Potty Training 101

I have about had it up to here with the whole Potty Training Business. Way back in April, when Ella ripped off her diaper, I thought we were the luckiest people around. She was practically doing all the work herself. Back then, in my ignorance and innocence, I thought it was just a small detail to go from pooping in her diaper every day at naptime (when I still had a diaper on her) to using the potty. Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong.

It has been a battle which I have no idea how I can win. I tried making her go naked and she just held it until it was bedtime. I tried just putting panties on her every day and dealing with the mess, figuring eventually she would eventually get sick of pooping in her pants and start telling me. I gave that up after about a month of wiping poop off every surface in the house. I tried just being cool and letting her wear panties for part of the day and diapers for the rest of the time (particularly since the daycare people said they were also sick of cleaning poop off everything). But it is a miserable situation that has not advanced one iota and there are still far too many days when I have to put on my rubber gloves and scrub her and her clothes (and any other household item caught in the crossfire) in the bathtub.

But Sunday, we had the worst day yet; I am just glad that I got to share this lovely parenting moment with B because normally its all for me. We went to the park after lunch and Ella was in panties, having been very good all morning about using the potty. Well, Ella and I had climbed to the top of the jungle gym to watch the crowds of rollerbladers go by the park. As usual for such a beautiful sunny day, there were thousands of skaters and we cheered them on for a good five or ten minutes before turning away. There is a giant slide descending from the platform where I stood with Ella, so I told her to slide down to B. I called him over and gave Ella push on the back. B turned towards us, a look of absolute horror flashed across his face, and he shouted "Stooooop!" I was baffled- until I saw the thick streak of brown that Ella left all the way down the slide.

What B could see from below but I didn't notice from my position behind Ella was an enormous bulge underneath her skirt. She must have done a stealth poop while I was watching the rollerbladers and somehow I didn't smell anything (which was astounding considering the size of the thing). We were horrified enough, but I felt even worse when I saw the looks on the faces of the people sitting directly in front of the slide. And it gets even worse.

Let me recap- Ella is standing there at the bottom of the slide, with poop smeared all over her legs, the slide is a biohazard, there is a crowd of horrified tourists and toddlers standing around the slide, and B asks if I have any wipes in my purse. Yeah! Three different kinds! Except that I didn't bring my purse with me to lunch... I had to go and beg kleenexs off a bunch of mommies sitting on a bench on the side. They hadn't seen what had happened, so not only did I have to ask for something to wipe up a mess, but then I had to try and explain. Oddly, after all these months of potty training, I found my vocab to be slightly lacking and ended up having to convey most of the tragedy via charades and the phrase "C'est partout. Par. Tout." (Its everywhere. Every. Where."