electric boogaloo

The key to successful potty training is acting like accidents don’t phase you one little bit. It took me awhile to grasp this because it’s counterintuitive to say positive, upbeat things about puddles of urine on your $300 living room rug. I really think there are seven stages of emotional states that parents go through before they reach Acceptance. They are:

1. Eager – excited that your child has taken an interest in toilet training, looking forward to the end of diaperdom
2. Amused – awww, isn’t that cute? He’s running towards the bathroom yelling “I need to tinkie!”
3. Horrified – Did a person who lives in my house just shit on the floor?
4. Exhausted – it will never end.
5. Annoyed – Look, you’re supposed to tell me when you have to go.
6. Frustrated – Look, really, we’ve been over this. TELL ME when you have to go!
7. Overly enthusiastic – YAYYYYY! YOU DID IT!! Let me get out the sparklers and bake a cake because YOU DID IT. WOOOOOO!!! GO YOU. (This stage may sound okay, but really it is a frantic push to the finish. Children can sense desperation and will back off in the face of all that pressure to succeed because they’re all basically ornery little punkasses who want to show you at every turn: This isn’t about YOU, it’s about ME, and right now *I* want to pee on the floor.)

I went through every single stage before I realized that accidents are good. Accidents are the only way a child can learn to do this on their own — otherwise the kid isn’t really potty trained. Carefully scheduled maybe, but not really trained. Once I started seeing every accident not as something I should try to prevent, but as a necessary step toward finishing this, I was able to give in to the process. And what do you know? Success.

Well Kevin hasn’t been here for the daily in and out of all this, so he’s been sort of hovering in stages 1 and 2. He went to take Nicolaus to the potty while I made dinner. Suddenly I heard Nicolaus bellowing “OhmyGAD. Oh! Myyyyy! Gawwwwwwwd!!”

Later I mentioned to Kevin that our kid sounded like a little valley girl and Kevin confessed that he had said it first. Ahhh! Welcome to stage three my love. Here’s your towel, your shovel, and your bottle of everclear. Use the alcohol for cleaning and/or consuming as needed.