Potty Training 101 (Man vs. Woman)

With the house now being done, we can finally focus on more important things in our life. At the moment that happens to be working with Alex to get himself potty trained. Every day is different, and it's usually an all or nothing thing-he's either game for training that day or he isn't. Since Jason is self-employed we try to save ourselves a little money in daycare, so Jason works Tues-Saturday and stays home with the kids most Mondays. The weekends are the best times for us to focus on this because Alex gets a good 3 days of consistency, and it's when we have our most success. This past Monday I jumped off the cliff and scheduled an appointment for both kids to have professional photographs taken simultaneously. It has been a year and half since Alex's last "nice" photo, and Laura hasn't even had one taken yet due to the chaos the last year has been.

Since I didn't go to work this particular day, I got to start the day out at a more relaxed pace. Teri's definition of "relaxed pace" means I was able to drink a couple cups of coffee before I walked out the door, and I would be able to shave my legs in the shower. As I was enjoying the latter part of my relaxation, I hear the door open to the bathroom. "Mom, gotta poop" Alex tells me, since Jason happens to be home I tell Alex to go let his dad know-so I didn't have to interrupt my leg shaving time. I hear the door shut, and assume that Alex has went to tell Jason about his plans. I finish up and grab my towel as I'm getting out of the shower and as I shut the closet door, I catch Alex out of the corner of my eye-apparently he decided he couldn't wait, and had taken the liberty of putting the seat on, pulling the stool up to the toilet and parking his butt for a while. He got up, and proclaimed in a stern voice "Pooped mommy". That was my cue to make sure he was clean and ready to face his day, being a mom-I've seen poop a few million times, so I took Alex at his word, and didn't feel the need to double-check it right away. Well, Alex being a boy, opened up the door and yelled "Pooped Daddy!!!"; Jason being a man, felt the need to come examine what was left in the toilet. I continue to try and get ready for my day, and all the "poop excitement" around me continues as Jason comes in, he looks in the toilet and as serious as a heart attack says "he didn't do that, did he?!" Honestly, only a man would even consider that his wife would do something like that and then to think that I would ploy my kid to get him to come look at it?! Instead of interrogating me, I'm surprised he wasn't gloating about his kid's new found (and probably inherited-or so Jason would say) talent.

So that particular day was a success, as was the next day, and this morning as well. Some days are better than others, but we know that he'll eventually get there-when he decides that it's time. Until then, we won't push-we just try to celebrate like Rock Stars when he does do well.