A Time For Change....

Just a heads up: This entry is about Anna becoming potty trained. If you want to look at the few pictures I posted and know that is what it's all about, great. If, however, you'd much prefer to read the incredibly long description of the ENTIRE process, then by all means, read on my friend........................................................


As most of you know, Anna is just over 3 years old now. Her tastes are maturing - see tea party above- and she is becoming more and more sophisticated and grown-up every day. :-) For example, one of her favorite words right now is 'certainly'. Doesn't that just sound like a little woman, and not a 3 year old? So, it is very surprising that Anna has had little interest in learning to go potty like a 'little woman'. Sure, she would humor us and use the potty occasionally, but when I would delve deeper with her in conversation, she would say something along these lines: "I just want to wear diapers, mom. I don't want to be bigger. You can just change me. No thanks." And if she somehow caught on to my disappointed vibe she'd reassure me, "It's okay sweetie."


I guess that I should take a second to clarify here. I, we, have not spent much time AT ALL trying to get Anna to potty train. (We've talked about it a bit, we've asked her to sit on the potty a few times and she's obliged, and she happened to go a couple of those times.) Since Anna turned two I have used all the excuses I could think of to put it off, mainly legitimate ones: I'm student teaching. I'm in my third trimester. I just had a baby. We're selling our house. We're moving. We're going on a few trips over the next month. Etc. I guess in the back of my mind, my main goal was to have her potty trained before Sunbeams (the church Sunday school class she'll be starting in January). So there was always more time, but that's less than two months away now.


This past Monday we took the plunge. I mean, we went cold turkey. (No pull-ups. Just strait to panties.) I had a talk with her Monday morning explaining that she wouldn't be wearing diapers anymore, and that she would be going 'pee-pees' and 'poo-poos' on the potty. She was devastated. She cried. She said she didn't want to. She cried more. BUT, after some comforting, some explaining, some hugging, some reassuring (about 10 minutes worth)...she was okay. And here are the results...

JUST LOOK AT THAT! Smiling. Going potty. Waving at me. Oh, my little sweetie is growing up! The first day we had 4 successes and 3 accidents. The second day we only had two accidents and her first 'poo-poos' in the potty. Third day: one accident. Today: a half accident. What is a half accident you may ask? A little bit escaped before she made it to the restroom. I also just want to clarify that from the first day we explained/emphasized the idea that SHE recognize when she needs to go potty. Since, you know, she is 3 years old. So we didn't make her sit on the potty or "try" unless she felt like she needed to.

Wow, potty trained in three days...practically. :-) (We do have her wear a pull-up at night, and on the third morning she woke up dry and said she needed to go potty right away. Yay Anna!) I guess I was just totally setting myself up for the worse possible experience. This was great. Yeah, a bit draining. I mean, she "tries" about two or three times as often as she actually goes...and she usually, but not always, wants me there. I am constantly asking her if she needs to go, although it's gotten less and less as I'm learning to trust her judgement. She's proving herself. Oh, and one final piece of info: I totally expected us to just hunker down this week and not really go anywhere while we figure out the potty thing. Not so. We've been somewhere everyday...to the mall, voting (Whoo Hoo for Obama!!!!!!!), to the park, and to the Children's museum. We just take a spare potty seat with us and she's fine.

Of course I had to make using the potty as fun as possible since she was so sad about it. We say "Wheee" when it goes down...because the pees and poos are going to a party of course. :-) She has her own special hand soap and a potty toy. We do a potty dance to the tune of the cha-cha: "Pee-pees in the potty. Potty, potty potty. Shake your little bummy. Pee-pees in the potty." And repeat one more time. Finally, she gets to put a sticker (2 stickers for poos) on her potty chart - see above - and she got a present after it was full. Anna put her last sticker on this morning and was very excited about her first present, "pretend food." She's already 7 stickers on her way to another present...just from today. Needless to say, the next present will not be so exciting, as I'm sure all of these incentives will be fading pretty soon.

So, was this unbelievably long post necessary just to inform everyone that Anna is now potty trained? I think so. I was expecting the most stressful, messy, frustrating, inconvenient thing ever, and it has been the total opposite. I just wanted to write about it in full detail so I can look back and remember this amazing occurrence with my first born. Way to go Anna!!!

One final note: When Anna informs us she needs to go she refers to it as "My bum is full," or "My bum is empty." (She uses this meaning for pees and poo.) We just go with it, although I've tried to explain some anatomical differences.