The absolute WORST job of a Mom
So here's a subject that may or may not interest you. If you aren't or have never been a parent then it probably won't. Potty-training, or I would say "potty-coaxing" because if it really truly were potty training then it would be over and done with quickly, is the bane of my existence as a mom. Potty-coaxing is almost neck and neck with getting kids to eat and only surpasses it as the worst job of a mom because of it's gross-ness and possibly slightly higher frustration level, which well nevermind, is actually due to gross-ness after all.
As most of you know I have a 4+ year old and a 2.5 year old. I have said for years now since Beya was born that eventually she would be potty-trained before Novan and I think that may actually be the case now that I have started Beya. Novan is still not potty-trained and when I take him for babysitting I still leave him in a pull-up for fear that he will have the babysitter changing his pants 3 times or peeing on their carpet. To this day, I still have to tell him to go use the potty when I see him dancing around. He does go by himself from time to time but usually only after he has leaked all over himself. I feel like I have tried everything in the book. I have spanked, yelled, bribed, done the chart thing, taken away privileges like using the computer and watching TV, sent him to his room, made him clean up himself, run him under the cold shower, and put him back in a cloth diaper. He just doesn't seem to be motivated by anything.
I know he doesn't do it to spite me or to be difficult. That much is apparent because when his pants do get too wet he goes to his room and gets new ones all by himself in hopes that I won't notice. Often I don't until I see that he has new ones on. He usually will do #2 in the potty just fine, UNLESS he still has his pull-up on from the night. I always try to get that thing off pronto before he goes in it but sometimes he does it before I wake. We go over and over and over and over and over the night before. "OK Novan, so what do you do when you wake up in the morning?" "Take my pull-up off" he says. "Ok and where do you go poop?" I ask. "In the potty." he says. I think the only reason he doesn't poop in it sometimes is because I get it off before he can. If he's in it when he's got the urge though, he goes. So when he does I stick him in an empty bathtub with a trash can and some wipes and tell him I am not cleaning poop anymore. I just started this one actually. He has had to clean himself twice after tantrums and crying of course. We will see if that sticks but I certainly am not betting anything by it. I have even tried for a long period of time to put him to bed with nothing on. Well I got sick of his room smelling like pee and washing sheets daily. He would wake up smelling head to toe of urine. It was disgusting and I think some form of child abuse to let my child lie in his own pee all night. Of course it fixed the pooping in the pull-up problem but created another equally distasteful problem.
He has even pooped in his pants on rare occasions. He is very ashamed when that happens but it only does happen because he tries to hold it too long. Usually with no pull-up on he goes just fine in the potty. Peeing in his pants is the worst though. It's never an all-out soaking episode but like I said before, he leaks because he is trying to hold it too long. I couldn't get that kid 100% potty-trained if my life depended on it. He is simply not motivated to stay dry. My laundry schedule revolves around when that kid runs out of pants. It's pretty rediculous. I know people are like "oh don't worry, he has to get potty-trained eventually, it's not like he's going to go to school in diapers!" Yeah right, and don't you tell me that other kids making fun of him is gonna motivate him either because that kid marches to the beat of his own drum just like Brad. The only thing that is gonna motivate him is the development of higher reasoning skills in which he understands that it is actually more comfortable to be in dry clothes and having to change his pants all the time actually takes MORE time away from what he wants to be doing than running to the toilet when he has to go and thereby staying dry. He operates like Brad who never does anything unless it makes logical sense in his head.
As most of you know I have a 4+ year old and a 2.5 year old. I have said for years now since Beya was born that eventually she would be potty-trained before Novan and I think that may actually be the case now that I have started Beya. Novan is still not potty-trained and when I take him for babysitting I still leave him in a pull-up for fear that he will have the babysitter changing his pants 3 times or peeing on their carpet. To this day, I still have to tell him to go use the potty when I see him dancing around. He does go by himself from time to time but usually only after he has leaked all over himself. I feel like I have tried everything in the book. I have spanked, yelled, bribed, done the chart thing, taken away privileges like using the computer and watching TV, sent him to his room, made him clean up himself, run him under the cold shower, and put him back in a cloth diaper. He just doesn't seem to be motivated by anything.
I know he doesn't do it to spite me or to be difficult. That much is apparent because when his pants do get too wet he goes to his room and gets new ones all by himself in hopes that I won't notice. Often I don't until I see that he has new ones on. He usually will do #2 in the potty just fine, UNLESS he still has his pull-up on from the night. I always try to get that thing off pronto before he goes in it but sometimes he does it before I wake. We go over and over and over and over and over the night before. "OK Novan, so what do you do when you wake up in the morning?" "Take my pull-up off" he says. "Ok and where do you go poop?" I ask. "In the potty." he says. I think the only reason he doesn't poop in it sometimes is because I get it off before he can. If he's in it when he's got the urge though, he goes. So when he does I stick him in an empty bathtub with a trash can and some wipes and tell him I am not cleaning poop anymore. I just started this one actually. He has had to clean himself twice after tantrums and crying of course. We will see if that sticks but I certainly am not betting anything by it. I have even tried for a long period of time to put him to bed with nothing on. Well I got sick of his room smelling like pee and washing sheets daily. He would wake up smelling head to toe of urine. It was disgusting and I think some form of child abuse to let my child lie in his own pee all night. Of course it fixed the pooping in the pull-up problem but created another equally distasteful problem.
He has even pooped in his pants on rare occasions. He is very ashamed when that happens but it only does happen because he tries to hold it too long. Usually with no pull-up on he goes just fine in the potty. Peeing in his pants is the worst though. It's never an all-out soaking episode but like I said before, he leaks because he is trying to hold it too long. I couldn't get that kid 100% potty-trained if my life depended on it. He is simply not motivated to stay dry. My laundry schedule revolves around when that kid runs out of pants. It's pretty rediculous. I know people are like "oh don't worry, he has to get potty-trained eventually, it's not like he's going to go to school in diapers!" Yeah right, and don't you tell me that other kids making fun of him is gonna motivate him either because that kid marches to the beat of his own drum just like Brad. The only thing that is gonna motivate him is the development of higher reasoning skills in which he understands that it is actually more comfortable to be in dry clothes and having to change his pants all the time actually takes MORE time away from what he wants to be doing than running to the toilet when he has to go and thereby staying dry. He operates like Brad who never does anything unless it makes logical sense in his head.
I totally agree that potty training is the absolute worst mommy job (or at least neck in neck with nursing). It's enough to motivate me not to have any more kids. London would hold it ALL DAY. But she wouldn't leak. She had total control. And she wouldn't poop in the potty for a LONG time. She just got fully potty trained about 6 months ago. She would hold her poop until she had her diaper on at night and then she would poop, I would change her diaper, and she would go to bed. Finally we ran out of diapers and I didn't buy more. I tried that once before but she kept peeing in the bed. I decided to try again a few months later and she didn't wet the bed anymore, but I think it takes boys longer to not wet the bed. Anyway, I really do understand and I'm sorry to hear that it's so horrible with Novan. Hopefully your other kids will be easier. I am NOT looking forward to potty training ever again. There were so many times that I just gave up and let her do her own thing and then other times I would just get so mad that she wasn't potty trained yet. Now she's FINALLY fully trained. Good luck. That's all I can say.
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