Lessons from Potty Training

I have always been the parent that celebrates every mile stone.  Holding his bottle:  I will never forget this day.  I was so excited because that was a few free moments where he was occupied.  Oh the possibilities of what I could do with free hands as he fed himself!  Crawling: cheers and excitement even when the nay-sayers said “you just wait, now you won’t be able to keep him contained”.  Walking: even more cheers because that means I don’t have to carry him everywhere.  All celebrations aside, there is one milestone that I have been dreading for 3 years: potty training.  I’m a germaphobe so the idea of “accidents” terrified me- not to mention having to take him to a public bathroom.  Ew.  The tantrums.  I could hear the screaming in my head when I just thought about potty training.  Not sure whose tantrums would be louder: his or mine. 

We toured Trey’s new school a few months ago.  I asked what their policy was for the 3 year olds when it came to potty training.  They said he would have to by potty trained.  What?!  You mean I have to get my kid who has no interest whatsoever to be fully potty trained by SEPTEMBER?  I had 4 months.  The anxiety has been boiling up ever since.   My heart pounds, my palms get sweaty, I have a hard time breathing.  You think I’m exaggerating but sadly I am not.  This is not something I am looking forward to.

I did my best to prepare.  I told myself that this level of anxiety is ridiculous.  I also thought about one of the biggest lessons I learned after losing the twins.  The anxiety over the event is far worse than the actual event.   Let me repeat that: the anxiety over the event is FAR worse than the actual event.  Let that sink in.  Think about the last time you have been anxious about something.  How did the actual event go?  Not nearly as bad, right? 

I had some major anxiety after losing the twins.  I would literally panic leaving the house.  I didn’t even know what I was anxious about but it would take a lot of prep to get me to leave the house.  I remember panicking about going to church.  There was a wonderful lady that worked the check in in the children’s department.  She told me about how she lost one of her twins about halfway through her pregnancy and was on bedrest to save the other one.  She told me this hours before I went to the hospital and delivered my babies at 20 weeks.  We are not friends on facebook or have any other connection other than seeing her on Sundays so I was anxious to see her and face the “how’s the pregnancy” question.  It took me about a month to gather up the courage to face that.  You know what?  The anxiety over the event was far worse than the actual event.  When I walked down that hallway and saw her.  She greeted me with kindness and sincerity. She already knew.  I don’t know how the message got to her but I cannot thank my church enough for that.  It was evidence that God went ahead of me that day and made sure that what I was anxious about was taken care of. 

I thought about this situation a lot as I was preparing for potty training.  I was praying that this pattern would remain true.  I prayed that God would go ahead of me and take care of my potty training fears.  We are now about 6 weeks into potty training.  We are not done but I can say that God did exactly that.  Trey has done exceptionally well.  I’ve even talked about how I’m afraid to tell people he’s doing well for fear that the “honeymoon” phase will be over and he will start refusing the process.  I don’t want to “count my chickens before they’re hatched”.  Trey has been so well behaved during this process.  I almost feel like I have a different kid!  He is proud of himself and has a new confidence.  Everytime he uses the potty he says “I so proud of me!”  He makes my heart smile. 

I’ve learned a few things about my anxiety through this experience, other than just reinforcing the lesson discussed above.  Here are a few things I have learned:

Psychological Trial Run:  Let yourself go to the worst case scenario.  What would be the worst that could happen?  How would you handle that? If you can label your fears, you have a better chance of fighting them.  You can set up a plan, a battle strategy.  Sometimes the best thing you can get out of this exercise is simply learning that you can survive.  I’ve had to do this as I deal with my fears about being pregnant again.  My fears for this child are valid.  I’ve been through losing two children halfway through a pregnancy.  But if I let myself go to the worst case scenario, I can remind myself- “you have been through this and survived.  If it is God’s will for you to face this again, you will survive.”

Physical Trial Run:  I have always been anxious, even as a child.  Thinking about what I was anxious about as a kid makes me laugh now because I really had nothing bad happen to me until we lost the twins.  I had no idea what true anxiety was.  My parents were great about making me face my fears.  They would be there to keep me standing but I had to do it myself.  A week before I started college my dad and I went on a trial run driving to the school.  Everything I had driven to thus far was 5 minutes away.  College was 30 minutes away, since I was too anxious to take the expressway.   Dad made me drive but went with me so that I knew where I was going.  Sometimes I still do this if I feel significant anxiety over getting somewhere new.  It may be ridiculous but it does help.

I also did this with Trey about a month before we tried potty training.  We took the diapers off and showed him the potty.  He did really well and would run to the potty saying “oh my! Oh my!” The next day he was not having it!  He was done trying this new potty thing.  I didn’t consider it a failure though.  He went from no concept of potty training to being pretty good at it in one day.  I felt better about taking the next step when we were ready because we had already taken a first step.

Plan:  gather all the tools you need to set yourself up for success.  We have multiple potty seats- all for different needs.  I took all of his books away and replaced them with potty training themed books.  We have m&ms for rewards.  I read a book on the subject so I had more of a strategy or game plan.  My first action on that plan that included Trey was giving his pull ups to his buddy JJ, who is two.  I explained to him that he is a big boy and doesn’t need diapers anymore.  JJ still needs them.  So I gave him the box of diapers and had him give them to JJ.  That was tangibly putting my plan into action so trey could see that I was serious and there is no going back.  I’m a planner so it always feels better if I have a plan.  Anybody out there a list maker?  I love making lists when I have a busy day or a big project ahead of me.  I love being able to check things off as I accomplish them.  Makes me feel productive and that I have contributed to my life’s goals.

Prepare for setbacks:  Potty training is a process.  Trey is learning.  He had a great first few days.  Then he had one day that the honeymoon had worn off.  He was done.  He didn’t want to go to the potty.  He asked for a diaper.  I non-chalantly told him “you don’t wear diapers”.  We got through that day and continued on our journey.  When we have bad days I have to remind myself that this is a process.  There are good days and bad days and that is ok.  As with big change we are anxious about, we will have good days and bad days.  We will have days we accomplish a lot and make big strides towards our goals.  There are days that we take a few steps back.  Those are not failures.  That’s just us getting used to our new normal. 

Pacing:  trust the process and don’t rush it.  This has been a hard one with potty training.  He does so well at home.  After a few days I wanted to return to life as we knew it- busy and running around town.  I was beaming with pride over how well he was doing.  I had to remind myself that this is a process.  He has had 3 years of the comfort of a diaper.  3 days is not going to change this habit- much to the dismay of many books out there (I don’t know what children they are training in 3 days).  I need to slow down the pace of life and take this one day at a time, one step at a time.  Adding an element after he has had enough success in his current level of learning.  This applies to many areas of our lives.  I remember dealing with this with grief.  The question of “when does life return to normal” was constantly on my mind.  Where should I be in this journey?  Should I allow myself to laugh right now?  Is that ok?  Its ok to take life at your own pace.  Only you and God know where you should be in the process.  Take your time. Slow down.  There is no rush.

Put your trust in the right place:  Trey doesn’t like to be told what to do (who does, right?).  Overall, he is a good listener and if he is struggling you can say “turn on your listening ears” and he will put his fingers up to his ears and make the sound of a robot turning on- thank you preschool!  But he figured out pretty quickly that potty training is something he can control and I have absolutely no control.  Once he learned to get to the potty by himself I had to learn to trust him.  The more I nag and say “do you need to go potty?”, the more he will dig his stubborn little feet into the ground.  I have to trust him.  When I let go and trust that he will do what he needs to do, he does it.  I think you know where I’m going with this.  Where do you place your trust when you are anxious?  Do you let go, knowing that God will do what he needs to do?  Or do you plant your stubborn feet into the ground and create more of a problem in the process?

Potty training has been a whole new adventure in parenting.  Trey and I established a stronger relationship in the process.  He knows I trust him and hears me say “I’m so proud of you!”  He sees my face beaming with pride when he does what he is supposed to.  Trey has a new found confidence.  He knows he has accomplished something big.  He made the choice to comply with potty training and saw it through.  There are many things I have learned in this process, lessons that will take me much further than potty training.  These lessons I hope to take on to the next scary parenting milestone- maybe in a few months when I will be venturing into the world with two little crazies to keep an eye on!