A Pleasant Surprise in Being Wrong

Guess what happened last week? Mattias potty trained himself completely.

I think you should know that my experience with Noah led me to say things like,

"It seems that anecdotally girls can train themselves, but boys need a lot of reinforcement"

I was very good a rattling off a long list of all the things I did to potty train Noah. Noah was potty trained by 29 months of age, when he started a preschool-like program that required that he be potty trained. Getting him trained, however, was not without a good amount of preserverance and, frankly, TRAINING MYSELF to read his mind. It took about 3 months. But I we did it!

This summer when Mattias reached the same age that Noah was, I kept thinking of how much work it was to potty train Noah. And I kept swatting away the thought. Later.

Then autumn came, and I felt terrible from all the first trimester morning sickness. Somehow plugging my nose with a clothespin during diaper changes (yes, I really did that) seemed highly preferable to sitting around in the bathroom waiting for him to go.

My mother did some tsk-ing. I responded by making some more attempts to potty train him.

There was always some reason it didn't work or wasn't the right time. I kept relenting in my efforts. I made excuses.

He's so stubborn. He's not feeling well. He's not ready. It's not working. I'm not ready. I'm not feeling well. I still have some diapers to use up.  Now I'm out of diapers but I still have a lot of wipes. None of his pants are very potty-training-friendly. We're just about to go on vacation. We're adjusting from being on vacation. The holiday has him too wound up. 

On and on and on. (That's my mother tsk-ing, too.)

Last week I ran out of diapers again. Mattias was sick. Not ideal timing. Nonetheless, I showed him the empty diaper box, and told him he needed to wear his 'big boy' pants, like I've done before. He protested, like he's done before. Then we put the 'big boy' pants on, like we've done before. UNLIKE before, he told me when he needed to use the potty. He ran to the bathroom himself. He pulled down his own pants. And he climbed on the potty. AND WENT. And then he repeated this behavior all week, day and night.

I was floored. It was like a light switch had been flipped in his brain. He proceeded to have only two accidents total over the course of an entire week. I'm calling that trained. It didn't work like that AT ALL with Noah.

So, who knows why it was so easy this time around. Because I waited longer (Noah was 29 months, Mattias is 34 months)? Maybe I was just lazy and excuse-ridden enough? Maybe Grandma needed to get in an adequate number of tsks? Maybe he's a different kid? Whatever the reason, I'll take the self-training over my long list of potty-training techniques with Noah. I'm happy about this! Also, here's that anecdotal experience where the boy-child trains himself.

However, this also illustrates this frustrating aspect of parenthood (for me), wherein, I'd like to say, Look, I did A, B, and C and Voilà! Success! See! I'm doing something right! But then, I do neither A, nor B, nor C and somehow I get the same result, with a lot less effort. I wonder. I ask myself if I will ever get to congratulate myself on anything parenting related. That's pretty selfish and arrogant, huh? I think sometimes I'm just too goal-oriented and self-centered for the task of child raising.

New Yard Play

In my mind, the yard should be Messy and Wild. It should be a space for children. There should be lots of overgrown plants to climb around and behind and under. There should be secret spots to dig holes and bury treasures. There should be trees to climb and stones to throw (but not while I'm looking, and NEVER at anyone, of course). We've planted 7 trees and many bushes in our 2 years here. Every summer, we've planted lots of vegetables. But the bushes and trees take time. They take patience and care and their own little plumbing line because it's so DRY in Colorado. Sometimes they die, even with the best of care. I live with a future version of our yard in my head. A version where the trees are big enough that lawn mowing won't cut them down.

Because, in reality, the yard is sparse, especially at this time of the year.

It's warm. The door is open between indoors and out. I listen to the boys' improvisational outdoor singing from the table inside:

Twinkle twinkle little star
How I can get a dirty car?

I smile to myself. That was Mattias. I'm impressed by his rhyming ability, never mind the funky grammar. Then:

Twinkle twinkle little star
How I can get a muddy car?

I decide that it's time I have some visual confirmation on the activity at hand. We have guests arriving in 10 minutes. Muddy cars don't sound good.

They're digging in the vegetable garden box. The water drip line has been dismantled and rearranged, but the mud seems minimal. I figure this is small trade-off for some healthy outdoor playing. I suggest we brush off and head inside.

Noah attempts his escape.

Well, at least they're still digging and climbing, even if there are no plants to hide among.

Some photos that made me think

My brother introduced me Nicholas Nixon's series The Brown Sisters this summer. If you've not heard of The Brown Sisters  or Nixon before, I'll give you some quick background information. Nixon is a professional photographer. Many of his subjects are emotionally difficult to photograph: the terminally and seriously ill, people with AIDS, people in nursing homes. I think if you've ever taken – or tried to take – photos of people in these situations, you'll have even more appreciation for his work.

The Brown Sisters is maybe not as painful as some of his work, but it still managed to permanently plant itself in my brain, where I have been unable to shake its impact. The series of photos is four sisters over 36+ years. Nixon takes one photo every year. The sisters are always in the same order. He started in 1975. His wife is the third from the left. My brother, as I understand it, traded some camera repair work for this print from the series:

When I saw the series in a book, I was absolutely fascinated - and I still am!

Looking at these photos was such a great reminder that what makes us interesting (and by 'us' I mean women)  isn't being model thin or photographically beautiful or looking like we just stepped out of a fashion catalog. What's really attractive and interesting about us are our connections with others. Connections with family, connections over time, and even connections with the camera come to mind. I think it takes looking at the series as a whole to really feel the full impact.

I hope you will follow this link and look at all the whole series. It's really powerful.
More recent link here.