I’m free. Finally. Can I get a whoop whoop? I know. You have no clue what I am whoop whooping about, but by the time you have finished reading this, I think you will be joyfully whooping with.

I now have a few strong beliefs regarding parenthood. The first: that when it comes to babies, everyone should receive one difficult one. It just seems fair that way. There’s something horribly wrong with the idea of someone having ten children and all of them being easy breezy colic free in infanthood. It’s all so moms can earn that extra sufferage badge (Me!) And make everyone think they had the WORST baby EVER in the history of all WORST babies EVER. Then, any time someone says they had a difficult baby, I morph into THAT person and I get competitive with the horrible stories. {“Oh really? Have you met Satan’s daughter? Did your child sleep with you for ELEVEN months? Wake up every two hours for the first nine months of her LIFE? SPIT UP BLOOD? NO? I didn’t think so. I win.” And if they say yes, I then pull out the trump card and say DO YOU HAVE THREE? And then I usually win again.} (and any mom with three or more is now rolling her eyes because, well, let’s face it,  the obvious reasons that this is extremely annoying and there are lots of people out there that could easily put the smack down on me with their horror stories-yet I like to wallow my misery and write about it on the dot com…)

Regardless, the bad baby subject matter goes right up there on the shelf with natural childbirth, categorized in the GOOD-FOR-YOU-BUT-NO-ONE-ELSE-CARES MAYBE-YOU’LL-GET-DOUBLE-DIAMONDS-IN-YOUR-MOMMY-CROWN WHEN-YOU-GO-TO-HEAVEN section of life. I know. You’re all, “OMGAH get over it already. If I hear her whine about how hard Emerson was one more time I’m going to throw my laptop around the room and send her some cheese and wine and a tiny violin and anything else generically indicating she’s a totally pathetic attention whore via the internet, in the mail. Packaged delicately in some homemade ANTHRAX. SHUT UP ALREADY...” 

So to summarize my blog subject matter run amuck: My first point was that there is just something wrong with the delicate balance of the universe and all things equally shared if:

1. Some mom out there somewhere never experiences a truly difficult baby. SUFFER already. (Sheesh.) And…

2. Everyone should experience a strong willed child and the execution of the impossible experience that is POTTY TRAINING.

I am not incompetent and neither is Aiden. He’s absolutely brilliant. I think that is the problem. But I won’t lie. I was beginning to think SOMETHING was wrong with me as a parent. Side note: apart from my open soapbox of gripeage let me just say, our children, as a result, are NOTHING short of fabulous personality. The personality practically oozes from their ears, and they have enough to share with ten other kids greatly lacking. I’m slightly worried Malone is going to be BORING compared to these other two, for the simple fact that he’s been so awesomely good (so far apart from the whole volcanic eruptions from both ends bit.)

Back to my original POINT: It only took me 1.5 years to train Aiden. He would tinkle just fine. But no poop. Oh the horror of the poop: the child was absolutely non coercible in the process of poopage. I got so tired of (very helpful, mind you) people being all, oh did you try the chart? We did a chart. He was trained in one day. Did you try cheerios? Toys? M and M’s? Standing on your head? Disney World? Lock him in his room for a week so he could sleep in his own feces? Make him clean it up? Threaten him? Dangle him from his toes on an overpass? LAXATIVES? -My kid is 5 mos old and potty trained. She also gave up the paci and is now reading on the first grade level.- {REALLY? Did you purchase her first TRAINING BRA last week, too? Good for you. My kid is now four, poops his pants…and this totally stresses me out.}

We tried it all. I was tired. And bitter that so far, nothing has been easy for us in the parenting department. I had given up forcing the situation. My child needs structure, and I am mastering that delicate art with his interesting temperament every day, (read: my CLONE) but Aiden will not be forced or rushed or coerced…into anything. And so here I was, with a newborn and an eighteen month old, and a nearly 4 year old…wiping butts. Stinky little butts. All. Day. Long. It would just be really stellar if we could reduce that number from three to two since Aiden just so happened to be old enough and capable. I have bigger things to worry about like blisters on my nutritionally giving woman parts and the latest whelp on Emerson’s head from booty dancing on the coffee table…

And then Thursday morning, Aiden was doing THE dance. There he was in the middle of the den, in his Mickey Mouse whitey tidies, doing the dance. Me: (I think around three times…) “Aiden, do you need to go to the potty?”
Aiden: “No.” And then ten minutes later he asked me permission to poop in his pull-ups. {If I didn’t give him permission to poop in the pull-ups, he would hold it in for six days. No lie. Strong willed. I think you get it...I can’t possibly preface everything in this story so just roll with it or ill be explaining for days. Trust me. We’d tried EVERYTHING}

But he wasn’t wearing pull-ups. So on his way to get some, he peed on the floor. And when I say he peed on the floor, I mean he left a trail the size of Niagra falls all the way from the far corner of the rug in the living room to the bathroom, as he screamed “It’s leaking!” and left a gigantic puddle in one great big grand finale…all for me to clean up.

I was livid. Completely frustrated at this entire enabling vs. forcing vs. BATTLE of wills…this neverending cycle of a conundrum. “You are not a dog. Yet you just went on the floor like one.” I stated, and then promptly pulled out the good cop bad cop split personality approach as I firmly placed him in the bathroom for a come to Jesus on the potty moment. This was no accident. It was sheer neglect and the refusal to go when he was fully capable. I was done. This was it. (I had no clue where I was going with it, but I made him sit there.) “You will poop today. You are too big for this.” A major struggle ensued, but I made Aiden sit. He begged me to get up, but he stayed for a good thirty minutes, just to make the point, for me, that sitting on the potty is not so bad. We had tried all of this before, but it was different this time.

The potty is not scary...the potty is our friend... And I DID make it enjoyable. I knew he would fight it, so I broke out one of his fave movies on the laptop, and let him watch while I intermittently made him push. I even broke out the coke and cookies, to rewarding him for each effort. I knew he had to go and he was fighting it. In the end, we had a big bathroom party (myself and Emerson dutifully playing the cheerleadering roles: Emerson was pumped since she was able to partake in the rewards system of one mini Chips A Hoy per push.) I had de ja vu of the entire labor process again…

And this time…we made a small breakthrough. I could tell he was trying. For the first time ever. But the moment had passed. And I was, once again, too late. But for some reason, I felt like I made some ground that day. 

Here comes the best part: And such is typical in life, when Aiden went for his weekly routine of spend the night at my parents house on Friday. That night, when they turned on the jets in the hot tub for his weekly luxury-filled bubble bath, he suddenly had to go. My parents, who have been just as eager as I have been, promptly placed him on the potty. They said he had no option as he’d been holding it for so long. And he went. Apparently there was a major party, and they took pics for his baby book…(YES ACTUAL PICTURES…we were so proud to have something to frame and put at his bedside-LOOK! It’s your first big boy POO!) and apparently Aiden made a comment about “what a huge turd he had produced.” (We need to discuss the correct reference to one’s waste products) We missed it, but when the phone rang later that night, and his excited little voice told me all about it…I knew the payoff had come.

And that, my dear bloggy peeps, is the eternally long story of our potty training conundrum, and how Aiden (FINALLY) pooed. {After 1.5 years of effort.} I totally missed the moment, but have photos to document said monumentally unbelievable event.

Whoop Whoop. The End. 

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seagrass and linen

here we go

baby blues and sick babes