Potty Training Is Stupid

I don't think there's been anything more irritating or frustrating that I've dealt with in regards to the kids than trying to potty train Gabe. I mean, there are certainly more irritating or frustrating MOMENTS, but nothing that's been such a protracted and seemingly hopeless battle as trying to get him to use the toilet. Except maybe their sleeping. But I can't really complain too much about that since Libby has been handling the night time duties almost exclusively for the past several months.

I don't get it, either. He's been able to recognize when he's gone or going to the bathroom since he was about 18 months old--several people even commented that he would be a breeze to potty train because of this fact. But that has been anything but the case. He does recognize when he's gone, but he seems incapable of identifying the feeling BEFORE he goes, and we've tried all sorts of gimmicks to coax him into cooperating. Even asking him every ten minutes if he needs to go until he finally does often doesn't help.

I tried that yesterday. I put him in a pair of underwear instead of his diaper or pull-up and asked him about every five minutes if he needed to go. Then I took a break from asking while he ate his dinner, and, sure enough, he peed all over himself and the dining room chair he was sitting on. And today, Libby took him out in the back yard to play in the sandbox, again wearing underwear. Eventually, she got tired of asking and just took off his pants so he'd HAVE to see when he went. She tried to get him to pee on all sorts of things, but, in the end, he had to sit down on a part of his sandbox and pee out into the yard. Even though he pees standing up as soon as he gets into the bath every time (usually after he spends a few minutes sitting on the toilet, not peeing)!

And forget about poop. He doesn't seem to have a clue what that feels like before it happens. Ugh.

To be honest, I spent a goodly portion of my waking hours worrying about all of the various things he's not getting done, and potty training is always at the front of the pack. I see him wearing a diaper in kindergarten, being relentlessly teased by everyone there--even the teacher, since he/she will have to do the cleaning up and will be understandably resentful. I remember in kindergarten, one of my classmates still dropped his pants and underwear all the way to the floor when the school year started, and most of the rest of us boys made fun of him until he cried. Kids are terrible human beings! But that kid wasn't even wearing a diaper, he was just dropping his pants to the floor! Gabe will be saddled with the stigma of being a poopy pants for the rest of his life! Argh! The stress of it all!

So that's fun.

We also got a few good videos tonight. Libby, in her infinite patience for mess making (though, admittedly, I'm the one who got to clean it all up, which probably helps her motivation for such tasks), helped Gabe make a chocolate pudding pie tonight. He had a ball, and the video might be one of the more amusing ones we've gotten of him in awhile.

(So, this video was too long to upload onto blogger, apparently. Instead, I posted it on youtube. Here it is.)

My favorite part is how he had to keep looking for clean arm spots to wipe his mouth on. Then, when he ran out, he started to lick an arm clean. Surprisingly, after dinner, he wasn't all that interested in eating any more, since he'd probably had half a package of pudding by that point.

Shortly after dinner, Gabe and Norah started a new game, where she opened up the diaper cabinet (her favorite toy right now, god knows why), and he ran over and closed it. I like the shit-eating grin on her face each time she opened it and turned back to see what Gabe was going to do about it. I tell you, she's going to be trouble for that boy, and she's going to be trouble on purpose.