One of the things I dreaded about parenthood was toilet training. Even before Charlotte came along I knew that I would hate this stage. I'm not sure why I have this attitude, but it all just seems really hard. And the last few weeks I feel justified in that.
I had decided though that Charlotte would be toilet trained by the age of two. Definitely done before the new baby came along. And then I got pregnant. I couldn't even get off the couch let alone worry about taking her to the toilet. And dealing with wees and poos would have been an impossibility. So we decided to delay toilet training. I felt really bad about this, but then Charlotte wasn't really showing any signs of readiness so we just went with it.
I was very happy to just ignore the issue until about 2 weeks ago when Charlotte decided that she didn't want to wear nappies, she wanted to wear undies. Eeeek. So I let her. I figured we could see how the day went. And it was fantastic! I put her on the toilet a number of times and she did a wee each time! No tantrums, it was great! I felt like a brilliant mummy! The next day was a daycare day and we let her go in undies, and she did really well all day, and the next. But then I got a bit erratic and would put her in a nappy to go out or for her nap and forget to take it off. She started to refuse to go to the toilet. We started to have more accidents. I could handle that. That was fine. It was the tantrum over every aspect - I don't want to go, I don't want to wash my hands, I don't want to put my pants back on, and worst of all - I don't want to change my pants after weeing them, instead I want to run around the house leaving little wee wee footprints everywhere. After a particularly trying day where she refused to go to the toilet all day I had had enough and we went back to nappies.
But of course then I felt guilty. We went to the baby expo last weekend and there was a stand there on potty training (http://www.pottytraining.com.au), and they had a kit. So I bought it even though I was dubious. First day they recommended just letting your child go and seeing what happens, so that you know how big their bladder is, what is the routine etc. This made sense so that rather than making her go every 30 mins, I now know she only needs to go every 2 hours. But it was still a frustrating day. But then I sat down and read the book that came with it, and talked about the matching chart and stickers. The next day she did wee wees in the potty. And then some more, one little accident, but then the rest of the day was dry!! And the same the next day, we even had a poo in the potty! The last 2 days at daycare she has stayed dry (with one poo accident) and they even said she asked to go. I can't believe it, we seem to have a toilet trained child. I still don't think we are done yet, but we are definitely on our way there.
I have to say though that it has been exhausting. Trying to convince her to go regularly, watching her constantly, being supportive. Phew. All I can say is that I am glad we didn't go and replace our crappy stained carpet with something new and plush because the wee comes out of our crappy stained carpet quite easily!
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