In a diaperless society

Breathe.

In.

Out.

Repeat.

I should be packing up clothes, taking drawers out of emptied dressers, figuring out if that box of papers can be burned or if we need that stuff and making a grocery list of foods to fill my new, heart-stopping awesome refrigerator with because I'm so in love with it and feel it deserves more gifts that a pack of Juicy Juice juice boxes. Poor thing probably feels neglected being all the way over there without anything to chill and freeze yet. Soon, sweet machine, soon.


The reality of the situation, though, is that I need a break. Every day lately is filled with the constant go-go-go of normal life mixed with the anxiety of trying to accomplish this move, clean our current house top to bottom, make the necessary repairs and get it on the market well before Thanksgiving. I wanted it for sale before Halloween, and while I'm not giving up on that goal, doing all the work on my own with the kids in tow is giving me a hard look at how much I can truly get done in the next four weeks.

So, here I sit with my reheated (again) mug of coffee, fresh from a workout, smelling like a foot ... and all I can think about is how much I'd love a nap. Not a theoretical nap where I say I want one and then don't achieve that greatness - which is precisely what is going to happen - but I want a real honest to goodness nap where there are no little people waking in the middle of the night from cold, damp sheets and soaked jammies only to crawl into my bed and then use my breasts as pillows that need to be hit and punched in order to get the supposed perfect fluffiness. No. I want to climb into my bed and have two hours to myself. To sleep. And keep the dreams away, Sandman, it's just a distraction.

Since I've hit on the topic, let's talk about potty training. We officially have two board certified potty trained kids in this house. I thought we just had luck of the draw when Josephine went diaperless at 19 months - only wearing them at nap and bedtime - and then felt really fortunate when she was totally day and night trained at 22 months. To date, she's had one accident during the night since we took the diapers away.

No. We have hit the fucking jackpot of potty training. Charlotte, the monster that she is, also chose the 19ish month mark to stop with the diapers. She was wearing them mostly at nap and bedtime, and also when we went to the gym because she was in the infant room where they just don't have the staff or capability to handle a potty training youngster. So I didn't mention it for the longest time. Then about a month ago, my kid stripped. Like, pulled her pants down and in a near-Hulk move tried to tear the tabs from the diaper (disposables are approved for the gym, not cloth, which she at that point couldn't get off). It was at that point the supervisor had a talk with me and we agreed Charlie was big enough, old enough and obstinate enough to move to the big kid room with her sister. *cue angles singing from the heavens*

She was officially diaperless all day, and only wearing one at night. Then it started. The screaming. The fighting. The tantrum over getting that damn piece of cloth on her at bedtime. For more than a week we fought - sometimes all out battles, other times just a little twist of the hip to prove her point - and for a week straight, I woke to a child with a dry diaper.

I still have that one last load of cloth diapers to wash, only one having been peed in because she refused to stop playing and get on the potty one morning. My baby is a big girl now.

But along with being a big girl also comes using words. Words like, "I have to potty" at 3 a.m. Three nights in a row she didn't bother to tell me when she woke in the night that she had to pee and me being stressed and sleep deprived as it is never bothered to ask.

Three mornings in a row I loaded all the bedding into the washer and rinsed away the evidence of a failed dry night.

Despite restricting fluids (bedtime quota, which is about an ounce of water or milk, is given at 7 p.m.) and using the potty before going to bed, I was at a loss for about 24 hours. Until I realized she isn't telling us she has to go potty if she wakes in the night. Last night I leveled with her and told her if she wakes up and has to go to the bathroom, she just needs to tell us. Seriously wish I had thought about that before she released her bladder all over MY bed Tuesday morning.

At 12:47 a.m. today I heard her cry out for me. I dragged my exhausted butt out of bed and down the hall to try and calm the fussing, found the binky and placed it back in her mouth, and then crept back down the hall. And the "MAMA!" came floating back down the hall just as I lifted my leg to crawl back into bed.

I've got to give the kid credit. She kept up her end of the deal. I almost killed myself trying to climb over the gate at the landing at the top of the stairs, but sure enough she had to go potty; judging by the amount she went, there's no way we would have had dry sheets this morning if I hadn't brought her downstairs.

There is no magic trick, I didn't buy into the 3-day method or use a sticker chart or bribe them with candies. I simply told them if they didn't want to wear diapers, the potty was right there for them to use. We have the occasional accident when playtime is too engrossing or a stop to the bathroom isn't made before a nap, but for the most part we're accident free.

She's not even 2 yet, so really this isn't bad. At all. Not all parents can say their children have been ready to use the potty this early, and I'm still in shock that mine have been ready. Some kids are just ready sooner, so I hope no one takes this as me bragging or thumbing my nose at children who don't train early. That would be stupid. But, I am proud of them. I'm pleased they got the hang of it early, and like everything else we do with our children, this takes practice and patience and the kindness and care to remind them that if they do have an accident, it's no big deal. It's not like they stood in the middle of the dining room table and let the floodgates open. And if they did, at the very least, it wasn't on purpose.