Fun times! My eldest went through 7 changes in about 2 hours on his first morning.
Cannot recommend this book enough
Everybody poos
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Answering questions from an Adventure Time story (Fionna and Cake, it’s a good one)
“But if you turned into ice, you’d die”
“That’s OK”
“Really? If you die, that’s it, you’re dead”
“That’s fine”
“Uh… why do you want to die?”
“Well, I don’t want to play any more. I don’t mind dying”
This goes back and forth a bit more, with me increasingly worried and trying to elicit the reasons for this sudden expression of depression.
“But you’ve never been to Machu Picchu!”
“What’s Machu Picchu?”
“It’s a beautiful place your mum and I went to once”
“OK, I can die after I go to Machu Picchu”
“Not just there, there are so many interesting places around the world”
“OK, after I go to all those places, I can die”
…
I think it’s OK, she seemed happy enough, but wow, they know how to get your attention, don’t they?
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That is the dream.
We have been working on this a lot with both my kids during shelter in, and with therapists.
My youngest (6 non verbal) has figured out how to squeeze himself into the toilet seat hole. Fun times.
Oldest does pretty well on the pee side, but poop is hit n miss, common with ASD kiddos.
We found out the kids therapy center will open in waves, starting the 15th with 7 kids and 7 therapists (a set per room, they have 7 therapy rooms) and our kids are in the first wave. Mama needs a break. We have had some rough times.
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I cannot imagine doing this with an ASD kiddo. My 2.5 yo is normally the sweetest little girl but potty training has brought out the worst in her. I’m sure it’s a trying time on her and I don’t fault her for pushing boundaries and experimenting with defiance as we’re going through potty training.
The weekend went quite well. Saturday morning had a number of #1 accidents on the floor but by the afternoon she was cuing herself when she needed to go. She had been fighting it all day on Saturday, but Sunday morning we had a huge success with #2 followed by a bit of a #1 regression in the afternoon (I wasn’t surprised).
She behaves much better for me than mom; we don’t know why.
So today was very trying on my partner; when I was done working, she had to go for a walk to calm herself down and I looked after both girls who, when I came downstairs after work were both screaming and crying. By the time my partner came back from her walk around the block, both were calm and playing. The oldest wouldn’t obey my partner when it was time for a potty break (almost at all throughout the day) and had a number of accidents. It was probably too soon to try underwear, but we have a goal of getting the girls to their grandparents on Thursday so my partner can go to her doctor’s appointment (instead of rescheduling it again) - as soon as my partner left on her walk, the toddler cued herself, pulled down her underwear (which she had been “forgetting” to do when my partner was around) and went #1 without me saying a word.
In other news: the younger one will probably be late to walk because she’s so freaking fast at crawling (which is not new) but she’s started carrying things around in her mouth to be able to move around and bring things along with her. So, we’ve starting referring to her as our pet baby dinosaur (mostly because of the noises she makes). It’s only a matter of time before the toddler mimics us calling her that and we all live to regret it.
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ASD toilet training sounds rough.
I am once again grateful to Japanese daycare, as we never had to go through the whole wee-all-over-the-house phase of toilet training. Our eldest just eventually got to the point where she used the toilet, with only a little prodding on our part, mainly thanks to the small-scale toilets at daycare, the teachers, and the examples of her peers. I think she just wore nappies until she stopped needing them.
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Apart from the book, the best #2 tip we have is, when they need to go. Get them to sit on the potty or toilet (we got a seat for the kids, so much easier) and get the kid to blow up a balloon. Apparently doing that pushes the diaphragm down and makes you go.
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Our 6 year old has the position of family cat. He climbs up on everything, scratches at you when he’s upset or playful, lays in odd positions, and just this weekend he brought me a dead spider which I assume he killed. I’m just happy it wasn’t in his mouth.
Unlike the paint chips he keeps peeling off the corners of the walls…
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During the roughly 2 months of no daycare and no playgrounds, our 5 year old took to secretly scratching off patches of our textured wallpaper, presumably as a stress outlet. I wish we had used paint - cheaper to fix.
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A page of the life~
I took kiddo to the bathroom. He sits, no pee.
He looked at me n smiled. And wiggled. Took me a sec before I realized he had been successfully squeezing into the toilet seat hole (he is super flexible).
I pull him out, he squats and pees on the floor.
He
He is easier then our other. WE HAVE SEEN THINGS.
But honestly it’s the stuff we all see, just done by an older child who decided to use their powers for evil.
Like when he sneaks into the bathroom and climbs into the sink and uses it for a trampoline.
Or throws my mugs. That can burn my toast. One time seeing the wonton destruction and crumbling letters of “super mom”
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These things, I’m sure, are all in my future. I always remind my partner that it was foolish of us to wait (not that we really had a choice, but that’s a different subject) until mid-to-late 30s to have children because we’ve spent the better part of our late 20s and early 30s spoiling ourselves with nice things and a clean, orderly home.
Like today: toddler pee on the couch – totally saw it coming after my partner jinxed us by saying, at around 6:30pm, that she had gone all day without an accident.
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We got corner guards, which are just 4’ long plastic rails that you nail on the corners to stop him from doing this.
His response? Pull over a chair, stand on it and chew on the corner above the guard.
My kids are problem solvers, y’all.
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I think it is a good idea to wait, we did too (I was 34 and my OH 29 when we had our first). At least you enjoyed those years fully! And when you were young!
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That is totally asking for trouble. I remember every time our firstborn had a good night, we couldn’t mention it, or the next one would be hell. Don’t jinx it!
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I’m 40 and my partner is 39. I was a child until…
…still, probably good we waited.
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People think I’m joking when I talk about “pretending to be an adult”…
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I still twirl my damn hair. Just comes down to my legal obligations, right? I’m adult on paper, I’m in the clear.
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One of the notable transitions is when all your kin in the previous generation have died. It feels strangely exposed.
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I am still shocked by the first time they called me Sir…
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When we get to that stage I will probably cover all of the couch with blankets. It’s my standard go to. Suspect kiddo might have an upset tum? Cover the couch with blankets and sheets. And one on the ground.
Much easier to clean up
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We had towels down … But she wiggled it out of the way – there’s a reason my nickname for her is Wiggle (I called her this for the first time even she was 2 hours old… Little did I now it would be so applicable)
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