Confessions of a Toilet Whisperer: A Modern Parent’s Guide to Understanding Toilet Learning. Holistic. Practical. Philosophical.

By Sharon Murdock

Are you struggling to navigate the daunting process of potty training? Do you feel confused by too many conflicting sources of potty training advice? Have you attempted potty training and ended up feeling frustrated and discouraged?

 

You are not alone. Begin a Google search with "why is potty training…" and it autocompletes with:

why is potty training so difficult?

why is potty training so stressful?

why is potty training so frustrating?

why is potty training not working?

 

Understanding how to approach potty training, or toilet learning, is one of the biggest challenges that today's parents face. In Confessions of a Toilet Whisperer: A Modern Parent's Guide to Understanding Toilet Learning, Sharon's insightful perspective will help parents understand and navigate this natural life transition.

 

Confessions of a Toilet Whisperer is filled with practical advice, including detailed logistical tips, innovative language strategies and fresh perspectives on gaining cooperation and overcoming hesitancy during toilet learning. Sharon's detailed roadmap will set the stage for a low-stress and positive toilet learning experience that will help you create an authentic and connected experience with your child that leads to true toileting independence.

 

By debunking common misconceptions and creating a deeper understanding of the complexities and nuances of the toilet learning process, Sharon guides you through the philosophies and strategies that will prepare your family philosophically, mentally, emotionally, and physically to engage in this learning process with compassion and confidence. Confessions of a Toilet Whisperer will equip you with the tools and knowledge to cultivate a positive and empowering experience for both you and your child.

 

In this unprecedented and groundbreaking new book, Sharon brings hope and clarity to parents everywhere. Drawing from her extensive experience in the toilet trenches, Sharon fills-in the knowledge gaps that often leave parents feeling frustrated and under-prepared to facilitate this transition with their child. Throughout this candid and comprehensive tell-all book, she shares invaluable insights, practical tips, and concrete strategies to help you and your child navigate the toilet learning journey with confidence and optimism. Prepare yourself and your child for a positive toilet learning journey, get your copy of Confessions of a Toilet Whisperer now!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sharon Murdock
• Release date: Jul 29, 2023
• ISBN: 9798988791805

Book preview

CONFESSIONS OF A TOILET WHISPERER

A modern parent’s guide to understanding toilet learning.

Holistic. Practical. Philosophical.

Sharon Murdock

To my entire family:

My mother, Bonnie, my daughters, Isabel, Abigail, Madeline & Lydia, and all y’all.

Because y’all are:

The reason I was brave enough to do this.

The source of my strength.

The connection that makes sense of the unfathomable.

The genesis of my wisdom.

Especially to Dustin. You are profoundly missed and deeply loved.

Love. Love.

Introduction: The Silent Crisis

Are you struggling with figuring out how to potty train your toddler? Do you feel confused and unsure of whether the time is right to start? Or have you tried to potty train your toddler and ended up feeling frustrated and disappointed? You are not alone.

I have seen firsthand how so many of today’s parents are missing critical information that would allow them to approach potty training with confidence and optimism. Many years ago, I was one of those parents. But now, 20 years later, I have gained expertise in toddler development and potty training that has cultivated my commitment to helping parents navigate this process.

I have written this confessional tell-all book to help today’s parents understand all the complexities of potty training, or really toilet learning, with their toddlers. I have approached writing this book from a holistic, practical, and philosophical perspective with the goal of creating a concise guide that will make this process understandable, accessible and manageable.

The Silent Crisis. Knowing how to make the transition from using diapers to using the toilet has become one of the greatest mysteries of 21st-century parenting. Over the last dozen years, I have worked with hundreds of toddlers and their families in the potty training process and I have watched many families struggle with a real gap in understanding about how to approach potty training. I have something radical to say on this subject: 21st-century potty training is in an absolute crisis.

Families are stuck in a quagmire of conflicting messages about potty training that leads to indecision and delaying.

The potty training process seems so daunting to start. How do we just unwrap this kid from their diaper and set them loose on our house?

There seems to be this idea that there is this magic timethat you’re meant to wait for: then your child will just seamlessly go from diapers to underwear.

What’s so bad about waiting until they’re ready anyway? Isn’t that better than forcing this new thing on them before they can understand it?

Here’s the thing. We are waiting. And waiting. And waiting. And while we are waiting we are missing the developmental window when our children are most predisposed to learning this new life skill.

I have worked with toddlers and families for the last twelve years as an Early Childhood Educator and I have seen on an individual basis how families have benefited from my help with the toilet learning process. Over the last few years, I have been inspired to broaden the scope of my work and I have set a goal: To destigmatize the mysteries of potty training and to help families understand the absolute benefits of prioritizing this learning process at a developmentally appropriate stage. I have concluded that the most effective way to reach a broad range of families with this valuable information is to write a concise and detailed book. This book will help parents and caregivers understand why this crisis of potty training has developed, what your toddler really needs from you, and how to successfully support your child in reaching toilet independence using a low-stress, cooperative approach.

In the chapters that follow, I have drawn on my years of first-hand experience in my work with many different families to synthesize all the various concepts and specific ideas that can help you and your family truly understand how to engage in this process in an authentic and connected way. Using these insights to inform your approach to this process will enhance your relationship with your toddler. By defining realistic expectations and deepening your understanding of the potty training process, you can create a fulfilling and enjoyable experience for everyone!

The information I am sharing in this book builds on itself so I encourage you to read through the whole book in order. I have made a concerted effort to avoid unnecessary repetition, to speak directly, and to say what I mean and mean what I say so that the book would be an enjoyable and quick read.

I’m glad you’re here with me!

sharon5

Preface: True Confessions

The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.

Can I tell you something? I never thought I would write a book about toddlers and toilets. As I was out there living my life, making plans, thinking about all the options that lay ahead of me, write a book that delves deeply into the mysteries of toddlers’ peeing and pooping, just somehow never made the list. It’s kind of a weird thing to do if you think about it.

Years ago, when my brother and I both had young children, my mother loved joking with us, You never thought you’d pay so much attention to someone else’s poop, did you? Then she’d just chuckle- obviously enjoying the passing of that torch. For most of us as parents, we spend several years pretty involved in the daily routines of diapering and toileting and then, as our children get older and more independent, that level of attention fades and is replaced by other parenting concerns. As a mother to four young children, I certainly put my time in with diapers and potty training and at the time I assumed it was just a stage that I would progress past. Little did I know that this was a subject that would take on a life of its own for me.

One of the things I’ve contemplated in the course of writing this book, is the sheer quantity of diapers that I have changed in my life. Recently, I tried to figure out if I could calculate an estimated number. I concluded that there was no actual way to reasonably figure that out. But, reflecting on all my years of diapering experiences, from babysitting as a teenager, to caring for my four children (and often their cousins too), to teaching and nannying for over twelve years, I realized that diapering potentially could be the one activity that I have repeated the most in my life. Which is an odd thing to realize.

In 2010, I started working with toddlers at my children’s Montessori school as a way to be able to keep all four of them in the school that we all loved. I quickly became a Montessori-certified educator. A dozen years somehow passed. During my career as an Infant and Toddler Early Childhood Educator, I have helped hundreds of toddlers and their families through the potty training process.

As my life continued to make other plans for me, I had the opportunity to work with toddlers and their parents in a variety of settings. Through these experiences, I have developed a unique expertise and insight into toddler development. I have learned so much about supporting toddlers’ authentic development and nurturing their amazing capabilities. And I have discovered a passion for helping parents navigate the unique challenges of the toddler years.

These pages grew from my life in the toilet trenches and the recognition that potty training support is an area of great need for parents and caregivers. There is a significant knowledge gap in the understanding of what toddlers really need from us while learning to use the toilet. I want to facilitate a fundamental shift in the understanding of the how, why, and when of helping toddlers transition from diapers to toileting.

Over the last twelve years of working with toddlers in classroom environments, I gradually came to the realization that toilet learning was one of the most critical components of toddler development. Surprisingly, even in my professional credential courses, this was not formally taught with as much emphasis and consideration as is really needed. As I developed a more in-depth understanding of the process of potty training, and how to support toddlers during this transition, I was able to leverage this knowledge to mentor teachers and parents in learning to facilitate this process for their toddlers. Over these years of working with children and adults in toilet learning, I’ve come to be affectionately known as The Toilet Whisperer. I am passionate about helping parents and caregivers in their very important work of nurturing young children.

As my understanding of the developmental phases and needs of infants and toddlers has grown over the years, I often say that I wish I could send myself back to ME when I was a parent of young children. I would love to have had the knowledge and strategies that I’ve learned now back then. In 2003, I was an overwhelmed and overstressed Mama to my four little girls who were five years old and younger. Daily life was intense and unbelievably busy. Parenting in those early years was the hardest and most rewarding thing I’ve ever done. For the most part, I did alright and I bet, as a parent, you are doing alright- I bet you even have moments of downright brilliance! But we could all use some help, some fresh insights, some perspective shifting. That is what motivates me now. I want to be the help I would have loved to have had in truly understanding my own children at this amazing time in their development.

Since I can’t send myself back in time I am putting myself out there right now. I am sharing every little insight, tidbit of experience lived, and perspective-shifting anecdotes here that I have accumulated over the years. I am committed to being a helping hand in assisting others in recognizing and investing in the development of all toddlers’ true capabilities. Through this book and my website The Toddler House, I want to welcome you to our learning community that is dedicated to building a gathering place for children, parents, and caregivers to learn and grow together!

CHAPTER ONE

Ditch Diapers Quick?

THERE ARE SO many potty training books with titles like Ditch Diapers Quick!, 3-Day Potty Training Boot Camp!, or Ready, Set, Potty! that the obvious conclusion would be that the process of learning to use the toilet needs to be fast and streamlined.

Everywhere you look the advice about potty training is oversimplified. The most popular books on the subject proclaim that they will show you how you can get through potty training as quickly as possible. It’s understandable- from the outside it looks like a daunting and messy undertaking. Of course, the impulse is to complete it with as little inconvenience as possible.

With so much of the popular advice on this subject talking about 3-day boot camps, quick fixes, and shortcuts, it sets the stage to make it seem like this process should be considered a minor inconvenience that you are meant to get over with as quickly as possible. Imagine if we treated other infant/toddler milestones with this attitude:

Have your baby crawling in three easy steps.

Get your toddler weaned in our Drop the Bottle Boot Camp.

Crawling, Walking, Talking, Eating. All of these are things our little ones are naturally motivated to learn. Really just given space, exposure, and opportunity most children will learn to crawl, walk, feed themselves, and develop their language of origin (or languages) through normal daily interactions and activity. It doesn’t seem that the same is true for learning to use the toilet. This is mostly because we, as a society, have developed things that contain the mess neatly away (which certainly makes life easier for us). Having a baby is intense and messy and takes a lot of work. So, of course, it is a great blessing for us to be able to use absorbent and dependable diapers. The unintended side effect of the development of such effective diapers is, it delays adult motivation to help a child learn to use the toilet. Living in these very effective diapers makes children out of touch with their body‘s natural function. It’s like this mystery zone for your child - something they have not had very much organic opportunity to experience and understand.

Let’s think for a minute about what potty training (or toilet learning as I prefer to call it) really is. Your child has used diapers for their entire life. Now you are going to ask them to stop using diapers and start using the toilet. Instead of peeing and pooping wherever they happen to be and whenever the urge strikes, they will now need to go to a specific place, undress themselves, manage all the mechanics of sitting on a toilet, and then, finally, allow their pee and poop to exit their body with some level of intent. It is the single biggest life transition that your child will make in their young life. Why in the world would we expect (or want) that to be a quick process?

A life parallel that the toilet learning process brings to mind for me is learning to drive. (I’ve been through that process with my children four times now!) Learning to drive is a long continuous process of accumulated experience with progressive levels of developing independence that, when facilitated thoughtfully, leads eventually to a skilled driver who makes smart judgment calls, follows safe practices, and contributes to the collective society of good driving. The more thoughtfully involved you remain as a parent, the more opportunities you will have to support their learning through your reciprocal interactions and real-time responses to their real-life experiences. Your first-hand involvement (sitting in the passenger seat) will be balanced with increased opportunities for their own independent driving experiences. It’s a back-and-forth balancing act of supported learning and space to make (hopefully) minor missteps as they develop the new life skills. This really is an excellent metaphor for toilet learning especially when you consider the very accurate reality that just as you can not help someone learn to drive by doing it for them, you will not be able to help your child through toilet learning by exerting your own will and expectations on them. But, if you meet them where they are and provide lots of support from the passenger seat, your child will become a skilled driver of their own bodies!

CHAPTER TWO

What Would Great-Grandma Think?

I INTRODUCED THIS book with the controversial statement that 21st Century potty training is in an