Wonderful World of Potty-Training

I am fairly certain that no one else will find this news as exciting as me today…but, nonetheless, it’s an exciting day for me so I absolutely must share!

In the world of potty-ing, I am pleased to report that our little Taylor did her first ever poop in the “big girl” potty just moments ago! I'll say it again...let it sink in....first ever poop in the "big girl" potty by Taylor.

As all of you know, I’d made the decision to introduce potty-training to the twins for the very first time when the twins turned 2-1/2 years old. Neither of the girls were ready for it back then, so I called it quits after just a week.

About a month later, I re-attempted potty-training with the twins and it’s been pretty hit or miss ever since. Sometimes they would have a successful pee-pee in the potty but those have been few and far between. Additional challenges to our potty-training efforts has been the utter, near impossible schedule Mondays – Fridays each week that we have to maintain due to all the therapy appointments. We run the roads non-stop from one appointment to the next and it’s simply been unfair to challenge or expect the twins to get this whole potty-training thing when there is little opportunity to provide them with consistent time every day to just sit on the potty and make lots and lots of potty runs to and from the bathroom. Plus, to further complicate matters in the world of potty-training, all the therapists with whom we have appointments with had specifically requested that diapers be in use while the therapy sessions were taking place (to avoid any ‘accidents’ during the therapy sessions). So, straight away I learned that it was unfair to have the girls in “big girl” pants on the weekends and to concentrate our efforts on potty-training all weekend to only then have to put them back into diapers again come Monday through Friday. Talk about mixed messages to a toddler, right?! Can you imagine? Today, you wear "big girl" pants. Now, the next 5 days, you're back in diapers. Okay, weekends here again so back to "big girl" pants. How confusing and tormenting that would be to them.

During our latest round of potty-training efforts, I’d been told by lots of different people that the twins simply aren’t ready for potty-training and that I should wait until they’re 3 years old. Many of these folks encouraging me to wait ‘til 3 years old happen to be other mothers of multiples and 3 years old was the starting age for potty-training for nearly every one of them. One of the moms even shared with me that 3 years old is the age to start because it said so in “the books that give a checklist of things to do for potty-training.” When I heard that, I thought about my Mom, and her mom and her mom and all the previous generations – who, I’m pretty sure didn’t use books when they decided to work on potty-training.

Well, anyways, I have been maintaining a no-pressure, they’ll get it when they’re ready approach to potty-training for the past few weeks. It may be 3 years old, maybe 3-1/2 years old, maybe sooner. Who knows.

Well, back to what I was saying....we’ve not been able to concentrate too much on potty-training Mondays – Fridays since we compete with so many out-of-the-house appointments, but on the weekends when I’m home, I try to provide the girls with opportunities to sit and go potty but again, there’s been no pressure on them or me.

Today, Taylor came over to me and said “need to poop”. This was a first!!! So, we scurried to the bathroom, pulled down britches and sat. As soon as she sat down, she immediately started saying “all done, all done, all done, all done.” I told her, “let’s just sit and sing some of our songs for a few minutes while you go potty.” We ran through “Jesus Loves Me, Itsy-bitsy Spider, Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star” and got half-way through the ABCs song when all of sudden, splish-splash a little poop appeared in the “big girl” potty. Taylor cried a little bit at first, struck, I think, by the mystery of what had just happened. I praised her and showered her with lots of “WOW’s” and “You Did It”!!!! Pretty soon, she was feeling pretty stoked and like such a big girl.

When we came out of the bathroom, lo and behold, there was Paige saying “need to go poop.” So, Paige and I ventured into the bathroom and did the sit on the potty, sing songs routine as I’d just done with Taylor. Like Taylor, Paige started up with the “all done, all done, all done, all done” as soon as she sat on the potty. We ran through all of our little songs together – twice, actually – and still Paige kept saying “all done, all done, all done, all done.” And, so we pulled up britches and came out of the bathroom. About 30 seconds later, Paige went poop in her pants. Yep, she was right on when she was telling me that she needed to go poop, but she was not about to go in THAT potty. Ha, ha, ha.

So, while we are still in the trenches of the wonderful world of potty-training and while it is probably taking us a little longer than most, today was a good day because Taylor finally did her first poop in the “big girl” potty! I think when we say our daily prayers later today, we’ll be adding a new prayer of thanks to God! We can thank God for helping Taylor learn to be such a big girl today and for helping her go poop in the “big girl” potty. We’ll of course say roughly the same prayer with Paige too but modify it slightly to something like: “Thank you, God, for helping Paige to sit like such a big girl on the “big girl” potty today. Please help her to go poop next time we sit on the potty.”