How do you transition them to go in public places and/or friends houses? Kaitlyn will go fine at home (minus the BM, we havn't gotten that far yet) but she will hold her urine for hours upon hours when were out only to wet herself when she can't hold it anymore, a lot of the times only 2 minutes after we left the restroom. Any advice?

By Trina~moderator on Tuesday, October 4, 2005 - 09:44 pm:

We kept a small potty seat in the van with tissues and large ziplock bags. Saved us MANY times when out in public. The kids often didn't want to use public toilets but would use the potty seat in the back of the van. I would line the potty with a large ziplock bag, they would go, use tissues to wipe, zip and then toss into the nearest trash can.

By Kaye on Tuesday, October 4, 2005 - 10:55 pm:

I just made it a point to go into lots of restrooms. If we went to the grocery store, we we go into the potty first. It just became habit and we were all waiting to go do something, not having to stop mid way. And a little reward and bribery doesn't hurt!

By Eve on Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - 10:22 am:

Ditto the potty seat in the car! (I would recommend the disposable potty liners though. They are great to just toss out! No clean up! They are a plastic type bag, but they have an absorbent liner, sort of like a pad and it absorbs all the pee! Love them! I still keep them in the car just in case.)

My DD was not fond of public toilets for the longest time. The large toilets, and loud flushing just scared her. I finally bought a folding portable seat to carry in my purse and I let her pick out stickers to decorate it with. We tried it out at home a few times and then we tried it in the public toilet and it worked! HTH

Folding Potty Seat

By Kittycat_26 on Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - 11:29 am:

I'm so glad I have a boy. We never had troulbe with using other toilets (other than porta pots). He's happy to stand up and pee in/on anything.

By Dawnk777 on Wednesday, October 5, 2005 - 07:24 pm:

My kids never had trouble with public potties. For a short while, after Sarah started using the bathroom, she got treats, if we were out in public, so she LOVED using public bathrooms, until the time we were at a gas station and no one had any change to buy her some candy. She was sooo mad, but that was also the end of the rewards that she really didn't need anymore, anyway.