Potty training my big boy

The early days of potty training...
Ethan when he was 20 months old

Wow, this past week has been crazy! On Monday morning when Ethan, my 2 1/2-year-old son woke up he decided he no longer wanted to wear a diaper. To my surprise, I found him jumping on his bed in his birthday suit. My smile quickly turned upside down when he said, "Mommy, I went pee-pee in the bed." I had no idea if it was an accident or if he did it on purpose to get my attention. Rather than getting upset, I took it as a hint that he needed to be potty trained immediately. He had occasionally gone potty in his chair, but always refused to go poop in it.

He had several accidents in his underwear that morning, but I was told by my sister who successfully potty trained her daughter to not give up once I start. She was the support I needed to get me through this, otherwise I would have given up that morning.

Before his nap I put a diaper on him with underwear over it to prevent another accident. Unfortunately, he outsmarted me by taking off his diaper and wet the bed again! That's when I had to walk away and give myself a "time-out". Later that day when he was due for another nap (since the first one was very short) I was ahead of the game. I found some tape in Ryan's toolbox and wrapped it around the top of his diaper. Then I put his underwear and a pair of jeans over it. Evidently it did the trick, since he gave up and went to sleep after attempting to pull the tape off.

On Tuesday he did much better and had less accidents, although he still refused to go poop in his potty chair. On Wednesday he totally caught me off guard. He went poop twice in his potty chair after telling me that he needed to go. Ryan and I were so proud of him!

Today he went to stay with his grandparents for two nights, which is the first time he's been away from home overnight without us. I, of course, made sure to pack his potty chair. So far he's been going potty there and I'm praying that he'll go poop too. I obviously miss him, since I'm sitting here writing about him. =)

Despite all of the controversy, we've been rewarding him with stickers, chocolate bunnies, and will give him the "Thomas the Train" table/train set if he goes poop in his potty chair two more times. There's no turning back now. I'm determined to try to see the light at the end of the tunnel, even while cleaning up unwanted messes. I now admire all of the parents who have potty trained their child. It's definitely one of the most challenging things a parent must do.