, she still doesn’t like wearing them.
Twin A
Alisha on the other hand (twin A), was very fascinated with the panties I bought them back when we first bought the potties, and she would try them on all the time for fun (sometimes all 6 pairs at the same time, and often on her head!), but if she was buck naked or only had loose pj pants on, she would still pee wherever she was. She was not bothered by it at all, and so, to save my sanity, I just kept her in diapers for awhile longer, even though her sister wasn’t.
She would sometimes wear pull-ups during the day, especially if her sister was putting them on for a car ride or whatever, but she was pretty attached to her diapers, especially for night time and naps.
I was okay with this, though, because when the girls would wake up in the night from peeing in their diaper (and twin A woke up every.single.time), then changing a diaper in the dead of night, in a dark room half-asleep, was way easier than putting on a pull-up . With a pull-up you have to take all the jammies off, just to put a fresh one on, as opposed to simply switching out a diaper (which I’d been doing in my sleep since they were born).
So the diapers stayed around for that reason, and admittedly, slowed down progress with Twin A, but once she was ready at 31 months (4 months after her sister), she just started taking her diaper off during the day, and going pee and poo on the potty.
By this time, her sister was going on the toilet with the toddler ring (soooo much easier for poops, rather than wiping poo out of a pot), so she just hopped on there too, and though she had more accidents than her sister had, she still ran to the bathroom for most of it. She was still excited about big girl panties, and since by this time they were getting dressed themselves, she had fun picking out her panties and pants for the day, and getting dressed all by herself.
Where we’re at now
About 4 months after twin A had joined the big girl world, she had a regression (mostly my fault) and went through a month of wanting to wear her diapers again (this past month of January). So I stopped buying the diapers altogether (since they were finally sleeping better at night due to not waking up from every little pee anymore) but she still insisted on wearing her pull-ups all the time.
Recently (the beginning of March) I finally had the energy to tell her that she could go on the potty and that pull-ups were for sleeping only, and actually enforce it (for the most part).
At this stage I found it was easier for me to just leave them both in pull-ups all day, because they would take off their own wet pull-up, put them in the garbage, and put on a new one by themselves. No messes in the bathroom for me, no potty pots getting dumped into the toilet themselves.
It was autopilot, and in my state of grief after my brother’s passing, it was what worked for me. So the all-day pull-up wearing regression was definitely my doing, but when you’re in survival mode it just doesn’t matter.
Ideally though, they would have been done with the pull-ups during the day, and all I would have had to do was remind them every now and then to go pee, or have little pee breaks from playtime where we all go together, to keep the accidents at bay. But I spent most of my days post-funeral in a hazy fog of grief just trying to keep everyone fed and clothed and alive.
Priorities.
So now the next step is night-time training! Which at this point they are not ready for because they still soak their pull-ups entirely every night. So we’ll save that for a later date..
In the end, potty training ended up being very much like sleep training, which I optimistically thought would only take a few days, but in reality took months, due to setbacks and regressions and sickness and all that lovely stuff!
The truth is, it’s something you just need to be consistent with, and each twin will go at their own pace. It’s not something that happens overnight…and even if you do get potty training down in record time, then does that mean night trained as well? In the car? Travelling long distances? Probably not. Most toddlers can only master one step at a time, rarely all at once.
So don’t be too hard on yourself if potty training twins doesn’t go how you thought it would. Sometimes unexpected things come up in life, and your potty training doesn’t go as planned. That’s when you just have to go with the flow…;)
