21 March 2012

Potty Progress: The Poo Whisperer

So it's been a while since our last potty update. I believe my husband shall henceforth be known as The Poo Whisperer. He has taken on the lion's share of this task and it is therefore a fitting nickname. But to explain...

Mylo grasped the wee wee part of the equation pretty quickly in the end. Within about 2 weeks, he was managing most wees on the toilet with just the odd accident here and there.

Poos...not so much.

So much so that we were beginning to wonder if he would ever get it.


At the time of the last potty progress update, we'd celebrated the first poo in the toilet after a couple of weeks trying. Which in hindsight was obviously a real fluke.

After this, at least 3-4 times a week Mylo was coming home with soiled undies to clean from daycare. Sometimes the teachers would clean the undies up a bit for us, sometimes not. I have to say they really were very patient about the whole thing.

The worst part was that sometimes they'd been sitting in a plastic bag in his little daycare bag for a good part of the day before we got to work our magic on them. One friend suggested to me I should just throw the soiled undies away and buy more, but I was a bit horrified at this suggestion. Its just poo after all and they came out fine after being scrubbed and washed. Besides, if I was going to be enduring months of poos in undies, I could imagine it beginning to cost a small fortune in new undies!


The other frustration was that opportunities to try and encourage a poo in the toilet seemed few and far between, between the almost daily poo that would be in his overnight nappy plus the accidents at daycare, we just weren't getting a chance to try and beat this thing at home!

Things came to a bit of a (turtle) head (sorry bit of a rough toilet joke I know!) a fdw weekends ago when we went up to the Hawkes Bay and he didn't go for a poo the whole time we were away, despite several sessions sitting on the toilet trying, we were positive there was one in there waiting somewhere. We arrived home midday Sunday just in time for Mark to take Noah straight back out for his swimming lessons, and in a few moments of distraction, suddenly there was a small person bent over the couch with a poo in his undies and a wee all over the carpet. Gah!

I must admit I did get a bit annoyed. I'll leave my response to your imagination.

This was just before his nap. So I put a nappy on and when he got up from his nap he had another poo in it. I was OK with that (well not OK but I wasn't as annoyed).

I put him back in undies and walked outside to pick some berries for the boys. I came back in and found the same small child bent over the coffee table with an intense look of concentration....gah!

So. not. impressed!

For whatever reason, that day seemed to be the turning point. I'd like to hope it wasn't just the telling off he got that day (as it so wasn't my intention but I was kinda at the end of my wits after six weeks of solid trying and encouragement with little result!). We didn't want to give up and go back to pull ups or nappies because he had the wee-wee side so sorted, but I was really wondering how much longer we could keep going on as we were without something or someone having to give in.

But clearly something just needed to switch on in his little brain.

And then it did.


Sure we still get the morning poo in nappy if we haven't been able to get him out of bed and into his undies before he finds he needs to go. I can live with that. Poor Mark had an unfortunate code brown in bed the other morning after an early wake up when Daddy (aka the Poo Whisperer) put him in undies at 5.30am and Mylo went back to sleep but woke up and clearly forgot he was in undies...oops.

But...but...but...every other poo during the day is going in the toiiiiiiiiiiiiiilet (just imagine this being sung in happy sing song voice).

Patience and persistence and some poo whispering the key, as well as chocolate mnms, chocolate buttons, and some mini chocolate Girl Guide biscuits (yay for it being Girl Guide season!). I do feel bad for having yelled at him that day and also for doubting that he would ever 'get it'. And I'm telling you this because I'm keeping it real here.

If I could take some learning away from this, it is this:

The ability to do what needs to be done on the toilet will come.

But it might take time.

A lot of time.

And one part might happen long before the other (I wasn't really prepared for this which I think was where my biggest frustation lay)

You may need to do some poo whispering

But they WILL get it in the end.

It's a good thing this parenting journey is just that....a learning journey.

I wish I could say that I kept calm and pottyed on the whole time but hey we all know this wasn't quite the case. The intention was there, just a bit of a failure to carry out on my part. So with that in mind, I've just adjusted the lovely freebie I got from Angela-Noelle at Striking Keys to reflect our reality.


For previous toilet training posts, click here and here.

And if you're wondering how happy the little person is that he is able to do what needs to be done on the toilet all the time, just imagine this little face sitting on the loo looking up at you chuffed to bits and you get the idea.



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