Potty Training a Child With Prenatal Exposure - Weekend Wisdom

How do you know your child with prenatal substance exposure is ready to potty train? How do you start potty training a child with impacts from prenatal substance exposure, like developmental delays? This Weekend Wisdom offers practical strategies and encouragement to help you stay motivated and keep up the good work.

Resources:

• Raising a Child with Prenatal Substance Exposure
• How Do I Potty Train a Child with Prenatal Substance Exposure?
• Prenatal Exposure, Part 1: Parenting Babies through Elementary Ages

Transcript

Please pardon any errors. This is an automated transcript.

Hello and welcome to Weekend Wisdom. I'm Tracy Whitney, your host for today's
conversation about potty training kids impacted by prenatal substance exposure and
similar developmental issues that many of our adopted foster or kinship kids face.
If you are considering potty training or you've started and you're feeling overwhelmed
by it, take a deep breath. You are not alone and I hope this episode helps you
deal with some of the practical tips and setting expectations and most importantly
reminds you that you're doing a great job even when it doesn't feel like it. Let's
start with the why of why potty training could be much more challenging for our
kids with prenatal substance exposure or other developmental challenges. For one thing,
our kids may experience delays in their development including sensory processing
disorders or motor coordination, which means that something as simple as recognizing
the need to pee or knowing how to get to the toilet on time and all the steps
that go into that can be a real struggle for our kids. Some of our kids may have
a hard time understanding or remembering the order of all the steps it takes to get
to the potty. They may have trouble with muscle control. they may have floppy
muscles or they may have rigid muscles. Others might not even feel their body
signals very clearly. So if it feels like your child is just not getting it, you're
not imagining things and you're not failing. That's the good news. It's not about
their defiance, it's about their ability. And knowing this and then keeping that in
your mind can totally shift how you approach this stage of parenting.
And it gives you the ability to have more grace and more compassion and more
patience with the process. So set yourself up for success and your child up for
success by remembering that you cannot compare your child's progress, your child who
has prenatal substance exposure or developmental delays, you cannot compare your
child's progress with another typically developing child, even if those typically
developing children are in your home that you've potty trained successfully before.
Another thing that we need to talk about with regard to potty training kids with
prenatal substance exposure is readiness. I know most parents feel to some degree a
peer pressure, if you will, maybe is the best way to call it, to start potty
training around two or three years old. But again, when it comes to our kiddos,
their unique development track and their ability, those are the things that matter,
not their age. So before your child starts to show any signs of readiness, you can
start reading books to them, watching videos together, and learning songs about using
the potty. One of my favorite kids' songs to sing with their little siblings during
this season of life was that TV show about the big blue bear that was in his own
house. And I don't wanna trademark anything, but if you remember that song,
you'll remember the catchiness of it. There's another little red guy on one of the
PBS shows that has a fun potty song. And it's pretty catchy and easy to learn. And
those are things that you can start introducing to your child before you actually
start potty training. There are six signs of readiness that parents and caregivers of
kids with prenatal exposure should kind of have on hand to be evaluating and and
observing and thinking through when will I know if this child is ready because let's
face it when it comes to diapers and potty training, most parents are ready before
the kids are. So when you're dealing with a child that's had prenatal substance
exposure or who's had some sort of related significant developmental delay,
there are six things that you can use to gauge that readiness. The first one is,
is your child aware of the difference between being wet and being dry? Second,
can they stay dry for at least two hours at a time? Number three, can they sense
when they need to urinate or have a bowel movement? Do they give you some
indication that they know that's coming? Number four, can they reach the toilet or
the potty, little steps to a potty in time, even if it means sometimes with your
help? Number five, can they dress and undress themselves, or are they ready to learn
how to do those things? And number six, are they motivated in some way and at some
level to take this next step. If you think all six of those signs are showing that
your child is ready, then you can go ahead and start the potty training process.
But if your child isn't showing those signs yet, that's alright. There is no need
to rush it. And I say that having had two and three kids in diapers at the same
time. So I understand the pressure that you feel to get at least one of them out
of diapers. It can be very stressful. However, trying too soon can create stress for
you, stress for your child, and then a difficulty and dynamic between the two of
you that they may be sensing your disappointment or they may be sensing your
frustration. They may be feeling shame. It's quite typical for children to feel shame
around potty accidents and things like that at this age, but if they're
developmentally not ready to do the steps to go potty and they're feeling shame,
that's just a hard dynamic for all of you to work through. Who needs more hard
right now? Who needs more stress right now? Here's a few strategies that if you
sense your child is ready to go ahead and start potty training, there's several
practical strategies that you can implement when you're ready to do this or when you
sense they're ready to do this. The first is to create a predictable routine. Kids
with trauma histories, neurodevelopmental delays and prenatal substance exposure thrive
on structure. Most kids do, but our kids who have these particular challenges do
even more so. So maybe every two hours you pipe up and say, "Hey, okay,
it's potty time. Real positive. Quick to the point and let's go try." And you just
bring them to the bathroom and you let them try. No pressure, no big deal. If
nothing happens and they don't go, no big deal. Applaud their effort for trying. The
second thing that you can try is visual aids. You can hang a little chart in the
bathroom or wherever you have your little potty seat and it can show the steps of
what it looks like to use the potty, how to pull it down your pants, how to sit.
Visual aids like that are very helpful for kids that have memory problems or that
have problems doing things in sequence, and that would cover a lot of kids who have
prenatal substance exposure. Another thing that could help is timers. Timers sometimes
can make a kid feel stressed and pressured, so you got to know your kid, but
sometimes timers can be, oh, yep, here it is, time to go, and it doesn't put the
weight of the responsibility on you, it puts it on the timer. And sometimes when
that third entity is involved in the conversation, the child may be less likely to
resist you because it's the timer. And of course, always celebrate the wins,
even if it's a tiny little effort, even if it's a tiny little step in the right
direction, you can do stickers, you can do a dance party, you can do their favorite
piece of chocolate or you can do high fives and celebrate in the kitchen. My kids
used to hoist their little sister up on their shoulder and dance around the kitchen.
It was adorable. Finally, normalize for your child that accidents happen.
It should be a no big deal when it happens. Let them know that there's no shame,
that you're not frustrated with them, that yes, it may smell or it may be messy,
but it's not something that is unsolvable and it's not something that you're upset
with them about. If you stay calm and when you stay calm, you're building safety
and trust between you. A little simple oops can make it less shaming,
less panicky. It does feel kind of panicky to kids when they have accidents. So if
you just say oops, let's try again later, It's no big deal to them and then you
just keep communicating to them in that way that accidents are no big deal. You can
find more information for potty training and helping your child with prenatal exposure
through some of these milestones when you go to creatingafamily .org.
In the search bar, you would say how to potty train and you'll get some of our
most recent resources there. We did actually just do a two -part series on potty
training and bed wedding and other accidents like that. On that note, remember that
any success or the delay of it is not a reflection of you. So when you're doing
those searches and you're feeling defeated and you're feeling frustrated, remember that
succeeding or not succeeding at potty training does not mean you are succeeding or
not succeeding as a parent. And I know that it sounds simple to say that, but
sometimes when we are stuck in the heat of these moments, it can very much feel
like it's all about us. So if your child takes longer or needs more support to
successfully potty train, it doesn't mean anything except that it just takes longer
for your child to learn how to potty train. Your child's path is going to be
different. That's okay. Normalize it for them, normalize it for yourself. When you
feel frustrated, discouraged, tired, or disappointed, give yourself some grace.
Because you will feel those things. It is overwhelming, it is messy, it is
exhausting, it is time -consuming. But when you feel that pressure, give yourself some
grace. You are doing a great job as a parent. Every parent struggles at one point
or another with a potty training issue. Children children who've been prenatally
exposed or not. I raised six kids, potty trained all six of them,
all six of them had different experiences, different timelines, and I had to just
keep telling myself, "Okay, I can do this. They can do this. We'll get it." You
don't have to be perfect. You just have to keep showing up. And I feel like that's
a message that's not just good for potty training. It's good for all of parenting.
But before I wrap up. Let me just remind you, yes, it can be mentally and
emotionally exhausting. So please make sure you're taking care of yourself. This is a
great time to just kind of fit a little bit of extra self care into your day.
Once they go to bed, maybe just sit down with a good book, quietly read something
that is brainless to let you just come down. Maybe that's a movie for you or quiet
time with a journal and a candle and some quiet music, yoga at the end of the
day, something that just helps you kind of reregulate your mind and your body from
the really hard work you just did all day with your little one. So it can be
anything that refuels and refreshes you and that will help you then continue to show
up for your kid. Your kid needs to know that you're there with them, that you've.
And when you let go of the expectations of timelines and skills and abilities that
they don't have yet, you can celebrate the progress and you can celebrate where they
are and who they are right in the moment. And that just makes a world of
difference for potty training. Lots of celebrating, lots of positive reinforcement and
lots of rest for mom or dad, whoever's doing the potty training. If this episode
helped you, please share it with another parent who might be in midst of potty
training and feeling discouraged. We all need that kind of support and encouragement
from each other. And if you head over to creatingafamily .org, you can get tons of
other helpful resources on prenatal exposure, on other developmental delays on how to
negotiate with your kids through conversations like collaborative negotiation with your
kids when they're kind of stuck and you're kind of stuck and things like that to
help you strengthen your family and by passing it on you'll be strengthening on
another family. Thanks so much, have a great day.