It’s in the title. You’ve been warned.
On July 28th, Olivia asked me if she could wear panties. Normally when she asks that. I always reiterate “you want to wear big girl panties?” Usually, she would say “Nahhh, not now.” However, that day she said “YESSS!”
So on went her Dora the Explorer panties my mom had bought her ages ago. She twirled around and said “I love them!” I asked her every thirty minutes or so if she needed to potty, but she kept saying “No, I don’t have to go.” Finally I heard her crying and saying she wanted to change into a pull-up. She had wet herself. I tried getting her to sit on the potty, but she ran away screaming and crying. I comforted her and she decided she wanted to put dry panties on. We tried again and she wet herself again. I asked her if she wanted to try the potty one more time and she sat on it for about 20 minutes with nothing. As soon as I put the pull-up on her, it was wet. I decided to take a break.
The next morning after breakfast we put another pair of panties on and I told her if she needed to peepee she needed to let me know so we could sit on the potty, because if she didn’t she would get wet again. About an hour later she started crying and saying she wanted to change into a pull-up. She wasn’t wet. I asked her if she needed to sit on the potty. She screamed and cried and said no.
I had two options.
A.) Put the pull-up on her and allow her to pee in the pull-up.
B.) Force her to sit on the potty.
I decided that her fear of the potty needed to be worked through. So I told her we were going to try to use the potty. She screamed and cried and kept trying to reach for me to hug her as she sat on the potty. It was painful, because I felt as if I was doing something wrong. I’m sure some child-development experts would think so. As she cried, I started hearing the familiar tinkle of pee in the potty. Suddenly, Olivia’s tears stopped and she started SMILING.
“MAMA! THE PEEPEE IS COMING OUT!”
I started telling her how proud I was of her, how incredibly brave she was for trying something new, how awesome she was, how proud Daddy was going to be and how much of a big girl she was.
We wiped, flushed (and said “bye bye” to the peepee), washed our hands and then mama did the potty dance. She enjoyed that tremendously.
We called Daddy, we called MeMe, and we all told her we were going to buy her all the panties in the store.
After that, she would tell me she had to potty, and we would go through our routine. She has had no more than four accidents in the past two weeks. Mostly involving poop, but from what I’ve read and been told, that is extremely common. She’s used potties at restaurants and done beautifully, even if the automatic flush and water freaks her out slightly. On Sunday, Olivia informed us that she no longer needed our help to use the potty. She now has a special potty seat on the big toilet, and we have retired her “Froggy Potty”–which is great, because I will no longer get pee splashed on me when Olivia tries to “help” dump the bucket. For now, anyway.
Every time she uses the potty, we continually tell her how proud we are of her (“Mama is SO proud of you, Liv!), and she beams with pride. The other day, she asked me “Are you using the potty mama?” when I confirmed that I was, she said “Olivia is SO proud of you!” She is also extremely concerned with our own potty schedules.
I wish I could offer more insight, but she was just ready. I do not ask her every thirty minutes if she needs to use the bathroom. I ask her before we leave the house, or before nap time or bed time. She is also still wearing pull-ups when she sleeps (both at night and for her nap). We will eventually get to that, but I’m not so worried. I would much rather her sleep in the pull-up than be traumatized by a wet bed in the middle of the night.
And I did, in fact, buy her all the panties in Target.