The Potty, The Stain and the Missing Poo

Potty training is still happening  There are training pants being worn, training pants being soiled and training pants being changed.  The potty is visited, sat on, looked at and dragged across the room.  And yet for all the potty "training" that's happening, we don't seem to be getting anywhere.

At my son's recent parent/teacher conference we asked if there was more progress being made at school.  Not so much, we found out. He's going to the potty regularly.  But he's not being successful at the prime potty objective.  We continue to forge on.

The other day after lunch I sent my son to the potty.  Usually I sit in the area with him and talk encouragingly to him about all things potty but in this case I was busy finishing getting his sister cleaned up and down from her high chair.   I thought, "what could happen? Nothing ever happens, so he'll just spend the time doing the nothing he usually does."

The next thing I notice is he's out in the living room without pants babbling at me in a "come see" kind of way.  I follow him into the bathroom and the first thing I notice is some stains in the potty.  Stains in multiple places.  Stains down deep in the potty that can't be from transfer alone.  But the potty is empty

Oh no, where is the poo?!  I am running around the bedroom, bathroom and closet frantically looking for some poo when I notice he's sitting on the bath mat.  Ugh, he's probably dirty and he's naked and he just sat  on the brown mat.  Add another load of laundry to the list

Urgent looking around continues.  I turn around just in time to see him get up on the bed...and sit down.  &%*^!!!  Snatch him off and swear at myself for not cleaning him up first and being more worried about him, or me, or my daughter stepping in a pile of poo.  Curse again because I am not thinking clearly and I have failed at prioritizing cleanliness and messiness threats.

I clean him up, get him re-diapered and then re-asses the situation.  Where is this mystery poo?  The original diaper was clean, there was enough in the potty to merit more than just skid marks.  So did he actually go?  Did he go, and then do the thing he knows you do next, take the insert over to the big potty and dump it in and then flush it?  He's done all of these steps multiple times and he knows the whole process.  He did come out from the bathroom to the living room looking excited.

I don't know.  I'm almost too scared to leave him alone to try again though.  It may remain the mystery of the potty, the stain and the missing poo.

The Big Boy Update:  After this entire process, he asked for the door to the linen closet to be opened.  He wanted to pull out the stool, drag it to the sink and then wash his hands--just like he does at school.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  Grinding her teeth.  Or is it her tooth?  She now has opposable teeth and she's discovered she can grind them.  She might only be able to make contact with one tooth on the top and bottom, but it still makes me cringe every time I hear her do it.

Someone Once Said:  I always feel animistic about a computer. The Pathetic Fallacy – I know.