I just have to rave for a minute about an awesome product I stumbled across called the Looster Booster. In a nutshell, it’s a stool that sort of wraps around the bottom of the toilet to help little ones reach the seat safely. Honestly, I can’t believe I didn’t think of this! It would have been perfect for our 3rd child, Emily, who was always so tiny she almost fell into the potty every time she climbed up. She was afraid and I always had to be right there with her to help her up and down.
Caleb showed interest in using the potty about 2 months before his 2nd birthday. I encouraged him and let him try it, but eventually he was fearful and refused to even look at the toilet, let alone use it! He even seemed terrified to sit on his little plastic potty, and would push it away whenever I got it out of the closet. I believed it would be a LONG road to getting his tushie on that seat and out of diapers!
Then I read about the Looster Booster. I was worried it would take up a ton of space in our little home and I kept telling myself that I successfully potty trained 3 children already, why did we need this? I’m so glad I ignored myself. After I bought it, I put it in the bathroom and showed him how easy it was to climb up and sit. He wasn’t too thrilled and for a few months it just sat there, taking up space in the tiny bathroom. I stopped talking about the potty situation completely and decided I would allow it to be on his terms – what was the rush anyway? About a month ago, I casually asked him if he’d like to use the potty before bedtime and to my surprise he jumped up and said, “Yes!” He climbed right up there all by himself and went.
The next day I just let him run around naked and after a morning full of accidents, he got the hang of it. I’d be working in the kitchen or nursing the baby and I’d hear him run into the bathroom, climb up on the Looster Booster, sit and use the potty – all by himself! I honestly believe the autonomy this stool gave him was the reason he potty trained so easily. He feels like such a big boy that he can do it without any help from me. Anyone who has every been through the potty training process knows that little ones think they need to go, yet as soon as they get on the potty they don’t have to go anymore. They sit forever or not long enough, meanwhile we’re running and lifting and bribing and screaming our way through it all. With this stool, that drill is history! Caleb literally climbs up, sits for a second, realizes he’s not ready, hops down, runs around, etc. until he goes. This process would be a nightmare without the Looster and we’d both end up frustrated and exhausted each time he’d have to perform this ritual.
Less than a week after he started using the potty we traveled to Canada to visit family and we had to leave the Looster at home. It was definitely missed and I can’t tell you how happy I am to be home where Caleb can do his thing without all the fuss. This is a great product – one that I wish I would have had in the early years of trying to figure out how to potty train my brood. Here’s a link to their website: http://www.littlelooster.com/