Post 300 (and still talking about poop)

I just realized this is my 300th post! I've been blogging since August 2005. Wow. My first post was about Mary learning to walk and Abby deciding to jump off the diving board for the first time. I find myself in a quandry with Mary, 2 1/2 years later. I've taken the do or die approach on pooping in the potty and it totally backfired on me. With Ben, it worked...but he was 4! And he magically found his motivation button. Fear. All Ted said was, "It'll collect if you don't let it out". And boom. He pushed the poop out like he was expelling a demon. That didn't work on Mary. We've tried material incentives. Nope. We've tried the incentive of letting her get her ears pierced. Nope. I let her go for a while and let her use diapers to poop in. I thought we'll get the potty part down first since she doesn't mind that part and deal with the poop part later.

Well, I thought now was later. I tried to hide the diapers and tell her we can't do them anymore. Mary panicked and cried when she felt the urge, but wouldn't sit on the potty. She just held it in. For three days. We heard cries whenever the pain would come to a peak. A couple of times I actually forced her to sit on the potty when I noticed she felt the urge. I held her down hoping that if she just let it come out she would see it's not so bad. That just made things worse. I heard my Pediatrician's voice in my head, "The pains are a natural consequence of their refusal to poop in the potty. This is a behavior. He KNOWS how to do this."

Those words kept me going for a little bit. If I saw ANY progress at all in those 3 days...like a willingness to sit on the potty, that would have kept me going. She just seems majorly not ready. She is scared to death of the thought! I looked back on my first blog. I was writing about Abby jumping off the diving board and this is what I said, "The more a child is rushed, the more they seem to resist the jump. Let them go on their own, and it's amazing what they'll decide to do."

I look at those words now and I wonder if they were meant for me today. This stuff exhausts me. It takes so much of my energy. I'm trying so hard to do the right thing. I'm trying to take every bit of advice I've ever heard and do them all. I'm tired. She's even regressed. She wouldn't take off her diaper today after she pooped. She kept saying she wasn't finished yet. *sigh* Tiring I tell you.

So I've backed off. She has control again. Hopefully I'll be inspired as to when I'm supposed to try this again.