Potty Training, Oh My!

WARNING: If you don't care about toddler bowel activity, trying to teach them to control it, and/or an overly long explanation of the insanity of it, you may stop reading now and find something more constructive to do with your time.

So we started potty training Aviendha today. The hardest part of today had to be the first hour and a half. I left her only in her shirt and put her little potty in front of the TV. I told her to pick out a movie (she chose Beauty and the Beast) and then I gave her lots of Juice and she used her potty as a chair. Sounds easy enough right?

About 10 minutes before the movie ended, she still hadn't done anything! I had given her about 3 and half glasses of juice so surely there should have been something! She started telling me "It hurts!" and I thought maybe she was getting tired of sitting on her potty even though the chair was padded pretty good. I told her she couldn't get off until she went pee in the potty. She started to cry a little. I wondered if it was just taking a while for her to have to go so I pushed a little where her bladder would be and she started bawling and pushed me a way. That's when I realized the little stinker was holding it! She had been holding it the entire movie! I tried telling her it was good to pee in the potty, bribing her with cookies and chocolate, but still she didn't want to go. She just cried. So then I got some warm water and put her hand in it. Yeah, she didn't like that either.

My last resort was to just give her more juice and hope that would break the dam. It did. She relaxed a little and started to go. After some congratulations, treats, and praise we picked out another movie and she returned to the potty. After about 2 minutes of sitting there she turned to me and said "I did it!" Turns out she didn't let it all out the first time and she happily let the rest go. Lets just say there was A LOT! Man, that kid can sure hold it! I know she's not afraid of the potty, I think she's just used to having something on when she does it (she asked me a couple of times if she could have a diaper put on before I got her to actually go in the potty).

The rest of the day was pretty much cake. I didn't have to ask her if she needed to go, she just went and did it when she felt the urge, not one accident. What a crazy kid! Holding it for that long??? I've never heard of a kid doing that BEFORE being potty trained! Night time and nap time will be worked on once we're in the groove for normal operating hours.

Anyway, that was day one! Surprising on several levels! What a funny kid....