Things I’ve said a lot of this week: “Sarah, stop licking Hooper’s butt” and “Hooper, stop touching your dong”. Here’s the recap:

Day #1

We started the day by collecting his diapers and throwing them into the trash. Hoop enjoyed this. Then we spent the morning watching cartoons while he sat on his potty. I fed him breakfast, on his potty. At some point, probably after an hour of sitting there, he stood up and pointed to the potty. Inside, there was urine. We celebrated. We high-fived. He got a piece of candy. We called Papa at work. Then he played. I reminded him of the potty and told him if he wanted more candy, he had to make piss in the potty. Then the fly by happened.

What’s the fly by, you ask? He literally flew by the potty, stuck his butt in it’s direction, and shot (and I mean shot as in like a bullet from a gun) a large size piece of shit out of his butt. The log struck the side of the toilet and streaked it’s way down to the floor. I told him to step away as I could tell he wanted to sit on the potty. He ran off in excitement and pissed in the corner. He may have pissed in the potty had I not shooed him away.

Nonetheless, there were hits and there were misses. It was day one. There was cheers and candy and there was paper towels and vinegar. All in all, a success. A start. 

Day #2

I had intended to sacrifice three full days to only potty training. But, alas, life happens and staying home for three days straight doesn’t always work out. I had a commitment to keep, so on went the diaper so my mom could take Hoop to his little class and I could go fulfill my obligation. After his morning nap, potty training reconvened. He sat on the potty long enough to eventually pee in it and we jumped for excitement once again. I gave him a piece of candy and on he went to play with his cars.

I reminded him of the potty often and used candy as encouragement. At one point he went over on his own and sat on the toilet, stood up a minute later and yelled, “yeah guys!”. I looked in the pot and there was nothing there. As he scampered away, however, I noticed some shit stuck between his cheeks. Then he straddled his bike and got shit on his bike. Then he poked the shit on his bike seat with his finger. So… not exactly a slam dunk, but definite progress. The realization that I will eventually have to teach him to wipe his butt dawned on me and the idea of keeping him in diapers fo’ life started to become more dreamy than ever.

Then he peed on the sofa. And later, again, on the floor. And that was day two.

Day #3

We spent the morning watching cartoons while sitting on the potty. I’m getting cartooned out, by the way. I hate relying on that thing, but it has been a good facilitator for potty training. I also googled “How to potty train” for the first time and can’t say I learned anything I didn’t instinctively already know. Anyway, I fed him breakfast while he sat on the potty. He got up a few times to play and would sporadically come back to the potty to sit down on his own. At one point, you could hear piss shooting into the pot and we both looked at each other with wild excitement. There wasn’t a whole lot of pee and I came to the conclusion that the excitement of it all must have stopped him mid-stride. We celebrated. He immediately said, “Can-dee, can-dee”. He’s part human, part Pavlov’s dog. Even more than the candy, I learned, he likes helping me clean up; dumping the piss into the toilet, spraying the potty with vinegar (101 uses for vinegar, right?), and flushing the toilet. I also gave him a sticker (thanks @lishyloo) and not but 5 minutes later he sat down and peed again, presumably finishing his job prior. Either that or he’s getting too smart and has learned to segment his piss to get more treats. Two year olds sure have a way of pulling the fast ones on us, don’t they? In any case, we celebrated again and cleaned up again.

Day #4 and onward

I’ll spare you the day by day shenanigans because while some seem to say “it took 3 days and that was that”, I can tell that won’t be the case for us. For starters, he naps a lot. I’m talking like he still takes a FOUR hour nap during the day and sometimes another two hour nap in the evening. I know, I know, he sleeps a lot. And, no, he does not have chronic fatigue syndrome. I laughed when someone had suggested that. I digress, but the naps make it difficult to potty train if I’m constantly slapping a diaper on for him to sleep in. Sometimes he only pisses one time before he’s ready to sleep again. So I only get so many opportunities in a day to potty train. And I’m not comfortable, yet, to leave the house without a diaper on. Wow, I just re-read that sentence and now it sounds like I’m the incontinent one. Let me re-phrase that: I’m not comfortable, yet, to leave the house without a diaper on Hooper. Whew, I feel better now that I made that correction. So, I don’t know. That’s where we’re at. I suppose I’ll keep going with the naked thing for the time that we’re home and awake and then, when he has a better grasp on that concept, I’ll start swapping out the diaper with the undies. What do ya’ll think? Is that a good plan? I will say, however, that by day 5 he was 4 for 4 and has not had an accident since. So, perhaps we are getting somewhere. Now we just need to work on clothing him once again and encouraging him to communicate that he’s gotta go… Round three will be coming your way.

You can read about round one here.