Potty Training 101

**Disclaimer: Please do not be fooled by the title of the post. This is in no way a lesson in potty training. As a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure the I could use some lessons on the potty training process myself before I have to go through it with four at once in a couple of years!

Jackson was a tough sell on the whole potty training business, but there is light at the end of the tunnel, as a matter of fact, I think we are exiting the tunnel! I had several mothers of boys tell me not to even attempt potty training until your boy is 3 unless he shows interest before that. I definitely see what they were saying. Jackson wanted NOTHING to do with it. He would get right in my face and tell me, " I don't want to go pee pee on the potty!" or " I just want to sit in my poop!" How do you argue with that? You can't make a kid pee!!

So, how did we finally convince him to give it a go . . . we didn't. John, his best friend, was the instrument of his success. John decided to start using the potty and therefore it became a competition. Jackson had to "beat" John. Jackson is nothing if not competitive. In reality, John beat Jackson at this one, but Jackson doesn't need to know that if the "competition" motivated him!!

We've had some ups and downs and some entertaining moments, but we've had peeing in the potty down for about a month, and the second piece of the puzzle had been in place for about two weeks now. I'm bribing. We told him that once he could do it all the time, he gets a hotwheels race track that he fondly refers to as "Crash Cars". I have it sitting out taunting him and he talks about it most days!! He knows the rules to get it and he reminds me of those rules frequently! Of course we still get the occasional accident, but overall, I think we are just about there!!!! Yay! (The downside, soon I will have to set up "Crash Cars", like probably tomorrow.)

On the road to potty training, we encountered some rather hilarious moments, here is a glimpse into our ADVENTURES IN POTTY TRAINING. . . I was lured into a false sense of ease at the beginning of this process. I purchased a potty chair just to have around not long after he turned two. I figured that if he showed interest it would already be here. When we first got it out of the box, he used the seat as a hat!! (Maybe that should have been my first sign)

October 2009: 2 years old

Last February (yes, almost 11 months ago), Jackson randomly told me one afternoon, "Momma, I want to go pee pee in the potty." So of course I didn't argue and sure enough . . . SUCCESS (we celebrated with cheering and TWO suckers)! Well, I thought I was scott free on the potty training business . . . until the next day. The next morning, he once again requested to pee pee on the potty. Well, this time he sat there for 30 minutes (naked, in our house where the heater was broken). I kept trying to convince him to try later or to put clothes on so he wouldn't be cold, but of course he told me no. After 30 minutes of "trying" he finally told me through chattering teeth,"Momma, I want to get up, I'm cold." Poor baby. Well, apparently this traumatized him because after that, he wanted absolutely nothing to do with the big boy potty! I let it go for a while. Then came the news about the quads. I was dreading the idea of 5 in diapers, so we talked about it and made some half-hearted attempts. Around Mother's Day we spent a weekend in big boy underwear. I was hoping my child who hates to be dirty would hate having accidents and decide to pay attention. This was not the case. He just peed on the living room floor repeatedly (fortunately we have hard floors). As the pregnancy progressed, I just didn't have the energy to deal with it. My mom would work on it when she was here, she bought him pull ups, made a sticker chart, etc. The best was when she told him she would get him some cheerios to put in the toilet for target practice, to which he replied,"Granna, how would cheerios and pee be good." You can't argue with his logic. I guess he got tired of being pushed because one day when he thought no one was looking, he poured a glass of water in his potty chair and tried to pass it off as pee!! We talked about all the people who use the big potty including Transformers (his favorite). He argued that Transformers did not pee in the potty, then remembered the scene in the movie where Bumblebee "pees" and told us, "Transformers pee on people." I was waiting for this to materialize into a new, not so fun game, but fortunately it did not!

After much struggle and months of discussion with Jackson, John decided he was ready and therefore Jackson also decided. It didn't take long once he made up his mind. He struggled the most when he was too busy to be bothered with stopping to pee. In November, he was outside playing soccer with Poppo and peed his pants because he was having too much fun to stop. When Poppo noticed and said they needed to go in and change his pants, Jackson simply replied, "Pee dries, Poppo." Once again, you can't argue with his reasoning:) Anyway, the moral to the story, I should have listened to the women who told me to wait until he was 3! Now he's a pro and can even pee standing up (a new thing today) and in public places (that was a struggle at first). I do have to say that the hardest part was and still is, when I am here alone with all five kiddos and feeding two babies and Jackson exclaims,"I have to go the bathroom, I need help." We are working on improved independence still. Whew, glad the training part of it is over for a couple of years! I definitely think that the tiny foursome will have to be trained one at a time, probably girls first unless boys show some significant interest because otherwise I might have to be committed :)