All children can be potty trained no matter their circumstances, maybe an autistic child, a nonverbal child, a child with communication difficulties, a child with aggressive characters, or a child with hearing difficulties. They are humans and can all be trained in different areas of life, and just with the right knowledge and patience, all barriers can be broken down and overcome.
You may not know if your child is ready for potty training because things are different within their world of autism, and you should not be in a rush to teach them because age is not important for them. For example, you may feel since your child is 3, he needs to be potty trained by now, or because she is 6, she is way past the age, and she needs to be taught very fast.
Yes, toilet training is an essential life skill. The disadvantages of no being toilet training have no limit; it will cost their independence, lack of cleanliness, lack of private life, and limited relationships. So anybody can be toilet trained /potty trained at any age.
A few factors need to be reached and passed for an autistic child to start toilet training. Unfortunately, just because potty training is essential, some parents won’t consider the major factors involved.
For example, if an autistic child cannot sit independently on the site, instead of teaching their child to sit on the potty or toilet seat, they would just be prosed into buying an adapted toilet seat and supporters.
This way, you might be able to get your child to sit on the potty or toilet, but only in the confinement of your home, there might be no toilet seat supporters in public, and if there isn’t, your child won’t be able to use the potty or toilet elsewhere.
Factors To Consider Before Potty Training A NonVerbal Autistic Child
Most parents skip this first part and end up failing on the quest to teach their autistic child how to use a potty;
Firstly your child needs to have a communication system; having one or more communication systems will help because they will tell you they need something from you. It could be through different methods like signs or gestures, pictures, verbal words, writings, or a technology device.
Some autistic children are not always aware of their body; before potty training, you need to know I’d your child knows when they are pressed, or wet, or dry.
Is your child ready physically? For example, some autistic children don’t make any attempts to walk, take off some of their clothes, or sit on the couch by themself. If your child is in this category, you need to get them to do these simple actions.
Your child needs to understand what poop and wee is, the system of eating and excreting, the results of using the potty by himself, and the reward that is if you will be giving a reward for when she does it successfully and understand that using the potty by herself will gain her a reward.
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How To Potty Train A Nonverbal Autistic Child
When you have secured the factors involved in potty training, the following are the ways or methods of effective potty training;
1. Present Bribes And Rewards
While potty training any child, autistic or not, you must have a compelling reward, and whatever it is must be very special and meant for only potty training success. Therefore, immediately after every successful visit to the potty, you should bathe them with many praises of nice words and present them their reward.
It will make them very excited for the next visit to the potty kids with autism will really love it, and they would willingly do anything you want them to. Some ideas for their reward can be a new toy they have been craving, candy, an extra hour of their favorite show, a new video game, ice cream, some chocolate bars, and so on.
2. Cute New Underwears
You can take them shopping and encourage them to pick out their favorite underwear with their favorite cartoon character on them. When you do this, it’s time to try them on by taking away the diapers and replacing them with underwear.
This is to excite them about the new underwear and to make them feel when they’re wet and uncomfortable because the diaper takes all the wetness, and they have to take off the underwear. This way, they will not want to ruin their nice new underwear, so they will try to tell you when they feel pressed, although it will take longer, a few days or weeks.
If you don’t want to risk them pooping or weeing on your sofa, bed, or furniture, you can get plastic pants after wearing their underwear; this way, all the wee will get on the plastic under ware, not your valuables.
3. Bathroom Periods
Before introducing underwear, you need to know at what intervals your child pees and how long they can hold pee. Then, you need to train them to stay dry between bathroom periods; this way, they won’t let everything out when they feel like peeing.
They should hold their pee between the times it will get them to reach the toilet. Then, once you know, in about 1 hour, he’s going to pee, take him and let him sit, and if he doesn’t, leave and come back in the next 5 or 10 minutes and let him sit again.
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4. Teach Them How To Communicate
Teach them how to communicate with you when they need to use the toilet, just like they do when they need to eat. The easiest method of communication is what they should learn, like saying toilet, pointing towards the way to the toilet, or pointing to a specific picture for toilet, thug at your hand, or use signs. Teach them to use the communication they can for the toilet.
5. Exiting yourself from the visit to the potty
In the beginning, you should be prompting them about the potty a lot, but as time goes on, you should reduce the way you prompt them. Once there has been a success on using the toilet in one week straight, this means there is a huge deal of independence coming up, and you need to start exiting yourself and your assistant slowly.
Remove yourself slowly by delaying the reminders you usually give to them that they need to use the toilet, and watch them closely if they have registered that you delayed and are trying to communicate with you that they need the toilet in a way like holding her skirt or his pants and looking at you, or standing and shaking a little.
When you have noticed something like this, please encourage them to use the correct communication method you have taught them. If they don’t, take them to the toilet and try it again and again until they begin to use the right communication method.
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