Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Potty Training Update

So I know that everyone probably doesn't want a play by play of my son's bathroom occurances but since I have no other adults to talk to the blog will have to do. I almost gave up on potty training yesterday. It seemed that eveytime I put Lucas on the potty he screamed bloody murder and wanted to get off. I got really frustrated and had a few tears but after praying for strength and patience I decided to finish off the day and put Lucas in his room to go to bed at 6pm (which he didn't really fall asleep until 830pm). But I needed my sanity. As I sat in the bathroom I kept telling myself I have never give up on anything and I am not about to start now. I potty trained Beau and kept at it even though it got really really hard (the 30th day of waking up to find a poop covered dog was when I was reaching my breaking point). I taught Lucas about time out, they say a minute for every year so at 1 year when he did something naughty he got warned but then if it continued he got stuck in the time out chair. The first few times were hard but everytime he got up his minute started over again. Finally, it really didn't take that long, he got the hang of it and if we tell him to go and sit in his time out chair from another room he knows where it is and we know when he gets there because we hear this whine of definace. And lastly, we were having a very picky eater for a while. It drove me crazy because he never wanted to eat what I cooked and I never wanted to cook him a special meal. Now I am not some crazy parent who will make their child eat for breakfast what they didn't eat for dinner, but I do expect my children to try the food in front of them. Again, we learned a bite for every year old, so Lucas was only expected to eat one bite of what ever was in front of him. Now I have a strange child who would love to eat fruits and vegetables but refuses meat. The first time we implemented the one bite per year rule it took me 20 minutes and finally force feeding my child to try a bite. It slowly got easier from there, very slowly. There were many time outs and tears on his end but he learned if he just took one bite then he would be off the hook. Then one bite turned to two bites and so on. Now, Lucas will eat pretty much anything, however I do respect his tastebuds and if he is getting sick of the dinner I don't force him to finish his whole plate. I am also happy to report that he is eating meat with little to no struggle. So, with all that under my belt, I just knew that yesterday I could not give up.
I am happy to say that today went a lot smoother. He actually went into the bathroom himself, moved his stool to the toilet and started to climb up when he needed to go potty. I had to help him the rest of the way but he went potty with no struggle. He has also told me on numerous times that he needed to go potty (the word he uses unanimously for pee or poop is "poop"). I hopefully can teach him the better words for when we venture out into the world so I don't have a child screaming "POOP" in the middle of the store. I have to say to all those out there who are changing poopy diapers, it is so nice when they go into the toilet. Lucas pooped on the toilet for the first time today and that was such a relief!!! I am hoping that by the end of the week Lucas will be pretty much potty trained. We have come so far in just 3 days!!!
Keep your fingers crossed for me that this is successful and I maintain my sanity!

1 comment:

Becca said...

Wow - I love it. I am trying to get our 2 1/2 year old to eat dinner - he does the same thing - won't touch anything I make for dinner, and I have never made him anything special. We also have a rule that everything we are eating for dinner goes on his plate, but he doesn't have to eat it all. How did you do it? I need pointers because I am about going ballistic, and he keeps going to bed without dinner (I don't know if he really minds much). Anyway... your blog is great. :)