The victory (don't get too excited)

So I wouldn't be a true mommy to toddlers without having a blog about potty training at some point. I'm not going to say that it's the hardest thing about being a mom. I'm also not going to be one of those moms (no offense if you're one of these) who is like "Oh, yeah, potty training was the easiest thing ever. My one year old did it on his own!"

So with that said, let me just say that for my family, the diaper part of life has always been filled with nasty adventures. My daughter, beautiful child that she is, used to paint her walls with the materials found in her diapers. My son Andrew doesn't so much like to paint the walls as he does his stuffed animals. Jeffy has yet to discover any of this and I'm very much hoping that he skips this phase altogether.

Kadee Joy literally potty trained herself, but not until pretty late in her toddler life. I tried without success the entire time she was two years old. She just didn't feel the physical urge to go the bathroom, and after a few too many tiresome times of sitting on a toilet without success she began to fear and protest the bathroom. So it was given up. Right after Jeffy was born our household officially consisted of three kids in diapers, and the financial strain and and ridiculous amount of time spent changing kids began to take a toll on Mommy and Daddy.

Then, just a few weeks after Jeffy's birth, Kadee Joy began saying "Mommy, I need to go potty!" So we would run, and she would go. And that was it. Done. She still had to wear a diaper at night for a short time, but quickly thereafter became fully potty trained. And I must say that it does make life 100 times easier as far as taking care of her.

Mr. Andrew has recently developed a new system for letting me know that he needs to go potty. He drops his semi-filled drawers and, unless I catch him before, watches the fountain he is able to make while he pees on the floor. Of course, I usually hear what sounds like running water (and is, I guess), and come running to find the newly dampened carpet with Andrew smiling. So I run him to the bathroom, put him on the toilet, and he finishes the job, giggling with delight at his magical ability to create a fountain. Then I put a new diaper or pull-up on him, send him running, and go find the spot and clean it up. We have refilled our entire bottle of carpet cleaner over the last two weeks. We're hoping it slows down.

However, he does not have an aversion to the toilet which is HUUUGE. And his all-consuming desire for liquids means that there is generally always something he can deposit in the toilet.

We had a major victory just a few minutes ago. Andrew dropped his diaper and sat down, but luckily I was close by. I grabbed him and planted him on the toilet, which he promptly filled. He rediscovered the incredible ability to aim his fountain, giggled, and then said "Ah dun." I took him off, clapped for him, and put a new pull-up on him. His pullups have the red car from "Cars" (sorry I'm blanking on his name, and Kadee Joy also calls him "red car"), and so in putting them on he always quotes "Oh, yeaaaaah.". I then checked his old diaper, which was to my astonishment and delight was still dry!

So our next step is working on the signal. It usually takes a good six months of daily practicing and prompting for Andrew to be able to add a new word to his vocabulary. He already uses the word "Poo Poo" for "Blues Clues", so we're stuck with "potty." I'm trying to think of a potty song, because he'll pick up on songs after only two or three times of hearing it.

My goal is to have him potty trained before he goes to school in the fall (his preschool for kids with developmental delays), but we'll see. It's a little tough, because he has difficult connecting both rewards and punishments with their related behaviors. However, it may just be that being able to sit on a toilet and make a fountain will be all the reward Andrew needs. Let's hope so!