success!

I am actually writing this in January, but plan to pre-date this sometime in December.  I got way behind in blogging, and I like to turn each year's worth of blogs into a book, so I want to make sure that the events were officially recorded in the year they happened.

Ok, so here's something I was seriously afraid I would NEVER get to blog about, Christopher is officially potty trained!!!!

NO MORE KIDS IN DIAPERS!!!

woo-hoo!!!

We've been working with Christopher for a few months (years) but only seeing progress these past few months. (those teachers at his school are ANGELS) I was actually daring to hope that I might be done with diapers before Nick's birthday because I was really hoping to NOT be able to say that I have been changing diapers for MORE THAN 15 years - STRAIGHT.  (not including the two years total time that I had two kids in diapers at different times.)  Potty training has truly been the bane to my existence.

Anyway, usually I send Christopher to school in underwear, then change him into a pull-up when he comes home because he usually poops in the afternoon, and I really hate swishing out dirty underwear in the toilet.  (I admit to sometimes just throwing them away)  He had the peeing part down, but he wasn't interested at all in working on the second part of the potty training equation.

But when I was gone to science camp, John forgot to.  He forgot to put him in pull-ups.  He even forgot to change him before he put him to bed.  He could have had a potential mess on his hands, but he didn't. In fact, it's been a month, and he has had ZERO night time accidents (I totally know I just jinxed myself), and only one real accident since then as well.

So a month later, I finally feel confident in announcing that Christopher is officially potty trained.* (I've been somewhat quiet about it up until now because I didn't want to jinx myself)

So, woo-hoo!  I REALLY worried this day would NEVER come.

Also, given that today is actually January 1st, a day when people think about new years resolutions, I would like it noted that "potty training Christopher" has been on my list for at least a couple years now, along with losing weight, and if I had to pick one resolution to finally get to keep, I totally would have picked the potty training one, so I am pretty stoked about being able to cross that one off.  

I think what really tipped the scales in our favor was that Christopher finally figured out that he can get out of church several times in one day just by announcing he needs to go to the bathroom.  It's quite powerful.  He's figured out we are both happy to encourage him, and afraid he might have an accident.  Another reason why we sit in the back. By a door.

In other news, if anybody is interested, I have some boys' size large pull-ups I am happy to give away for FREE. :)

*(except for swimming lessons -which has turned into an EVERY SINGLE TIME occurrence. - Hopefully he will get that under control before summer)

mother of the year

Ok, so every once in awhile someone claims to win the mother of the year award, then as proof they cite some incident, some faux-pas, some event that may or may not land their kid in therapy in later life. 

Let me just say this- you aren't even in the contest until someone calls the cops on you.

Obviously, I have a story....

Christopher and Zach have swimming lessons.  I take them twice a week.  Twice because Zach needs some activity in his week, and because it's about time Christopher learn to swim.  Or at least not drown, and I don't think 30 minutes a week is enough for either of them to progress much. And they were having a special- buy one session, get the second half off.

I've made it no secret that my almost 5 1/2 year old is still not potty trained.  We've (finally!) seen some progress these past few months, but we still have issues.  Like, he will pee in the potty if he is wearing underwear, because he doesn't like pee running down his leg, ( who would? ) but is pull-ups rarely stay dry.   "So throw out the pull-ups!" you say.  But the problem is, he doesn't much care what he's wearing when he decides to poop.  We had a little bit of success with a treasure box, but once the novelty wore off (and the prizes got lamer- matchbox cars and candy) he quit trying.  Poop in a pull-up or underwear feels the same to him. It's been a normal sensation for his whole life.  I haven't figured out how to make him see that flushing it down the toilet is better than walking around with a load in your shorts.

I KNOW that at this point it's a matter of him choosing to.  For instance, just yesterday, he got bored in church, so announced to me (and everyone else in ear shot) that he needed to "go poop in the potty" and "make the water yellow".   Which he did.  It took some effort on his part, but he did. (since he said he needed to go, I wasn't gonna let him off the hook until he did.  If he's gonna pull that card, he better be able to back it up.)

So, back to swimming lessons.  Since he's not potty trained, I take appropriate measures every time.  I sit him on the potty for ten minutes before hand.  We discuss pooping in the potty, not in the pool. I put a swim diaper on him.  I put a plastic cover over that, then I put his regular swimsuit on. 

Most of the time it's not an issue.  Most of the time he stays clean.

But once or twice we've had a problem.  It's usually not apparent until we get to the car, and I usually have them sit on folded up towels anyway.  (And call me crazy, but I am uncomfortable looking down my kid's pants to check for issues in front of all the other mothers.  If he were two, I'd be fine, but he's five, and I just don't feel like dealing with their judgments -real or imagined. "Shouldn't your kid be potty trained by now? What's wrong with you?  What's wrong with him?" )

So where do the cops come in you are wondering?  I'm still getting there.

When we get home, those ever so permeable swim diapers are still leaking, only the water isn't so clear anymore.  It's taken on a brownish tint.

Anyway, so what would you do?  Have you kid walk through the house to get to a shower dripping brownish poop-water all over your carpet?

Not me.

I strip him naked and hose him off right there in the front yard.  (that's where the hose is, and the back yard doesn't have more privacy with the view fence back there and in the front yard he can stand on cement, in the back we have to choose between rocks and grass- rocks are uncomfortable, grass is another mess to clean up. )

No, it's not pleasant for him.  Yes, he cries.  Loudly.  Yes, it might be November, but No, we don't live in Minnesota, Maine, Canada, or even Utah.  It was between 60 and 65 degrees outside.  No, that's not running through the sprinkler weather, but in the three minutes it took me to clean him off, he wasn't going to get hypothermia.  (Besides in my irritation, I have been known to hose him off in the shower without waiting for the water to warm up.  Just sayin'.)

Before I could leave to take Maddie to her ballet class, there was a knock at our door. 

One of our neighbors had tattled on me to the police.

I don't know who.

He came, asked questions, talked to us, met Christopher -who was fully dressed, running around, perfectly happy, and completely untraumatized by the incident.

Nick elected to share this incident in class at church yesterday.  His teacher just happens to be a DPS officer, who stopped me in the hallway afterwards to talk about it.   He thought it was ridiculous, and he said that for $5 I can call a number and get a report from the city and figure out exactly who it was.  He said that they were probably some person who was traumatized as a kid because they had parents who did that to them.  In Minnesota.  In January.  For hours at a time.  As punishment for something like forgetting to put their dishes in the sink or leaving their bedroom light on.

I haven't decided yet if I want to know. 

I was really, really mad on Saturday.  Which one of my anti-social neighbors stabbed me in the back?  We only know one other family on our whole street. (I don't think it was them)  Every time I get to know somebody, they move.  And then if I should (heaven forbid) wave to a neighbor as I drive by, I usually get a look that says, "Do I know you? Why are you waving to me?".

After a day or so, I came to peace with the fact that instead of someone doing this TO ME, I could be okay with someone doing this FOR MY CHILD.  Someone was looking out for Christopher.  Someone felt protective of him, and despite the fact they wanted to protect him from me, and didn't have all the facts, I can live with that. I want what's best for him too.

So get the report or not?  It would probably be easier to emotionally let it go if I didn't.  Then I wouldn't know who to give dirty looks to. 

On the other hand, should we have another accident at the pool, I could pull up to their house, knock on their door, and ask to use their shower and drip poopy water through their house, since they are uncomfortable with me hosing him off in my front yard.  

That and the wife of the DPS Officer offered to help me toilet paper them. 

Answer: Christopher did it.

I'm quite the "potty mouth" in this post, so if reading about other people's toilet training troubles isn't your cup of tea, feel free to skip it.  And I think this might be a first where I am saying "You're welcome" to a lack of visuals, instead of  "sorry".

So I realize my last post was a little gross, but after potty training with limited success for two solid years, and seriously worrying that I would be buying Depends for him in a year or so,  a little turd in a toilet is a beautiful sight to behold indeed.

And believe me, I've done everything short of promising him the moon if he would poop in the potty.   "McDonald's? Absolutely...  Ice-cream?  We'd love to....  A DS? sure...  Disneyland?  Just as soon as you are potty trained....An iphone? We'll see how desperate I get, but I'll be happy to fix the cracked screen on my itouch..."  I'll even take him to the toy section of Target, watch him fall in love with something, smile at him and say, "You want that?  Go poo-poo in the potty..." 

I've even gone the other direction and taken away privileges.   "You want to be a big boy and play with friends?  Go poop in the potty."  (besides, their kid has been most likely been potty trained for a couple years, handing them the largest size pull-up they make and saying "Just in case. Sorry.", kinda sucks for all parties involved.  It's been a very, very long time since Christopher has played at a friend's house.  (that's no pic-nic for me, either). 

Basically, we knew it all came down to how much Christopher wanted it.  He needed to decide that using a toilet was better than walking around with a load in your shorts, and all we could do to encourage it was to sweeten the pot.  We've been promising "presents" for quite awhile now.

So yesterday Madison was getting ready for a birthday party, and we needed to wrap the present.  Christopher took one look at it, went up stairs, promptly pooped in the potty, came downstairs all proud as punch, and said, "I go store, buy present."  So we promptly left for Target where he picked out a little race track for a matchbox car. (I had to strike while the iron was hot.  Madison was 15 minutes late to her party.) 

As soon as he was bored with that toy, he squeezed out another little turd. (The image of which I so kindly shared on the internet for all to see yesterday.)  I could see where this was heading, so I talked him into getting ice-cream.  It was Saturday afternoon and I had been considering taking the kids anyway.

Then this morning before church he pooped again, and was pretty adamant about going to the store to buy a present.  Fortunately I just happened to have a little box of Legos I forgot to give him for his birthday, which I had decided to save it for Christmas, but ended up giving to him today instead.    (Oh, and PS- both the Legos and racetrack had to be wrapped so he could un-wrap them.) 

An hour later he was unwrapping a large Hershey's bar left over from Valentine's day.

After church he ate a bowl of ice-cream an hour before we were to go to some friend's house for dinner because he pooped a third time.

After all that pooping you'd think we'd be safe to leave him in his "big boy pants" for only two hours while we enjoyed dinner at our friend's house.

You'd be wrong. 

You win some, you lose some.

At least now I have HOPE.   I didn't even have that two months ago.

Guess why this picture makes me happy?

I surrender

I am losing a potty training battle today.

I prepared myself mentally for over a week. Today would be the day. I had a positive attitude that we could do this.

I purchased 6 packages of "big boy pants"

Thomas, Toy Story, Cars, and some extra thick white ones.

I loaded up on enough sugary liquids- capri suns, Popsicles, juice, etc to make sure that he had ample opportunities to use the potty.

I had stickers and Starbursts ready for motivational prizes.

I put a little potty insert into the guest toilet so he would feel more comfortable and safe and not feel like he was falling into the potty anymore.

I cleared my schedule for the day.

I said a prayer for patience.

I set the timer to take him to the potty every ten minutes.

I brought books into the bathroom so we could sit and read while we waited for him to tinkle.

It's 2 PM.

I've been at this since the kids left for school at 8 AM.

Since then, I've changed 11 wet pairs of big boy pants.

He has not tinkled 1 drop into the toilet.

Not. One. Tiny. Drop.

But he's loving all the sugar and attention.

The only thing that has worked was my prayer for patience.

Or maybe it's not patience anymore. Maybe it is defeat. I have no more fight left. I'm not even going to open the thick, white underpants. Once Buzz lightyear is soggy, I'll pull out the diapers again. I wonder if I have time to go to Costco and buy some more in bulk today?