Our second child is 22 months old and has recently been showing an infrequent, but successful, interest in learning to use “the potty." The problem is that she is in the midst of her “terrible almost two’s” and every hour these days brings a new set of power struggles and tearful tantrums over anything and everything.

This is exhausting enough! I can’t imagine adding another huge task to our day -and night. Being that she seems pretty evasive about the whole thing anyway, I’m wondering if it would be detrimental to wait until her temperament has smoothed out a little. Or should I seize the opportunity to foster her independence as early as possible? I am left pondering: How do you know when it’s really time to start potty training?

The question posed may sound like it has an obvious answer, but in my experience the first signs of interest and even success have not been the end of diapers. This is probably one of those things a parent should never say aloud, but I really don’t think we are ready to start toilet training. The work load to get started is tremendous, the laundry never stops, and there are more vile catastrophes than I care to remember - and that’s with a child who is ready. It has also been my experience that, without cooperation and the ability to listen to directions, the end result of an attempt before the age of two, often gets chalked up to practice until the child is really ready on their own.

I recall on an early episode of Jon & Kate Plus 8 (before it became a show never to take advice from), the exhausted mother Kate is nearly brought to tears the day the first three little girls of the six sextuplets started potty training. She said that she had been dreading that day more than anything from the moment they were born. That’s saying a lot coming from “a mother of two six year olds and six two year olds” as she and Jon used to say.

For now, we have decided it would be best to applaud and assist any effort she makes on her own volition, but to not encourage or push it on our end until we have to. Any great stories, advice or experiences are welcomed at searsen@live.com

Sara Arsenault is a full time stay at home mother of two, a community volunteer and a contributor to the Parenting section of AnnArbor.com