How to Potty Train a Child with Autism in 2024

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How to Potty Train a Child with Autism in 2024
Written by:
Michelle D. Swaney
January 23, 2024

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How to Potty Train a Child with Autism

In the world of special needs families, it’s often not a 3-day solution, or a stay-home-and-get-it-d quick fix, it is a process, a journey, that takes not only commitment but also a lot of love and patience. Special needs families often see every little step of success that family neuro-typical families skip over because their child took to the change so quickly. This is hard, and there's good in that. You can celebrate each milestone and all the steps along the way to get there. I’m happy to be part of that process and truly hope that this article provides some insight and encouragement to help you along your journey. The Potty School(R) was birthed out of a desire to help struggling families. Potty training isn’t necessarily going to happen overnight for many special needs families, but there are tried and true methods are methods that can help you to make progress to the next step, and then the next. 

Toilet training is one of the most discussed topics within the special needs parenting community. If you are a parent or caregiver in need of professional assistance with moving a special needs, or autistic child from diapers-to-flush, you may find this article very useful.

I’m honored to be featured as an expert contributor to @BeamingHealth. Any organization that can encourage and helps parents and caregivers with children with autism live their best and fullest lives is an organization I am happy to work with. Beaming Health provides community support and light for families of children with special needs.

In a recent interview conducted by Beaming Health, I answered 8 common potty training questions for special needs kids. See below for the questions asked, and a link to the answers.

The first 4 questions about potty training autistic children include: 

  1. What are your favorite actionable potty training tips that could be implemented ASAP? (We'd like to give our parents some techniques they can start using immediately.)

  1. What would you say is the biggest challenge to overcome when potty training kids on the spectrum? (And how to overcome it?)

  1. What advice do you have for parents whose child has mastered one bathroom activity, but is having difficulty with the other? (For example, a child that has mastered peeing in the potty, but struggles with going #2 in the potty.)

  1. What are your best tips for potty training nonverbal children?

Click HERE to go to the full article: 8 Common Potty Training Questions for Special Needs Kids

Pop on over to the article and get a chance to check out my tips, and beaming health’s suggestions about potty training special needs children. Whether you are a caregiver, or a parent, the suggestions can help you move your child along the pottying journey. It’s not just about getting potty training over with, it’s about the process of how to get there as well

Here are questions 5-8 about potty training a child with special needs:

     5. What are your best tips for potty training older children? (I'm thinking about our parents who have kiddos older than 6 and are still trying to potty train).

     6. Do you have any advice for parents who have maybe given up or fear their kids will be in diapers/pull-ups for life?

     7. Do you have any tips for parents who have tried *everything* and still haven't been successful with potty training?

     8. Many parents of autistic children co-parent, or have family helping them with childcare, which can make potty training inconsistent. (E.g. Grandma potty trains while          the child is with her during the day, but mom doesn't follow through in the evenings.) Do you have any ideas on how someone could overcome inconsistency?

Click HERE to go to the full article: 8 Common Potty Training Questions for Special Needs Kids

I’d be honored if you took a few minutes to look over this article and incorporated some of the tips into your family’s pottying journey. If you have questions along the way, that’s what The Potty School is here to help you with, so feel free to reach out for more information about a consultation (phone/Zoom), or home consultation. It’s how we personally serve families all over the world.

In this detailed interview, Michelle Swaney gives expert tips on potty training techniques that parents with autistic kids can start implementing immediately and potty training tricks that have worked for her in her years of assisting families with special needs in making this transition from  diapers to flush.

Here is the link to the excerpts from the interview: https://beaminghealth.com/article/8-common-potty-training-questions-for-special-needs-kids

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