Potty Training

We've been potty training the twins with varying degrees of success. Ella will pee on the potty almost every time she sits on one, but Jack just wants to play with his doober whenever his pull-ups are removed. And although neither of them will poop on the potty, Jack will almost always remove his pull-ups immediately after a bowel movement, usually making a terrible mess in the process, while Ella seems to be ashamed of her accidents, and refuses to acknowledge the mess under her dress.

There are certain aspects of this rigorous process that I expected to find disgusting, but as it turns out, these incidents aren't as gross as I would have imagined. Getting peed on three times in one hour isn't nearly as painful as spending the same amount of time in a doctor's waiting room, for instance. And the smell of poop is now just an affirmation that I'm home at last, my workday finished.

But it's the blending of activities that I find to be truly unsettling. We spend so much time in the bathroom trying to potty, that all of our daily rituals must now take place there. We read on the potty. We play on the potty. We sing on the potty. We learn on the potty. But I find that my morning coffee doesn't taste the same in the claustrophobic confines of our hallway bathroom. And the sight of sippy cups and bananas abandoned on the bathroom floor is just too much for me. What's that old saying that even a dog knows better than to poop where it eats? I guess my children will never run the Iditarod.

Still, we celebrate the small victories and draw encouragement where we can find it. Recently, we found the twins awakening in the nude, their pajamas and pull-ups discarded in the night, scattered among the half eaten books and broken toys, and shrouded in the foul stench of baby poop. We searched the room, but found only a sock that Jack had turned into toilet paper. After more searching, we decided on the direct approach. "Jack? Where's the poop?" we asked. Beaming with pride, he pointed to the top of the dresser and proclaimed, "There it is!". And behold, there it was. Reminds me of the Polish fellow who said "Look what I almost stepped in!".