We have been flirting with the idea of potty training. By flirting, I mean we have randomly been sitting M. on her little potty and waiting for something to happen. Not much has happened yet.
Because we are slackers AND Miss M has an uncanny (for a two year old) ability to not pee, we have been sitting her there in front of the Wiggles or Sesame Street. The only whiff of success we have had thus far is one time when we forgot she was there for an entire episode of Sesame Street and she managed to pee.
Of course we didn’t notice because we were having dinner! Alone! Without anyone demanding that we read books! Or yelling that she Doesn’t. Like. Meat! We were having a peaceful dinner like two normal grown ups and we were enjoying it. So we didn’t hear the tinkle.
A half hour or so later (the pee was cold), we remembered that we had a kid whose brain was turning to mush from an Elmo overdose. When we discovered the pee in the potty, we tried valiantly to make up for the fact that we missed the big moment. We praised! We clapped! We sang the Peepee in the Potty song! We totally freaked M’s shit out with our over-enthusiasm. She didn’t exactly cry, but she wasn’t thrilled by the attention either.
Trying to make up for the missed finale the last time, this weekend I was determined to be there for the tinkle. I saw Miss M making her poop face, so I scooped her up and plopped her on the potty. I sat down next to her, we turned on the Wiggles and waited.
Nada.
We watched the same episode again. Still, no pee OR poop.
We watched it a third time, because dammit, now I had already committed an hour to the project and we were getting pee if I had to sit there all night. M seemed to be enjoying herself, it wasn’t like we were torturing her or anything.
Of course, Miss M is a stubborn little bugger wouldn’t pee though.
Then I pulled out the big guns. I produced a BIG cup of juice. Usually, she only gets juice in tiny doses, so she was ecstatic. She drank a cup and a half. She started to wiggle around on the potty a lot.
A and I debated about whether she was holding in the pee or if her butt hurt from sitting on the potty (not complaining mind you, the little TV junkie) for over two hours.
Finally, after much wiggling, she stood up. And started to pee. We started the YAY! Party and tried to get her to sit back down. She freaked out, clenched off the pee stream and started crying.
She was not going to pee, no way no how.
After all that juice, I knew she had more than a few tablespoons of pee she had deposited (mostly on the bathmat I had put on the floor). She was vehemently anti-potty at this point though.
We decided to let her run around on the tile floor in the kitchen* with no diaper, just so she could get the pee/wet connection. When she realized that she wasn’t getting a diaper, she started crying and screaming. She practically begged for a diaper and PANTS.
I sent her into the living room to get a diaper from the couch. Sheran and got it. Then she ran back to get her pants (god forbid she should put on a diaper without pants…even if there is only a 30 second delay), when her poor juice-filled bladder finally gave out all over my living room rug.
Then the poor thing just LOST it. She was so upset she just cried and cried. She had apparently been holding out for a diaper for over two hours and then when she was >—< this close to finally getting one, she couldn’t take it any longer.
So we have learned some valuable lessons:
1) Just like the crying when we all sang the birthday song, M doesn’t like too much attention. Even if it is praise.
2)M has bladder control of steel. She definitely knows how to hold it in.
3)Of course an undiapered kid will pee on the only nice rug in the house. How could we not have known that?
4)We need to wait a bit longer before we try again with the potty. Otherwise she might develop Post Traumatic Pee Disorder.
*Yes. My hygiene standards are really THAT low. We needed to mop the floor anyway.