A Wonderful Day (and Potty Training Is Stupid Again)

So, today, Gabe did something fantastic that I hope is a sign of more good things to come. As Libby finished getting ready for work, she decided to go up and say goodbye to Gabe. He likes to see her when he wakes up in the morning. He's never had a full blown meltdown when he's woken late and she's been gone already--but, then, that's only happened a handful of times in the last year that I can remember.

Thus, to avoid the off chance that he might pitch a fit, she goes up and says goodbye to him if he wakes up when she opens his door (which he usually does--our stairs are impossible to sneak up and down, and Gabe has a long history of waking up whenever he hears us creaking up or down them).

This morning, she went up there and he was already awake. She went in and told him she was going to work and said goodbye. Then, as usual, she asked him if he was ready to come downstairs (he still calls us to escort him down about 75% of the time--we're not sure why as he's perfectly willing to get himself out of bed and come downstairs on his own the other 25% of the time). "No, I'm still sleepy," he said. "I'll stay in bed."

Hurray! For the first time ever, Gabe CHOSE to stay in bed a little longer! Of course, this will become a bigger issue as he starts school and refusing to get out of bed becomes a staple of life (though, I expect that is the case, to one degree or another, with pretty much every kid--and who can blame them, since school is what awaits them if they get out of bed), but for now it is a wonderful thing. Remember, this is a kid who's been getting up between 5:00 and 6:30 EVERY morning for the past three years. The prospects of him sleeping even an extra half an hour are very cheer-inducing, indeed.

And then there's the opposite end of the spectrum: potty training. I am, quite honestly, at a complete loss, and nearly at the end of my tether with the whole thing. Since my last post on the subject--where I claimed that it was starting to "just happen"--it stopped "just happening." He actually seems to be regressing--ASKING me to keep a diaper on so he doesn't have to worry about having an accident, and actively ignoring every bodily clue that suggests he might need to go to the bathroom still. And this was before he'd even figured out how to poop on the toilet. He's done it once. Every other time, it's an in-his-pants kind of thing.

Nothing works. We've tried every method of subtle manipulation and passive-aggressive parenting ever suggested in parenting books, on websites, or as suggested by people who've been there, and nothing works. He counters all of it with his own stubborn logic, abject laziness, and apparent disregard for the rules of hygiene and etiquette. We tell him that babies wear diapers, and he keeps claiming to be a big boy, and he says, "I'm a baby. I want a diaper." We say it's gross to sit in pee pants and poop and that it needs to go in the toilet, and he just blithely smiles and nods then usually follows it up with something like "I pee pee in diaper so no accidents."

Ugh! I'm about ready to say screw it and go back to diapers, switching over to adult diapers here in a few months when he's too big to fit the biggest size they make for children.