The scoop on potty training outside of the house.
As your child approaches two, every parent is faced with potty training. And there is advice EVERYWHERE! Some good and some bad.
One of the things people don’t talk about though, is how to leave the prison of your home when potty training and for the months that follow. As if going places is nonessential.
Reality doesn’t work that way though, at least not my life.
Once the basics were established (about 2 weeks in) I knew we needed to get out of the house. But how? Children do not use the potty when you need them too (like right before you leave the house).
Eventually you have to get on with life, and the inevitable day will arrive when you must take your toddler into a public bathroom.
Even writing this now, I cringe.
You rush through the store or restaurant, enter the stall, and remind your child for the 60th time in the last-minute not to touch anything. Then, you see this tiny person standing next to, what you never before realized, is a giant toilet.
I am serious.
In our adult view, a toilet looks like, well, a toilet. But when you look at it from a toddler’s perspective, it is frightening. It is high off the ground and has a big hole in the middle, through which this little person could easily fall. Also, there are the common bathroom noises: people talking, toilets flushing, and hand dryers running. Public bathrooms are actually super scary places and no toddler (or mine at least) will use them, no matter how bad she has to go.
The solution- a potty in the car.
That’s right. I’ve realized that it is not something that is talked about, but it is something that is done all the time. And I am here to tell you, it works. Need to go? Step outside, easy peasy, no frightened toddler, and no wet pants. We can stay out and about with no problem.
I do have a station wagon, so I have plenty of space for an on-the-go potty, but I have taken it along in others’ cars. We have pottied in the middle aisle of a minivan, the cargo space of a hatchback, and the trunk of a sedan. It can be done.
So here it is parents, to get the poop in the potty and out of the pants, put a potty in the car.
You’ll be so glad you did.
Recommended Gear:
- Small, easy to carry and clean potty
- Toilet Paper
- Baby Wipes
- Dog Poop Bags
- Books (for them)
- Magazines (for you)
- Hand sanitizer
Good luck out there. You can do it and they can too!
Special thanks to Daniel Lobo for the Potty Training Illustrated photo and to Celine Nadeau for the Public Potty photo!
Toddler vs. Parent 