Potty-Training Diaries

Probably a little less than a year ago, we decided we'd start introducing that wonderful concept called potty training. I didn't expect it to stick right away, but who knows, we could have had a little Allison on our hands who will take any opportunity to tell you that she was potty trained at 18 months. This was all well and good. As far as I could tell, potty training is supposed to go something like this:

1. Just sit the kid on the potty at intervals throughout the day. They will eventually go on accident. When this happens, make a really big deal.
2. Seeing your excitement, the kids will want to reproduce this joyous event (probably more so if they got some sort of treat like an M&M)
3. For a while, it's a conditioned response and you, the parent, take them into go periodically throughout the day. Until, one day, the child recognizes that there's a connection between the feeling of having to go, and going.
4. The kid starts to be better about recognizing their own signals and eventually can tell you when they need to go.

So far, our adventure has gone something like this:

1. Introduce Lillian to the toilet at intervals throughout the day. She goes on accident a few times and I make a big deal about it.
2. Tyler accidentally let her fall into the toilet making Lillian deathly afraid of going potty.
3. Much bribing and cajoling goes on to get Lillian to even sit on the potty.
4. She doesn't go on accident. Ever. I tried all the 'tricks' like trying to make her drink a lot of Crystal Lite. But, she's a stinker and won't drink if she's not thirsty. Six months goes by.
5. Lillian begins to HATE sitting on the potty and refuses to do it. I take a break.
   
6. I begin to be very tired of changing diapers, especially as Lillian begins to be more of a stinker and runs away and wiggles and I'm getting bigger and bigger and my ability to chase her down diminishes. More bribing and cajoling (and time outs for running away) to little effect.
   
7. I purchase training pants to help Lillian recognize the connection between going and being wet and needing to go in the potty instead of your pants.
8. She doesn't care at all about walking around in wet training pants with pee running down her legs. Not one bit. That little turkey.
   

So all you moms out there, what to do next? Do I take another break and wait for her to be a little older so she has more conversational power and we can talk about it a little more effectively? Just keep at it? Be patient? I know Allison has told me that Tristan didn't "get" it until he was almost three while Jack "got" it a little after he turned two and she did the same things for both kids, so it might just be that I need to be patient as Lillian is still only one month shy of being two and a half.

I just had a dream of not having two children in diapers at once. It seems as if that dream, like so many dreams I've had in motherhood, is just not to be.