A Fish Potty Trained My Child

Feb 20th 2010

Meet Diego. He single-handedly (or is that single Fin-dedly?) potty trained my child.

Okay, lemme back up a minute. My older son is 3 and a half, and has flatly refused to use the potty for the last 2 years. We’ve tried everything (and I really mean everything) but the boy could not be convinced. He preferred wearing diapers all day and night, and would never accept any motivation (oh hell, let’s just call it what it is: bribes) to go on the potty instead.

About a month ago I decided that I should buy him a fish. He loves fish, and I thought it could be just the thing to bribe him with. M&Ms and lollipops stopped working over a year ago. So I put up a sticker chart on the bathroom wall and told him that every time he went poop in the potty, he could have a sticker. After three weeks of stickers, he could pick out a fish. That was our deal.

Yeah. That shit didn’t work either. I think he only went poop in the potty about 1/4 of the last 21 days. BUT, for some unexplainable reason, I still really wanted to buy him a fish. So yesterday we went to the store, and after he picked out exactly the fish he wanted, AND named him, I told him we’d have to go somewhere and talk about what having a fish would mean.

So I took him by the boys’ clothes department and told him that if he started wearing underwear instead of Pull-ups or diapers, and started using the potty like a big kid, then he could buy his fish – because only big kids can take care of fish, right Jonas? Right, Mom. This all seemed to make sense to him, so we bought him some underwear, then bought him the fish – along with a “toy” for the fish, and some food, and a pretty little one gallon tank.

The child was over-the-moon excited. All he wanted to do was go home and help me put Diego in his new home. And right after we got Diego settled in, I went to nurse Julesy down for his nap. A few minutes into it, just as Julesy is dosing off, I hear Jonas grunting from the next room. I say

“Jonas? What are you doing?”

And to my heart’s delight he yells back,

“I’m going poop and pee in the potty, Mommy!”

And so he was. It’s been 24 hours now, and the child has not had a single accident. Not even during the night. Some times we ask him to go, and other times he just yells to no one,

“Oh! I gotta go pee/poop!”

and runs himself into the bathroom to put the pee or poop right where it belongs.

Now, I cannot say for sure that he is 100% potty-trained from now until forever (that’s a lot of pressure to put on poor little Diego), but this 24 hours has most certainly been the most success we have ever seen with it.

Even if he regresses now, this 24 hours of diaper-free Jonas is enough of a high to last me another 6 months, if that’s what it takes. So thank you little fishy – you have already paid for yourself in unused Pull-Ups.

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UPDATE! Two weeks later, I’m happy to say that Jonas has remained 100% diaper-free. The kid even stands up to pee now, and he does potty time all by himself without even being asked. He even puts the toilet seat back down when he’s done! What a man!