The Go Potty™ Podcast
Welcome to the Go Potty™ Podcast. I'm Rebecca Mottram, an NHS children’s nurse with a special interest in potty training, I'm the author of The Baby Pottying Guide, Positively Potty and founder of the Little Bunny Bear shop on Etsy. This podcast presents a new approach to potty learning, one that is backed by science and child development. Each episode will explore a key aspect of potty training, with practical tips and expert advice, all proven to work. So whether you're just starting out or you've already started, I’m really glad you’re here.
The Go Potty™ Podcast
BONUS EPISODE! Why children refuse the potty/toilet
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Cooperation is like a tealight on a windy night; fragile at first, but protect it and feed it and it can grow into a bonfire.
Because we all know how to use a toilet, it's easy to think that we can teach this skill to our children... and we can... But sometimes it becomes a power struggle.
In this episode, I explore why and how potty/toileting refusal happens, how it affects cooperation and how you can help cooperation come back if it's faded. The answer isn’t pressure or rewards, but understanding what the moment feels like from your child’s perspective. For a child who has always used nappies, stopping play for a body signal is a brand-new and surprisingly hard skill. This episode will help you to see seeds of progress in tiny moments like a pause before a “no,” a glance, or a moment of listening.
PLUS
- Why refusal doesn’t mean you’ve started too soon
- Understanding the difficulty of learning to interrupt play
- Identifying moments you can use to help cooperation return (and how to do that)
- Protecting and nurturing the seed of cooperation so it can grow
If you’d like the full framework, my book Positively Potty covers preparation, practice and stopping using nappies in detail.
https://rebeccamottram.com/books/
About the host:
Rebecca Mottram is an NHS children’s nurse, Doctoral Research Fellow and independent researcher with a special interest in potty training. Rebecca is the author of The Baby Pottying Guide, Positively Potty and is the founder of the Little Bunny Bear shop on Etsy. Rebecca was the potty training advisor to ERIC (the children’s bladder and bowel charity) between 2019-2024 and Rebecca became the potty training advisor for Pura in 2025. Rebecca has also been featured on Channel 5, the BBC, Women's Hour and My First 5 Years as a potty learning expert.
Get in touch about a consultation
https://rebeccamottram.com/problem-solving/
