Potty Training Continued...

Instead of a quick potty training week, we seem to have settled on training whenever we can find a moment. Of course, the week after I decide to potty train has to be the busiest week in a while. Most days we haven't even been home, much less had time to put on undies. So potty training has stalled a bit.

The good news: He likes the candy, so he is very motivated when we get home to run to the bathroom and ask to pee. Sometimes he actually saved a full bladder and sometimes he just does the tiniest dribble and expects payment. More often the later which gets frustrating. Considering we aren't even training him most days, I am very happy that he's at least taking initiative.

He now is able to tell us when he needs to go. Of course, it's not in normal language. He gives a big "uh oh" and often grabs himself. He'll give 1-3 of those before it's too late. It is a nice change from just having to guess or notice that the room got quiet.

The bad news: We aren't making any progress and he is getting slacker. When we do put on undies, he seems to care a lot less about accidents. These really bothered him before, but I guess we've let him get used to it.

He also has found a way to manipulate the system. Whoever believes young children are angels are crazy. Here we are at 17 months working the system! He has figured out that if he empties it all, he only gets one candy and he's done for a while. But...if he can dribble just a bit, he will need to come back quickly and he'll get candy every time he goes! The result? We are in the bathroom every two minutes...literally. Sigh.

So our next step is to give candy not for peeing, but for staying dry and maybe for peeing a lot. However, who knows when I'm going to have another slue of free days to start working on that. Oh well, if nothing else he is started and has made progress. We still have 16 more weeks until the baby is supposed to be here, so we do have time. It's a start!

Potty Training Days #4-6

If at first you don't succeed...try, try, try, try, try, try and try again.

Finally success! It has been a really long week, but we are finally getting somewhere! Day #4 started out rough and discouraging again. However, after two good refresher courses of how we pee, he ran in there the third time and just went. Just like that.

Throughout the rest of the day, we would visit the potty every 10-15 minutes and he would pee on command. No fussing, no crying, just go. Amazing!

He stayed mostly dry, although he is still having issues emptying all the way. That means he'll drink a big cup of water and then go, but only empty part of it. Then as he's playing he'll start to drip. If mommy doesn't catch it and get him emptied, he'll eventually let it all go for a big accident. However, I've found if I watch and get him to the pot every 10-15 minutes he'll stay mostly dry. Altogether, the day was a breath of fresh air!

Day #5 was pretty much a waste. It landed on a Sunday so we spent the morning at church, afternoon sleeping, and evening needing to run errands in a diaper. However, some positive things we experienced was twice when we were home, he would give a little "oh no!" and run towards the bathroom, in his language asking to go potty. We would strip him and he'd go. More often than not, his diaper would be dry. Good to know he's taking intiative himself!

Day #6 is today! And it has just started, but I won't be there. He is home with daddy today! I will recap any further news later, but we've already had an eventful morning. He continued intiating himself. I was planning on leaving him in a diaper till daddy took over, but first thing he goes running in there asking to go pee. I strip him down and he just lets it fly. By the time daddy got up an hour later, we had already gone three more times and had stayed dry.

However, today was a struggle with two things: emptying his bladder and a rebellious, uncooperative attitude. He had a very full bladder from his milk, yet would only pee a little then demand he was done. I have been trying to teach him that he needs to sit and continue, one squirt just doesn't do it! He has been very resistent to that. We spent most of the morning fighting that he could not get up. He spends so much time and energy fighting it, if he would just cooperate, he can pee quickly and be done. But of course it's never that easy.

I did find that leaving the room made him cooperate faster as there was no one left to argue with. However, that is tricky as he is still popping up and has a tendency to yank the potty bowl up spilling pee everywhere, trying to flush it himself. So I can't leave him for more than a minute yet. Hopefully, I can continue to train him to be more obedient and trustworthy with that.

More about that attitude: I have noticed this entire week since we started training that a little terrible two's monster has risen from inside of him. Children do often act out due to changes or bad things in their lives. Mine apparently is not enjoying this change and is letting me know it. The sweet little son I had last week has been replaced by a roaring dragon demanding independence and disobedience in every aspect of life. He knows mommy is not ok with fit throwing, yet has thrown several in stores this week. He has basically been awful.

Just a word of warning that this may also happen to your child as they are stressed by this big change in their lives. We are slowly working through this attitude and helping him to settle back into an open and obedient heart.

Well, we will see how the rest of today goes. He is with daddy for the very first time potty training. Daddy has never done this before, but is doing pretty good. Although he has already run through 3 pairs of underwear in the hour I have been gone, so we'll see. Unfortunately, potty training is geared more towards mommy's strengths as it takes constant attention and ridiculous patience to catch them before they pee, especially as my guy is not able to catch himself yet. Hang in there daddy!