Potty training - the results

This will make more sense [only slightly!!] if you have read this post

Day 1.

My sister in law, the Drama Queen offered to take the boys for a sleepover. We offered to pack the big boy pants so that she could start off the potty training. She didn't exactly decline, it was more a case of laughing and walking away.

Day 2.

Everyone knows that you don't start a new regime on a Sunday. Monday is a much better time to start these things. No, we were not putting it off because we were scared!

Day 3.

Ok, no more procrastination. This is the real deal. As soon as the boys woke up, we had a family meeting in the bedroom and explain that they are big boys now and they are going to start wearing big boy pants. The early signs are promising and they danced on the bed with delight at the news. We tell them that they have to let us know when they need to go to the toilet and they repeat the mantra with the appropriate earnestness. We took them downstairs, gave them breakfast [foregoing the usual morning bottle] and braced ourselves for what was to come.

9.30 to 10.30 - we asked the boys if the want to go to the potty approximately 473 times. The answer was always "no". It seemed like a very long morning waiting for something to happen. I can easily remember a dozen Saturday mornings when we had changed half a dozen nappies by now.

11.00 - we had the first incident of wet clothing but it was only a spilled drink.

11.20 - we sat them both on the potty, mostly because we were bored waiting. They both "tried" to go the toilet [sat there and grunted theatrically] so we gave them a little treat for trying.

11.25 - Hannah goes to the shop for supplies to get us through our house arrest.

11.26 - Monkey Boy has the first accident of the day

11.30 - giving them a treat for trying proved to be a big mistake. Fat Chops "tried" 7 times over twenty minutes without producing any urine.

12.00 - we managed to convince ourselves that they might be dehydrated since we cut out their morning bottle. Guilt overrided common sense so we gave it to them at about noon. Common sense drops in and kicks our asses. Monkey Boy wets himself four times over the next half hour.

Every time they wet, we told them that they have to tell Mammy and Daddy when they need a wee. They repeated the mantra diligently. Even when the wee is running down their legs, they repeated the mantra!

1.30 - Fat Chops didn't warm to the idea of peeing somewhere other than a nappy and was still refusing point blank to pee. Not even in his pants. This removes any lingering doubts that he has inherited his mothers stubborn streak.

2.00 - They wet every single pair of shorts they own and were running around the house in their big boy pants and a t-shirt at this point. We gave serious consideration to putting their nappies back on when Fat Chops asked to sit on the potty again. The pressure on his bladder must have gotten too much for him and we finally have one in the potty. We cheered as if he has arrived back at Dublin Airport with an Olympic gold medal in his hand luggage.

Needless to say, he loves the attention and they both sit on the potty every two minutes for the rest of the day. At one point MB has a nose bleed and I can't help thinking that it was caused by straining too hard to pee just because he wanted another piece of chocolate.

There were one or two more accidents during the afternoon and evening but we made progress. I couldn't wait to put on a nappy them that night so that I could finally relax a little.

Day 4.
Since the boys spent most of the previous day in varying levels of dampness, we decided to throw them in the bath. They squatted down as soon as they got in and seemed to think that we won't notice that they were peeing in the bath. We sit back to watch them play with the bubbles but a couple of minutes into it I spot a small floater behind Fat Chops in the bath. Then another. Then a bigger one. Hannah whipped him up and put him on the pot where he proceeded to take an ENORMOUS poo. He refused to poo yesterday but this looks like he had been saving it up for a couple of weeks, not just a couple of days. We spent all of yesterday practising our fake enthusiasm for each filled potty but this deserves an Oscar. Despite our burning noses and streaming eyes, we celebrate with gusto.
The rest of the day follows a similar pattern to yesterday. Every couple of minutes the boys announce that they need a wee wee. They actually urinate on maybe 10% of the occassions that they sit on the potty. Any time that Fat Chops squats and fails to produce the goods, he announces ruefully that "wee wee go bed".
The difference today is that there are only a couple of isolated incidents of wetting themselves. In case you didn't already know, the TV is the devil. The only times that they have an accident is when the TV has them in a trance and they can't tear themselves away. Forced to turn the TV off, we now have to entertain them too. Work is a doddle compared to this.

Day 5
They really have adapted well. While I was attending to Monkey Boy, Fat Chops came in to the bathroom and said something about poo poo. I finished with MB as quick as possible and went to lift FC on to the toilet but instead he pulled me out to the potty in the kitchen where he had made another XXXL turd and pulled his trousers up all by himself.

Although, they have needed help pulling their trousers up most of the time. Yesterday, FC pulled his most of the way but left his ding-a-ling dangling over the top of the waist band. I made the mistake of laughing as I went to tidy him up and when I turned back around MB had adjusted his underwear so that he was swinging a bit more freely too. Generally, they hare acting like they just found out that they have a penis and are so happy about it that they hold it protectively for most of the day.

Finally, the big news. THEY WENT THE WHOLE DAY WITHOUT AN ACCIDENT. I'm not naive enough [despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary published in this blog!] to think that they are fully trained and won't ever have any more accidents but this is a big deal. Not only have they figured out the potty training but they have the incentive scheme sussed too. Why go for one big pee and get one treat when you can go for six smaller pees and get six treats?