Finally. FINALLY!

After:

7.5 months since I first realized we were going to be done with diapers at Addy’s insistence and since I made the declaration that Addy would be easy to potty train.
6.5 months since she had her first 100% pee-free day and since she last pooped in a diaper.
3 months since the dreadful Pee in the Produce incident , and also the time I realized that this is HELL but that the end was near (or not!)

And finally I think we are done. I have to say - I have spent more time potty training this girl than I have with all three of my boys combined plus Tony’s kids from his previous marriage. After all of it, I can’t even say what finally really worked.

There were times when Addy would stay dry if she was naked. Or if she was clothed but not naked. Or only during her naps. Or all night long but not during the day. Or only when she wore pull-ups (which she absolutely detested). Or only in the car. Or she would do good for a day and then not. There were times when she would intentionally walk over and pee on the floor. Or the couch. We’ve had professional carpet cleaners here twice. There were times when I thought it was my fault - I wasn’t consistent enough.  There were times when we instituted the “PeePee Timer” as a reminder to both of us only to realize she would pee 10-20 minutes when the timer was set for longer.  Most recently there was a time when I just gave up and put her in a pull-up if we had to leave the house or wear clothes I did not want peed on an hour later.  I hate pull-ups, Addison REALLY hates pull-ups. Maybe that was the final straw for her - the motivation she needed? I don’t know. I can tell you it probably was not developmental or that she is suddenly more ready than she used to be.  But I can also say there are more noticeable signs now and if she doesnt remember to go potty, we can see that she needs to go and rush her in. And now the only accidents we have are if she is struggling to get down her underwear, right in front of her potty. I don’t think those count.

I think, in retrospect, at least some of this was from her life in Vietnam. Hindsight is 20/20, of course, but I can look back and see now that she probably had some sort of issue with disposable diapers (which she did not wear prior to her adoption). I think just the diaper itself created a constipation issue that had not existed prior and that we really didn’t even realize existed for a long time.  She absolutely hated to poop in a diaper, in her carseat, etc. Who could blame her!!?? So I think the insistence against her diapers and early poop training were related to that. Had the poop issue not existed, I probably would have just kept slapping diapers on her.

But she’s also always been very insistent, beyond her years, about what kind of potty situation she wanted. She really did show all the signs very early, she showed the ability to control her urine very early, the ability to get her clothes on and off by herself early and even now, at just about 2, she’s even already adept at wiping herself, washing her hands, etc. It seemed totally wrong to even consider putting her back in diapers but it was sure tempting!

So with that, here’s a super-short video we took last night. It might me hard to hear/understand but for some reason it totally cracked us all up. Usually Addy still uses “baby talk” when she has to go potty - she either says “butt-butt” (which is oooooold baby talk we used when we changed her stinky butt-butt diapers!) or she says “Peepee mama”, so I think her seriousness about saying “Uh-oh. I need to pee.” cracked us up.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 23rd, 2008 at 8:00 am and is filed under Milestones, Parenting, Photos & Videos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.