the day she started (and did not quit) potty training

WARNING: This post uses the word POOP more times than I care to admit. Read at your own risk.

Notice the difference in the title from my last post about potty training? The day I started potty training versus the day she started potty training. It started about two weeks ago. On Halloween. I went to pick Eva up from preschool as usual. When I got there, her teacher told me that she had been doing a great job during bathroom time. Of course, I was a bit surprised. I asked if she meant trying or actually going. She said she had been peeing every day. When she saw I was surprised, she said “Aren’t you training at home? Eva told me she goes on the potty at home”. My 2 year old liar. Bless her.

On the drive home I talked it up and told her I was so proud of her for going on the potty at school. When we got home and sat down to lunch she told me she needed to go to the potty and poop. I told her to finish her lunch first because over the past weeks she had been using going to the potty as an excuse to get out of any and everything. But, this time, she was holding herself up on her seat and said “Mommy! I need to go”. So we went. And she went. Immediately. No hesitation. No fear. Nothing. She just went.

I was super pumped and of course praised her up the wazoo. Since it was Halloween, we were heading out after nap so I couldn’t do much more that day but I asked her the next morning if she wanted to be a big girl and go on the potty. She said yes. So, I pulled the little potty out, took of her dirty diaper and left her bottomless. Within ten minutes, when I was in the kitchen, I heard “MOMMY! CAN’T YOU COME CLEAN UP THE POOP?”

Uh oh.

I raced into the living room and sure enough she was huddled over a turd on the floor. TMI? Sorry about your luck. I was shocked because she had just had a dirty diaper and rarely goes twice in a row like that. But, as shocked as I was, I am pretty sure she was even more shocked than me. As I cleaned things up, I talked to her about how she doesn’t wear diapers any more and that she needed to sit on the potty every time she felt like she needed to go.

I thought “perfect, we’re off to a fab start”. Sarcasm font.

As the day went on, things got better and better. She put a lot of tinkles in the potty. Too many, in fact. I could tell she was forcing herself to go to get candy but for the first day, I thought that was just fine. The next day, she got even better. Many times, she took herself to the potty without prompting. And we had success with #2 on the potty too. On Saturday morning we added undies to the mix and she did great. Saturday afternoon we went a step further and put pants on. We even ventured outside to play and do some yard work.

Over those three days, she wasn’t 100% but she was doing pretty dang good. We decided on Saturday night to brave it up and head to church with her in undies on Sunday. And? That was her first 100% accident free day. She did wonderfully. Telling us during service when she needed to go potty and telling her Sunday school teacher, too.

Monday again, was 100% accident free, even during a 30 minute car ride and play date at a friend’s. On Tuesday, I decided to keep her home from preschool for one more day of practice. I had already told her teacher she’d been gone since we had been planning to visit Nana and Papa before all of this began. That’s when things started to go downhill. I guess after doing so well for so many days, I naively thought we were in the clear. Tuesday brought with it 2 pee accidents and 2 poop accidents and I was really feeling discouraged. I had stopped prompting her since she had been doing so well and after the accidents I was back on her like a crazy person and I think she found that annoying and stopped wanting to care about the potty.

At the end of the day, I was having major second thoughts about sending her to school the next day. Maybe I just needed to keep her home again. Eventually, Evan and my mom convinced me to send her, as that was the place the whole thing started. So send her I did. With four changes of clothes. And when I picked her up I fully expected her to be wearing different pants than I dropped her off in – but she wasn’t. She had stayed dry all morning and even held it in and only gone during potty time. That was a huge relief to me as well, as she was still usually going every 30-40 minutes at home.

Since then, we’ve still had our ups and downs. She is doing amazingly well with the pee portion. She hasn’t had a pee accident for me since Thursday afternoon and even stayed dry on the 1.5 hour car ride to and from my parent’s house, even though she was wearing a pull up. She did wet her pants when she was with a babysitter on Saturday, but overall, she’s done great. The whole #2 thing has proven to be more of a challenge. The first few days, she was awesome. She said, “I have to poop” and then pooped. However, since that Tuesday that she had 2 accidents, it’s been dicey. She will tell me she has to go, sit down and pee and then insist she’s done, freaking out if I try to make her stay on. Then, she gets off and has an accident. That or she holds it and goes in her pull up when I put her down for a nap. Yesterday, she even had a #2 accident at school which really surprised me since she would never have pooped in a diaper there. It happened just before I picked her up, on the playground, and she walked up to her teacher and said “I fink I need to ask my mommy to take me potty”. Bless her heart.

Right now, it’s pretty iffy. Some days she still tells me and goes no problem. Other days, not so much. In the 14 days we’ve been training, 8 days she has been #2 successful and 7 days she has not (4 times having full on accidents in the undies or in the tub, for the love, and the other times going in a pull up). So, I guess that’s still better than it could be. We are using a Dora sticker potty chart courtesy of Melissa in hopes that it will help her to get more successful with the #2s.

Some days are frustrating and stressful but I keep reminding myself to lower my expectations and that this too shall pass. Right now, we couldn’t be more proud of her. She’s been doing so well and trying so hard, despite her occasional accident. I know soon enough we’ll get there and she’ll be spot on.

happenings

I’ve been so scarce around here lately. I didn’t really mean for that to happen but, well, you know – it happened. Life happened. The biggest thing that has kept me away from here lately is that I’ve been up to my eyeballs in potty training for the last week. Many of you know already, but last Wednesday when I picked Evalyn up from school her teacher told me she’d been doing great during bathroom time. When she saw I surprised she said, “Oh? Aren’t you training at home?” … when I told her we weren’t, she said that Miss Eva had told her that she goes pee on the potty at home. LIAR. Anyway, when we got home that day, E told me she needed to use the potty. And did it. And basically hasn’t looked back since. This deserves a post of it’s own and there will be one next week so I’ll just leave it here – there are ups and downs and we’re by no means “finished” potty training but overall, we are very proud of her and she’s doing marvelously.

Add the mess that is DST to the mix and I’ve basically been down for the count. We are all tired. Exhausted, really. And up until yesterday, the girls and I were suffering from a huge case of cabin fever due to the self imposed potty training house arrest. Hopefully the next few days will help the girls (especially Evalyn) get back on track with their normal routines and schedules so we can all feel a bit more rested again. Why is it that they have no problem adjusting back to the 7:30 bedtime but they still want to get up an hour (or more, hello 4 am mornings!) early? No fair. I feel more tired than I have throughout Gwen’s entire life. Motherhood is constant, isn’t it, though?

Amidst all of this our sweet Gwennie turned four months old last Friday. Trust me, I have not forgotten this. I swear I’m not giving into the second child syndrome clichés. I have all of her pictures selected and ready to go but was purposefully leaving the post for today because we had her appointment this morning and I wanted to include her stats. But then we ended up hanging out with our Buds today so alas, no post. Tomorrow the girls and I head to Nana and Papa’s for the weekend and following that we will have SIL and niece here for a few days. All of this means I probably won’t be back until all of that simmers down. But when I’m back? Watch out. Because I’ll be back.

the day I started (and quit) potty training

I’ve had this post started and sitting in my drafts for a long, long time. Since September 8th, be exact. The day I quit potty training. Let me tell you a little about it.

For months, Evalyn has been showing signs that she’s “ready”. Everything from interest in the potty (like, major interest … almost obsession. She plays potty with her dolls, is so intrigued when other kids are going and always wants to pretend to potty), to asking to go potty, to praising me for going potty, to telling me when she is going to/has gone pee or poop. Tons of people told me that I should start training her, that they were certain she was ready and that once she got the hang of it she would catch on it no time at all. And I thought they were right. I thought all of these things as well. So, I bought us some big girl undies, we talked about the undies, we talked about going potty all the time, I showed her how I go on the potty and so on and so on…

After our labour day getaway to Nana and Papa’s cottage, I decided it was time to hit potty training square between the eyes. We had a long string of days with no commitments and so I vowed to become a hermit and stay at home, put away the diapers, bust out the big girl undies and take her to the potty every 15 minutes and blah blah blah blah.

Well, let me tell you – it was a disaster. A major, major disaster.

Don’t get me wrong … I don’t have my head in the clouds. I don’t expect potty training to be a complete breeze. But, friends, I do expect it to be easier than those few days were. It was horrific.

The first day, she went through twenty one pairs of underwear. No, we don’t own 21 pairs. I did a load of emergency laundry part way through the day. She was dribbling non stop all day long. Somehow, don’t even ask me how, we managed to have a #2 success that very first day right after lunch (let me also say, she had peed and pooped on the potty numerous times before this – but never anything consistent or predictable), but her reaction was less than wonderful. She freaked and did not respond well to the praise or the reward. And that success was the last one we had – despite sticking with the training for two more days. Over the next few days, there were far less accidents. She seemed to have figured out the concept of holding it and peeing all at once, rather than little dribbles here and there all day. She would stay dry for 2-4 hours between pees. The only problem? She never, ever, ever peed on the potty. She would sit on it for 20 minutes at a time, do nothing, walk out into the living room and pee on the floor and then say, “I has to go potty and get a treat now”.

After a while, I was starting to get frustrated. So frustrated. Enough so that I got angry, yelled at her for peeing, once again, all over my dining room chair and put her down for a nap with barely a song and hug because I was so frustrated and fuming. The look on her face told me she was confused as to why I was mad. And as soon as I left her room, I recognized that my reaction and frustration was wrong, oh so wrong, and entirely unfair to her. I was ashamed of myself for acting that way and getting her in trouble for something she couldn’t understand or control.  I am not proud to admit these things – but this is real life, and I’m telling it like it is.

So right then and there I decided to call it quits. We were done. No more potty training for now.

When I made the decision to call it quits for now, I was hard on myself. So hard on myself. I thought it was a major parenting fail. But then the more I thought about it and after a few conversations with some wise moms who I highly respect, I realized that my decision to wait a while longer was more of a parenting success than anything.

It is a success because I was able to find the balance between being persistent and not giving up and recognizing that my child is not ready. It’s a ‘success because it means I am setting aside any pressure I have felt from others to get her trained and trusting my instincts as a mother to know that despite her verbal articulation of all things potty related, she just isn’t quite there yet. It’s a success because it means I’m taking into account the entire picture and doing what is fair for both of my children. It isn’t fair to pressure Eva before she’s ready and it wasn’t fair to Gwen to be constantly ignored over those few days while I raced back and forth with Eva to no avail. I even unlatched her and left her screaming a few times as I rushed to get Eva on the potty. It is a success because I’m letting her take the lead and follow her cues rather than forcing something that’s just not there yet.

So, sure … it would be nice to have one kid out of diapers but for now, that’s just not happening. We’ll get to it again … eventually. And when we do, when she’s ready, really, really ready… I know she’ll rock it. Besides, as one of the wisest women I know said to me during our first ordeal, “Don’t stress. It will happen. Seldom do we see a high school student who is not potty trained”.

So, see ya later Potty Training. We’ll see ya when we see ya.

A jumble of thoughts. Or something.

I sit down to blog and lately, nothing more than a huge jumble of random thoughts falls out. So, here goes nothing…

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I think it is so cute that Evalyn mixes up pronouns and says “you” when she really means “me” that I don’t even try to correct her. I already find it so bittersweet when she starts saying a word properly after mispronouncing it in a super cute way for a long time that I am in no rush to have her talk like an adult. She’ll get there. My favourite one is that she often says, “Mommy got you” when I’m holding her. Usually it’s when she’s being sucky, or is hurt or scared or something. Just last night she was having a hard time getting to sleep and I almost melted of the cute when I picked her up and she said “Mommy got you. Mommy got you, ah-ways”.

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For a while, we were sort-of-kind-of doing the potty thing. She started showing an interest in noticing the potty and all of that jazz a few months ago and asking to sit on it, so I went ahead and bought a kid potty. We would put her on before bath and also whenever she asked. In the course of a few weeks, she peed on it four or five times. Just before Easter, she pooped while sitting on the potty and I’m pretty sure the splash (tmi?) scared her enough that she doesn’t ever want to sit on the potty again. Granted, she still talks about the potty non stop, tells me when she’s pooped and is actually kind of disturbingly obsessed with her dirty diapers. She wants to “yook”, “touch”, “bye bye dirty poo poo” all the time. Is this normal? Should I take this as a sign that I should crack down on the potty thing? Now whenever we ask her if she wants/needs to sit on the potty she says yes but then shouts ALL DONE as soon as we get to the bathroom. I kind of feel like I should just pack it up and put it out of sight until after we are adjusted to the new baby and settled from the move. Experienced moms, is this me being wise or just lazy? Honesty please.

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I started packing today. Sort of. One box of my boots and three boxes of decorations from the walls, dressers, mantel and so on. Evan thinks it’s still too early. I keep reminding him that with every passing day I am becoming more and more pregnant. And soon will become more and more exhausted from a newborn. We get possession the end of this month. I am hoping to have lots ready to go by that point that can just sit in the basement/garage until the floors/painting is done. So, my house my be starting to look bare but I’d rather live in an empty, boring house for a few months than rush at the end. No?

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The friend who runs Evalyn’s daycare is named Jessica. So, we always tell E she is going to go to Jess’ while mommy and daddy go to work and that I will pick her up at lunch time. She has started to add “See ya yunch-time” to her list of goodbyes to people. Also? She has started to call Jess Jess’. Hi Jess’. Thank you Jess’.

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I suck at watching movies. I think it must be because I have the attention span of a camel. Do they have a short attention span? They must. My lack of interest or desire to watch movies drives Evan nuts. He doesn’t get why I can’t/don’t want to sit on the couch and zone into a movie for two hours every night. The other night we were laying in bed and he was watching a movie on netflix. I was “watching” too. Aka, getting up to get a snack, playing on my phone, doing some laundry, drifting to sleep and otherwise, just not paying attention. When the movie was about ten minutes from being over, it somehow caught my attention. But remember, I hadn’t watched the rest of it. And also, the angle of the laptop was making it difficult for me to see the screen. Our conversation went like this. Me: “Can you pause that when you have a second?” Evan: {pauses movie} “What?” Me: “Can you tell me what is happening in this movie?”

The response I got? Priceless. Sidenote: he did not have the decency to fill me in.

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I hate when I write a blogpost and then a few hours later realize that I forgot to include the initial thought that sparked the idea for the post. It happened yesterday. I wrote about how I love watching Evalyn become a combination of Evan and I. What I forgot to mention was that the whole idea for the post came the other day when she insisted on dipping every bite of her dinner in Frank’s Hot Sauce. So like her father. So unlike her mother.

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We can’t agree on this unborn child’s name. The girl name was selected within 34 seconds of finding out we were expecting and I am utterly and completely in love with it. The boy name was also selected but now I’m just not 100% sure about it so I’ve been tossing around new ideas. I found one that I fell in love with, but husband disagrees. I’m pretty sure the fact that I am convinced we’re having a girl, I love the girl name and we have no idea what the boy name will be guarantees I’m having a boy.

And while we were on the topic of names? Count yourself lucky if you never ever have to go through the process of naming a child with my husband as your counterpart. He is horrible.

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My hormones are raging. I feel like the hormonal mess of pregnancy kind of levels out somewhere in the middle and then spikes again as you get closer and closer to the end. Lemme tell ya, it is a-spiking. Many unannounced tears, taking offense over simple, harmless comments, and all together weirdness. It is happening.

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We bought our double stroller on the weekend. Long story short, I was quite simply done with agonizing over the decision. I found the one I had been eyeing on sale. I had a giftcard that meant I’d only have to pay $110 out of pocket so I took the leap. We went with the Graco Ready2Grow Sit and Stand. For the price, I feel like it will more than meet my needs for the next few years. I love the option of being a dual rider or a sit and stand. The thing that sucks? Tiny cars don’t believe in double strollers. I will have to take the child cup holder and the canopies off it to get it in and out of the car. Which will be a pain, but honestly, unless I was going to spend big bucks, there does not exist a double stroller that will fit easily in the trunk of a Mazda 3 hatchback and apparently (so says the husband), fitting a double stroller is not an adequate excuse for upgrading my vehicle. I have a feeling most of its use will be going for walks at our house anyway, so the in and outs of the car may be less than I’m used to. Quick trips to the mall just for fun won’t happen so much with two babies, not to mention the fact that we are now going to be living much farther away from the nearest mall.

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It’s May. Time to bring on the warm weather, m’kay, Mother Nature? I want to take my kid to the zoo before I turn into a sloth.