Toddlerhood and the Traveling Toilet

>Once upon a time, I carried only a backpack, filled with interesting books (and the occasional dull one).

Then I carried a messenger bag, usually overloaded with papers to grade and books of ideas for inspiring lessons.  If I ventured out on weekends, everything I needed – and more – could be easily stashed in my purse.

Parenthood arrived, and I was most often seen with a diaper bag dangling off one shoulder and a baby off the other.  The diaper bag often weighed more than the baby, but still, it was just one bag.

Flash forward two years, and there are still the diaper bag and baby in arms, but add to it a toddler being held by the hand and…

The Traveling Toilet.

Yes, I look like like the motherhood version of a circus act whenever I leave the house.  But really it’s not limited to outdoors. We go nowhere – not even up or downstairs – without bringing along the toilet.

You see, when the book titled Toilet Training in Less Than a Day shows up in your life, you think to yourself first that it’s really possible that your child will suddenly switch from diapers to the bathroom in, you know, less than a day.  Second, you think that means that he will use any toilet, which is great because they have them almost everywhere (except in parks…what is up with that?).

Yeah, neither of those things came true here at Chez Rasler.  Admittedly, once I opened the book, it became clear that he’d be using a toddler toilet for the training and there was no mention of when you switch to the regular one.  However, I was still pretty sure he’d learn how to do it in a day or two, and we’d figure out the big toilet soon afterward.

You can stop laughing now.  It’s just not nice to mock first-time parents.

All along, I’d been pretty honest about the fact that I was the one who wasn’t ready for toilet training.  I set my goal for January, figuring two and a half was pretty reasonable, especially since the current line of thinking is that boys train later and often not until they’re after three.  Seemed like Sebastian was ready and he was pretty willing to go along with the nightly ritual of sitting on the toilet before getting in his bath.

Then suddenly, he started refusing.  There was no interest in using a toilet or being a big boy.  From his perspective, the baby’s life was the one to have.  Theo got all the snuggle time and attention that Sebastian wanted, so Mr. Contrary would refuse to have anything to do with the toilet and its big boy status.

January rolled around, and I picked up the training book again.  And it hit me.  The Sentence.  “Developmentally delayed children may not be ready for the training until 30 months.”  Umm…what was that?  My son, at 30 months old, was in the same boat as the children who have developmental delays?

I think something snapped in my brain.  I’d already been fed up with the diaper change battles and washing a load of diapers every single day from one boy or the other.  But that sentence was the last straw.  We were DONE with toddler diapers, and by we, I mean me.

So I gathered up my materials, drew my line in the sand, and prepared for Training Day.  Little did I know then that three weeks later, the Traveling Toilet would still be a major part of my daily ensemble…

{This is the end of part one.  Tune in next time to read about the training and its aftermath.}