Messy Potty Training

      I hate potty training.  We are on our third round of potty training and every experience has been torturous in different ways for each one of our girls.  All of our little ladies are extremely different.  Therefore each time we suddenly arrived at the potty training time frame it was new and different.  Instead of being able to use the same techniques that worked with the previous girls we were forced to relearn every time.  I have always felt like we are reinventing the wheel for each horrible potty training experience. This is the the last time and that is one thing that makes me happy. 

     Our first little lady was potty resistant which was told to us by our pediatrician.  She refused to have anything to do with the potty.  She didn't want to sit on it or look at or even talk about anything that had to do with the potty.  As a result when she was three and half our pediatrician informed us that we just needed to take away all the diapers to force her to start using the potty.  We  did as we were told and put her in big girl pants.  My strong willed little girl held her pee for 36 hours.  I remeber sobbing on the bathroom floor begging her to go potty.  I was saying "Just pee on the floor I don't care. You don't have to sit on the potty." I'm pretty sure at one point her grandma offered to buy her a pony if she actually went potty.  Incorrectly I thought the next one can't be worse than this.

     Our second little lady decided to start potty training on her own.  The bad news was my strong independent lady made this decision three days before we left on a two week vacation.  We were set to have one week to visit family and then go to Disney World the next week.  I tried to support her decision so part of our Magical Experience was touring all the bathrooms of Disney.  The day before we left we found out that we were unexpectedly pregnant with our third.  After an exhausting potty training experience while on vacation we then told her that she was going to be a big sister.  This sparked a potty regression that was followed by another potty regression nine months later when her sister was born.  I was pretty sure that it felt like had been potty training her for ten years. 

     Our last little lady has recently decided to potty train herself.  I mean this literally.  After our first two experiences I was dreading potty training again.  I was mentioning it occasionally and we were reading books about it every once in a while but for the most part I was putting off starting the process.  A few weeks ago my current three year old was mad at her six year old sister.  She took a cup that had been monogramed for her sister for Valentines day and pooped in it.  My husband and I were shocked.  We realized that she apparently had the skills to actually use the potty if she was able to poop in a cup with no mess.  That is very impressive.  Begrudgingly we switched her big panties with very low expectations.  Much to my surprise she has gone potty every time and actually does it without asking for us to help or anything.  It's been two weeks and things are going great. 

      Why am I telling you all these stories?  Mainly to explain that nothing about potty training makes sense. Potty training is crazy.  I read every article and book that I possibly could during our potty experiences.  At the end of the day each of our ladies had to decide to do it on their own.  I could not force anyone to physically go potty.  during the rough times I would hear my mom echoing in my ears "They will not be 16 and still wearing diapers."  Potty training is the just the beginning of a long journey with my girls were I need to encourage them to make the right decisions.  They are in charge of their choices and my job is love them no matter the choices they make.  This is the same for potty training or anything else that comes our way.  I will stand by my girls in the bathroom and in life.  Potty training is the worst but we will all survive ...hopefully.