training Louis

Here we are again.

After Louis failed to grasp either the importance or the fundamentals of toilet training last time around, I was in no hurry to attempt it with him again – even though changing his frequent dirty diapers is possibly one of the grossest things I’ve ever had to do.

His parents kept dropping sort of wishy-washy hints, but I wasn’t biting. I figured with me closing from December 22nd – January 2nd that they had a good long stretch there where they could tackle it, if they wanted to.

My contract does say that I will help with toilet learning. Nowhere does it say that I will keep beating my skull against a wall to take on what really ought to be the parents’ responsibility.

However, I know that they have set his third birthday as their totally arbitrary date for when they want him out of diapers, and that’s coming up in March. I figured my days of lighting scented candles at diaper time and blissfully not worrying about how on earth to potty train someone who grudgingly squeezes out up to six (!!) foul-smelling micropoops in an eight-hour period were numbered.

And so here we are, day one, of the second week-long attempt to convince Louis that the bathroom is not a scary place to be avoided at all costs.

It’s one hour until pickup time and I am provisionally encouraged.

His attitude toward the proceedings is much better this time around. I’ve only faced token resistance a few times to scheduled potty breaks, and once he is on the potty he is peeing within a minute or two.

He also woke up from his nap with a dry PullUp, although I’m not reading too much into that. His mother is. She thinks they’ll never have to buy PullUps again! And it is possible – my own two older kids both announced calmly within days of making the switch to underwear that they were not sleeping in diapers, and rarely had nighttime mishaps after that. But I thought last time that they were putting too much pressure on him to succeed – even if only in their own heads – and I’m worried that they are doing the same this time around. None of my business, you could say, except that I fully intend to have him in PullUps for naps for a good while yet. Hell, Pixie trained successfully in September but I still make her wear PUs to sleep. (She’s had a few ‘accidents’ of the horrible variety while she’s half-awake and it’s just easier – and more sanitary, frankly – to do it this way for a while longer.)

And while I was writing this, he actually told me he needed to pee… went and did so… and came out properly dressed to tell me he was finished. This is more than he ever managed last time. Fingers crossed…

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