When you hear perfectly sane, mature adults conversing about the bathroom habits of their children, you know you’ve entered the potty-training zone.

My girls are grown, married with careers and husbands of their own, but I can still recite the trials and tribulations of that period in our lives. And I say “ours” because during the time you are potty-training your kids, it’s an all-consuming task. It’s all you can talk about. It probably an exaggeration to say “it takes a village,” but it’s not too far from the truth.

Confidence and perspective are the keys, says Kim Flores, who not only manages the children’s department at the Library Center, but also the lives of her three children: Adam, 16, Maya, 5, and Elena, 22 months.

“Don’t make it a power struggle by expecting results when the child is not ready,” said Flores. “Your job is to provide the tools, the potty seat, introduce the concept and to patiently wait until your toddler is ready to take one of her first steps toward maturity.”

Flores says that reading books about potty training to your toddler “is a wonderful way to introduce the concept.” Books on potty-training? Oh, yes, you’ll find a hundred or so titles on this intimate subject that are suitable for reading to your child on the shelves of the eight branches and bookmobile of the Springfield-Greene County Libraries.

Hands down, Flores chooses “Once Upon a Potty” written and illustrated by Alona Frankel as her favorite book on potty-training. “When I was working with Maya, this book went everywhere with us. It’s funny but very informative,” she said. And, appropriately, there are separate books for boys and girls. There’s also a video version available.

Here are some other resources:

It’s Potty Time: For Boys, in print and video and in Spanish

It’s Potty Time: For Girls, in print and video and in Spanish

No More Diapers by Emma Thompson

When You’ve Got to Go by Mitchell Kriegman

Going to the Potty by a reassuring Fred Rogers

Time to Pee! by Mo Willems

Toilet Tales by Andrea Wayne von Konigslow

Uh Oh! Gotta Go! by Bob McGrath

To give you the knowledge and information you need to help your toddler, look to the parent shelves at each library for titles such as The Everything Potty Training Book by Linda Sonna and Infant Potty Training: A Gentle Primeval Method by Laurie Boucke.

And, when all else fails, there’s this book: Potty Training for Dummies by Diane Stafford and Jennifer Shoquist.