The Potty Wars

Tiger: Our faithful readers may recall that we have had random acts of potty training with Bobby over the last year or so. Before Bobby was even 2 years old he started potty training. He did very well for a bit then all of a sudden he refused to have anything to do with the potty. After a few months we had some more potty success & Bobby even pooped in the potty. Of course this was totally by accident on his part. He was trying to be funny & fart on the potty. When a little poopy came out Bobby freaked & seemed horrified that something fell out of his butt butt when he was trying to fart. This caused a total meltdown & we were back to diapers all the time.

Mommy has been trying not to push the issue but as his 3^rd birthday rolled around & the doctor frowning on my parents about the fact that my brother wasn’t really trying to potty train has added some stress. Shortly after that dr. visit Bobby started to try to use the potty in spurts. Then he went to Ms. Delania’s for a visit. Zach was astonished that Bobby was in a diaper because “only baby’s wear diapers”. The next day Bobby wanted to get a little frog potty & pull ups. Mommy was ecstatic.

Sometimes it seems like we have tried everything & none of it works. There was the infamous let the kid be naked for 2 days while awake. I will spare you most of the gory details but lets just say the house was very aromatic & there were little piles hiding every where throughout the house. Bribing doesn't really work more than a few times because Bobby starts to try bargaining rewards then stops making an effort if he doesn't get things his way. The list just goes on & on.

Anyone that has potty trained knows this is a very hard process & can take a loooong time. It takes a lot of energy & dedication. We have had a long, hard road & every time we think we are close to the end there is a back slide. It is so frustrating. Sometimes you can almost hear mommy's sanity snapping as we slide backwards. Mommy also seems to be putting herself in timeout more & more when there are accidents. Of course neither of my parents are being mean about this because that just won't help get over this mountain. Sometimes I just don't know how they do it.

I am glad I am a dog & learned very fast to go do my business outside. Now if only Trixie would get that thru her head then Bobby would be the only one in need of potty training. Trixie seems to think our laundry room is her own personal litter box. She will go potty outside most of the time but periodically she just plays around outside then comes in to potty in the floor. Like I said she usually uses the laundry room but every now & then you will here 1 of my parents yell as they squish in some random potty accident.