While I was pregnant, my good friend Heather sent me an interesting book called “Diaper Free“, which explains the philosophy of natural infant hygiene, which is essentially beginning potty training from birth. Before my daughter was even born, I bought her a potty and planned on starting potty training my wonderful bundle of joy shortly after she was born…Unfortunately things don’t usually go as planned when you have children and poor Sydney was SO colicky for the first 4 months that I was not about to sit her on a potty and try and teach her anything while she cried her little eyes out.

When Sydney was around 5 1/2 months, I started my own form of potty training. The diaper free philosophy is pretty simple: Whenever your baby is pooping or peeping, use a word or sound that they will eventually associate with doing their business. After a while, when you say the magic word (or sound) they will pee and/or poop on command. For example, ever since Sydney was born, whenever I noticed that she was pooping, I would say “Poopoo”. Now, whenever I take off her diaper for a diaper change, I sit her on her little potty and ask her: “Do you have to go poopoo or peepee?”. I’ll say it a couple of times and if nothing happens after a minute or two, I’ll put her back on the changing table and put a new diaper on her.

Well, guess what happened today?! I put Sydney on her potty, asked the magic question (“Do you have to go poopoo or peepee?”) and she pooped in her potty! Syndey is 7.5 months old. It will be interesting to see if this is a case of impeccable timing, or if she is starting to understand the concept of using the potty. My main goal is to just get her used to sitting on a potty, rather then to just spring it on her when she is 2, but hey, if this leads to early potty training, I’m all for it!

Update (2/26): It wasn’t a fluke! Sydney pooped and peed in her potty again today, immediately after I sat her on it and said the magic words. Cool!