Potty Training

Potty Training take two!

We started potting training in January and it was a bust, she wasn't ready and I honestly think I wasn't really either.  But recently I noticed her holding her pee longer, telling me when she was going to pee in her diaper, etc....  So when I saw there was a snow storm coming, I thought it would be the perfect time for us to hunker down in our house and try again. So on March 6th we began!!!  

She was all for it!!

I  bought apple juice boxes (a rare treat), made an incentive chart to get her going, had blankets and towels spread out all over; I wasn't messing around!

She did amazingly well, was so proud, and really seemed to get the hang of it.  I set my alarm for every twenty minutes which seemed to work great.  No accidents for day one!!! We did have a couple accidents during days 2-4 but after that NOTHING.  She was a pro.  We hit days 5-10 with no accidents and she was going an hour in between.  She was even showing signs that she was holding it.  (she would grab herself and say, "Mommy Im holding it in, hurry." hahaha)  We tried so many different inside activities that kept us home and close to the bathroom.  We've been able to venture out a lot more and she is doing great!!!!

Here is a picture of her incentive chart -- hard to see but she got a sticker each time she went and when she got to the star, she was able to go to Target and pick out a new doll baby.

Funny that I didn't calaucate that going every twenty minutes would mean that she would earn her prize in one day!!!!!!  haha!  So I knew we had to celebrate her good job right away or else it would mean nothing to her.  I was a nervous wreck on day to take her out but we did it anyway.  It was a record breaking trip to target.  We were in the door and back in the car within 8 minutes!!!!  No accidents wahoooo!!!!  She chose Cinderella by the way.  She loves her Belle doll (the one in yellow) that she got for her birthday and needed another one.  She has since then asked the Easter bunny for an Ariel doll:) 

During day one of potty training she wore nothing on the bottom for the morning then the afternoon we put on undies.  She loved giving her little people a bath!!! **Notice the large towel she is sitting on??  That is part needed for the bath she was partaking in but mostly in case she peed on the floor haha!

Another activity she has become quite fond of it "stirring"  She looks for any and everything she can stir to "help mommy."  This particular time she is helping me make pancakes.....she chose to make them the color blue!

I had to share this one -- she always tells me to go somewhere else when she is going potty so one time all I could see were her little feet kicking around and had to capture it.  

One day was pedicure day.  haha not really but she wanted so badly to cut her toenails and use a file like mommy does that I let her "play" with a closed pair of nail clippers!

Day four and five of potty training were pretty warm outside so we decided to take the risk and go outside.  I was quite nervous because I knew she would not want to come inside once she was out there.  I set my alarm for 40 minutes and believe it or not she went in to pee and never once had an accident!!!

We had a lot of dance parties while we were staying home :)

And we did many crafts to pass the times in between potty breaks!!  She loved making her bunny!

I must add at the end here that this wasn't the happy ending our potty training adventure had.  We had two good solid weeks for potty training.  Made it to day 11 actually with very few accidents, she was holding it and didn't mind going potty for me.  THEN she screamed two times in a row when trying to pee,and of course we were out somewhere and not in the comfort of our own home.  At first Ryan and I thought it was the little potty seat that was pinching her but it became apparent that she was in pain.  Luckily we were right next to children's urgent care in mason so we popped in over there to see what was going on.  **If you remember the last potty training fiasco ended because she said it hurt when she was trying to pee.

So we go in and they want her to pee in a cup.  I thought maybe she would do it because she was pretty intrigued by the cup but it WOULD NOT HAPPEN.  I did everything I had been taught not to do in teaching, beg and bribe!!!  They could diagnose the problem without a urine sample so we tried maybe 6 or 7 times within an hour and a half.  She had juice boxes galore trying to make her have to pee enough to go for us.  Didn't work :(  We were so upset because we knew that if she didnt pee they would have to give her a catheter :(

Two hours later I, along with two other nurses, hold my precious little girl down as they put in the catheter.  It was NOT PRETTY to say the least.  She was hysterical!  It was wayyyyy past her nap time as well which is never a good thing.  While the nurse was getting the sample she mentioned that she saw a small cut that might have been the reason why she was having pain because the urine is acidic and probably made it sting.  I wanted to say "HEY! why didn't the doctor notice that during the exam so we didnt have to go through all of this???" but kept my cool because I knew they needed to make sure it wasn't infected.....

So once they got the urine sample, Ryan took her out to the car to wait (thinking maybe she would fall asleep) while I waited inside on the results.

Wouldnt you know that almost immediately Whitney peed all over her car seat in the car.  Ryan was outside with her while I was inside with the diaper bag and all of her extra clothes.  Poor girl had so much pee in her that she just couldn't hold it anymore.  Broke my heart.

So turns out that she didn't have an infection, just a small scratch that we later found out was caused by Whitney  herself :((((  Ugh.  The scratch healed in a day but she was terrified to go potty on the toilet again.  I obviously couldnt make her go so instead we gave her the choice to wear pull ups, diapers or undies.  She chose diapers.  So much to my dismay, after all of that hard work on potty training, we were back in diapers.  She didn't seem phased by it.  I on the other hand was having a hard time letting go of the fact that I was TWO weeks into potty training and was going to have to start all over!!!

Two days in diapers and she was ready to go back into her big girl undies.  It isn't like it was during days 5-12 with her but she is peeing again and going about an hour in between potty breaks.  Fingers crosses this is going to stick this time:)