Many of you know that I have had major "difficulties and challenges" in potty training Eleanore for the last 6 months... I use "difficulties and challenges" as a very loose, loose term because on more than one occasion (maybe closer to 10 occasions) she has been found without a diaper, drawing circles, faces and other magical creatures on some random flooring and/or cabnitry in our house (or someone ELSE's house) with of course, her favorite writing utensil, her own poop. So that scenario in itself is really above and beyond "difficult and challenging" ... it's more like: fucking discusting.
So you get the picture: my kid is a poop artist. Lately, we've had less poop drawings and more of what I will dub as "wiping incidents." Now a wiping incident is just as bad as a poop drawing. Ellie will go stealth. And I don't mean just quiet...she will hide, hide well, and not respond to anyone calling her...complete stealth. While she's invincible to the world, she will poop in her pull up. I have to use my super-human-8-month-prenant-detecting nose to find her usually. However, usually, she waits and watches me, to make sure I am doing something that I can't leave right away, like cooking dinner or washing the dishes. After pooping, she will go into our bedroom, take out the wipes and a new diaper from the basket at the foot of our bed, and procede to change her own diaper.
"Oh my gosh, she is so smart!" some of you would say... Yes, and no. Yes, she is smart, she can wipe her own ass...NO, she is still is 2 and no doubt, can't do anything without making a huge damn mess!! So we end up having a shit-streaked Ellie; she gets the front to back thing really well, but how FAR is really where the mess goes is what I'm talking about. Wiping from her butt to her lower back usually results in her just moving poop from one area to another. Then she will sit down on the carpet (yes I said carpet...another 2 things that don't mix well...poop & carpet) and again try to wipe herself. She comes out of our bedroom, smelling like poop, looking like a poop covered enclaire and totally proud of herself. She's a super kid. So we usually end up getting a REALLY good bath when those days come along.
Now on to the main point of this post today... yesterday, a good and wonderful friend of mine came over to say goodbye before she left on her 7 hour plane ride back to Fayatteville, North Carolina. We were sitting on the ground and Ellie was with us, climbing over and in between our legs, and the following conversation took place:
Miss Julie: "Ellie, when are you going to be a big girl?"
Ellie: "I am a big girl"
Miss Julie: "No, I thought big girls were the ones that go pee-pee on the potty by themselves. You still have a pull up on"
Ellie: "I be a big girl today"
That was the jist of it...Ellie lost interest in us and soon turned her focus to Kaia, Miss Julie's beautiful dog. Julie and I went on with our previous conversation and thought nothing of it.
As soon as Julie left, Ellie pooped, I caught the scent early (whew!), and I changed her. She wanted big girl panties, (no pull up) so I asked her why big girl panties now, and she simply said, "(something I couldn't understand here) because Miss Julie said so." Well, low and behold, Eleanore Leigh Phipps stayed dry in those big girl panties for almost 5 hours. Every 15 minutes she ran to the bathroom to try, screaming, "The Poo-Poo is coming" or "The Pee-Pee is coming" ...she reminded me of Paul Revere. And finally, at 8:36pm, she ACTUALLY went Pee-Pee in the potty all by herself...TWICE! (THANK YOU MISS JULIEEEEE!!!!!)
So for those other 50 times that she didn't go, but sat on the potty, she would pull one sqaure of toilet paper and wipe herself, over and over again. I think she wasted a whole roll in those 5 hours and probably 45 gallons of water from flushing the toilet unneccesarily...but who gives a flying Ellie shit!! I was so stoked that she actually sat and peed those 2 times!!!
So this morning, we're in big girl panties again...we've gone through 10 sqaures of toilet paper, but we'll get there, eventually! One square at a time.
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