They Like to do What???

**Warning this post is about poop and only poop. If poop offends you don't read on. If you find poop humorous see here and here and here.**

If you are a regular around here you know that Saturday we entered the challenging world of potty training. Immediately the peeing was going great, but pooping (always the biggest challenge) was much tougher. After two days of Austin pooping in his underwear, I asked all of you to give me advice on how to get him to poop on the potty. Most of you were at a loss and advised encouragement and a careful eye to catch him before he had another accident.

That night I pondered the issue. As a teacher I decided to evaluate my "student" for his ideal learning situations. What I came up with was that Austin responds and learns best from humor and a visual.

So, I thought about how I could make this whole pooping on the potty thing a humorous yet motivating activity. And here is what I came up with.

The next morning I was talking to Austin about pooping on the potty and I began to tell him a story.

"Austin, did you know that poopies like to swim?"

(Austin looks at me with a "huh?" look on his face.)

"Yes. Your poopies really like to swim and they will be so happy if you will sit on the potty and let them 'plop, plop' right into the water. They will have so much fun swimming in there. Then you can flush them and they will get to go to a really big pool where they will have even more fun."

(Austin staring at me and listening carefully to every word that I am saying.)

"And you know what else? If you bend over a little bit while you are on the potty you will be able to see them dive out of your hiney and into the potty to go swimming."

"Yeah," he said very matter of factly.

I had a feeling it was going to work, but had to wait for his need to poop to find out.

We went to a friend's house to play that morning and when we came home he was at the table eating lunch when he said, "I needa go potty Mommy." We hurried to the bathroom and I put him on the potty. He immediately bent almost in half to look into the potty. Then he looked up at me and said, "No Mommy! You close the door." I closed the door just enough to see in, but he again firmly asked me to close the door. I did as instructed and listened closely. Within 20 seconds I hear, "Look Mommy! My poopies ARE swimming!!!"

He was so excited and got down off the toilet to really observe the swimming poopy. Then he flushed and said, "Go swimming poopies!"

I can't remember the last time I was that excited about any bodily function...probably never.

I was so excited I almost hopped on the computer to blog to the world about this wonderful new development. But, I hesitated because I knew that it was possible that seeing the poopies swim one time and getting a little chocolate race car might be enough to make him happy for awhile.

However, I am happy to report that he has been excited to see his poopies swim for three straight days. In fact, this morning I was upstairs gathering things for a day at Grandma's house and he was in the basement watching TV. He came upstairs and told me he needed to go poopies. Yay!!

He has now gotten in the habit of telling me instead of me having to ask him. He has only had one pee-pee accident in the last five days and that was today. He was outside riding on a new vehicle that Grandma got him and he was trying to tell my sister-in-law that he needed to go pee-pee but she was too far away to hear him. I happened to come out while he was saying it and grabbing himself with gusto. As he moved toward me to go inside he lost control. He was sad, but I assured him that it was okay and it was only an accident.

He is doing great and I am so proud of him! I have not been putting a diaper or pull-up on him at nap time either and he has stayed dry everyday, even when he naps for three hours. In the morning, even though he has a diaper on from overnight, he will not pee in the diaper and starts yelling, "Mommy I have to go pee-pee right now!"

He has also done fine peeing in places other than home. He has gone in a grocery store bathroom, a friend's house, Grandma's house, and in a nasty public park bathroom. What a trooper!

I swear I am beaming with pride and joy over....well...pee-pee....and swimming poopies!