This post is all about poop, or rather the lack thereof for days on end and then it's rapid, sudden, and I dare say soggy appearance. Don't say I didn't warn you.
Speaking of warnings, no one warned me that potty training really involves TWO trainings. Getting a kid to pee on a toilet is one thing. But poop?! That's a whole 'nother story.
If you read part 1, you know how we went about potty training. And it was successful (if not maddening at times). But I left out half of the story. The poop side of things.
Leading up to potty training, Bailey never had problems pooping (save when I first introduced solid foods and plugged her up with too many bananas). Like clockwork she would poop in the morning, usually before 10 A.M. and then again at some point in the late afternoon/evening. I never dreamed that a pink potty chair with a lid shaped like an elephant (or is it a bear?) would change all that.
Once we started setting Bailey on the potty throughout the day, she stopped pooping. And although she was downing bananas, bread and cheese daily (all known to stop ones self up), that's what she's always eaten. I didn't think her diet had much to do with it. But in the name of desperation, we cut out bananas and scaled back on the bread and cheese. We introduced bran cereal (sprinkled into her yogurt like granola) and prunes (she still called them raisins since we cut them up in smaller bits). Graw even used some of the prunes, boiled them in water and she sipped on homemade prune juice.
And still, no poop.
Bottom line was she was afraid to do the deed in the toilet.
We could tell she needed to poop; she'd say "Poo! Poo!" and run to the bathroom, but then, when faced with the prospect of having to squat on the pot to go number two, she's clamp those booty cheeks together and hold onto it for dear life.
Every few days, though, all the self-control and squeezing in the world couldn't hold back the inevitable. And once she let go, she really let go. I'll leave it at that. ;)
Even with all of our praise over her being such a big girl and how proud we were of her, she remained terrified of going poop for nearly two weeks. Even when we'd coax her onto the toilet, she'd be screaming and crying and waving her hands for "all done" in sign language.
The beginning of the end came late one night after another three day span with no poo in sight. We were sitting around playing cards when Bailey started screaming "Potty! Potty!" from her room (she had been put to bed an hour and a half earlier and is an EXCELLENT sleeper). We debated for a while over whether to get her up or not (more on that "issue" in Part 3), but decided that it was probably best to get her up and let her try - again - to go to the bathroom.
After a handful of out-of-the-crib-to-the-potty-nothing-in-the-potty-diaper-back-on-back-in-her-crib cycles she was still not going to sleep, insistent on screaming "POTTY!" We were certain she needed to poop. We tried reasoning with her that she'd feel much better if she just let it go. At one point I could actually see the poop popping out of her cheecks . . . but nothing. In desperation, I grabbed a Q-tip, some Neosporin (we didn't have Vaseline), and the rest is history. She pooped.
I can't say that the events of that night "cured" her of her fear of pooping; it was still a few more teary-eyed attempts - and several days - later that she actually went number two without the accompanying water-works. But it was a start.
Stay tuned for Part 3 - The Girl Who Cried Potty
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