Notes From the Asylum

More Potty Stories

Sorry, I know potty stories are such a stereotypical thing for parents to talk about that nobody else ever wants to hear. And some of it is not for the faint-of-somach. Feel free to skip such posts, but I want this stuff saved...

Liam has been more-or-less potty trained since late summer, but for a while he was perfect -- except when he had pants on. As long as he had his pants off, he would ask to go to the bathroom, make it there, and do his business. As soon as we had pants on him, he would suddenly forget all about the toilet and soil the pants. The answer, of course, was not to put pants on him, which was more-or-less his typical state for the better part of the late summer and early fall (no, not when he was out of the house). He has, fortunately, gotten past this now and rarely has accidents these days (except when napping and at night). He does still go without pants sometimes, but I think that is likely as much for convenience and because LeAnn likes seeing him run around with a naked butt.

Liam still sits on the potty for the most part, though he clearly would like to be able to stand up. I came in to the bathroom recently and found him standing in front of the toilet on his tiptoes, with his "peanut" (Gwyneth's word), resting on the edge of the seat, angled toward the bowl but slightly up. Fortunately, I got there fast enough to reposition him before he let loose. On another occasion, he was sitting just fine, but for some reason decided he wanted to find out what would happen if he didn't aim down, but up. Unfortunately, I was not fast enough on that one.

Note, however, that I have had th opportunity to comment elsewhere, that the girls were not much better. It seems that if they sat forward and leaned at just the right angle, they were able (for many years -- or so it seemed) to shoot urine between the seat and the bowl and onto the floor. And even to this day we rarely get them to flush. One more, rather unpleasant detail, is that not only do they not always flush, they leave "number two" unflushed, and sometimes (here it comes) we find only the "number two" -- no toliet paper.