Terrible Twos

I must have all my toys in the pool!

This is a terrible age.  And it's a wonderful age.  Sometimes in the same 5 minute span. 

Friday morning was a rough morning of epic proportions.  Finn woke up before 6am (we don't have to get up until 6:45).  "Good morning, Mommy!" For a few minutes he was content to play a game on my phone, but then, "I have to poopy, Mommy!" So up we went.  He sat on the toilet and while he did pee, there was no poop.  He then ran around naked for a little bit, but then came in to my room with his shorts and wanted to get dressed.  I had an idea.  "Why don't you put on underwear, instead?"  So he went to his room, got his underwear and managed to put it on himself.  (As an aside, I had no idea how exhausting it was to be with a child who wants to do EVERYTHING HIMSELF.  Even the things he can't possibly do.  EVERYTHING.) The epic struggle to put on his underwear with no help from mommy ended with a triumphant, "I did it!" a huge hug and kiss for me.

With a reminder that if he needed to poop, he should let me know so he could go on the potty, I got in the shower.  I got out of the shower to find my powdered eyeshadow all over the counter (and on Finn).  While I cleaned this up, I let him out on the porch off my bedroom to play.  I was putting on my makeup when he came running in, "I have to go poo!" I started to take off his underwear, and then got suspicous, reached out and felt his butt...yep.  There was poo. 

Have you ever tried to take underwear full of poo off a two year old?  It never ends well.  I got the underwear halfway down his legs and - plop - the whole big pile of poo fell onto the floor (conveniently on top of his pajama bottoms).  After I'd flushed that and wiped the poop off my arm and his legs, I sent him back out on the porch, with a strict warning to come back in if he felt like he needed to potty again.

But I quickly grew suspicious (running theme these days), and stuck my head out the door to find him peeing on the floor.  At least it was outside and I was able to clean it easily.  But that won him a fresh diaper and the end of running around naked.

In what I am sure was an act of defiance, he managed to open the bathroom closet door and get out some of his lotion.  Which he covered himself in - but only after dumping out half the contents of  a bottle of hand sanitizer all over the floor. 

At this point it was almost 8am.  Nanny M walked in the door as I was carrying him and his dirty laundry down the stairs.  I've never been so relieved to be able to hand him over to her as I was on Friday morning! 

Of course, he stood at the door and waved, yelling "I love you!" and "Bye-bye!  See you later!" and "Peace out!" while blowing kisses as I drove away. 


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I'm still feeling pretty crappy.  Usually it's just a constant low grade nausea, but there's waves of much more intense nausea that hit at random times and just about knock me over.  I'm not a thrower-upper, so I've managed to avoid that so far, but I've come pretty close.  What really worries me is that I'm only 8 weeks tomorrow, so there's still a chance it could get worse.  I am lucky that while this nausea is a lot worse than it was with Finn, it's not debilitating, so while I'm not feeling up to doing much of anything, especially in the heat, at least I'm not lying on the floor unable to move for fear of throwing up. 

I've also been having a lot of spotting.  It's been pretty constant this entire pregnancy, but usually just pink or brown. Today it was more a dark red - still spotting, mainly on my Crinone (I know, gross) and not when I wipe.  Spotting can happen in normal pregnancies, but it's impossible not to worry about it, especially since there was a definite change today.  My next ultrasound is Friday and I'm trying hard not to feel anxious about it.  The second ultrasound seems to be the magic scan - if all is well with the second scan, then all will be well with the pregnancy.  (I know that's not completely true, but it does make me feel better.) 

I have also worried about how I'll feel about this baby compared to Finn.  Will I love him/her as much as I do Finn?  Will I feel sad that he/she doesn't share my genetics?  I've read before that your heart expands with each child, that your capacity to love grows as each new child is added to the family.  I'm starting to see that's true - the fear I feel when I think of losing this pregnancy is much more than the fear of having to do all this again, it's the fear of losing this little baby - this Chimichanga - that I've already come to love so much. 

Potty Training

Finn and his hat that is not underwear

I've been letting Finn lead the way with potty training, and he's already way ahead of where I would have anticipated he would be.  He asks to go to the bathroom about 75% of the time when he has to poop, and rarely (usually bedtime!) when he has to pee.  He's even told me, "Mommy, I need to poop!" when we've been out, and then pooped in a public toilet.  I didn't do anything to prompt this, it's all been him.  Though, from the time he was old enough to notice, I've shown him his poop in his diaper, and when he was old enough to help, I've had him come with me when I dump his poop in the toilet, and have him help me flush it.  (I have several friends who had children who freaked out the first time they pooped in the toilet and saw their poop, so I wanted to be sure we avoided that!)

Friday morning he woke up with a dry diaper, and had showered with me.  He had naked time after the shower, and as I was picking out my clothes he said, "I have to go potty.  Bye Mommy!" and went to his bathroom.  I followed, but he kicked me out, then came running in the room a few minutes later, "I pee-peed on the potty, Mommy!" I had to go to give the appropriate oohs and ahhs and yays, and discovered a potty full of pee...and pee on the floor, too.  I was running late and short on patience, but really hate to make him feel bad about anything potty related, so I groaned just a little, cleaned up the pee and sang the "Finn pee-peed on the potty!" song.

He got big boy underwear a couple of months ago, but until last week, didn't show any interest in using them for anything more than a hat. Then this past week we've read the Potty book a couple of times and he's asked about wearing underwear.  So yesterday afternoon I put him in his first pair of big boy underwear.  Within an hour he was walking to the bathroom, pulling down his pants, and then peed on the toilet.  Yay!  "Oh, this is going to be easier than I ever expected!" I thought to myself.

This morning I put him in underwear right after we woke up, then puttered around upstairs while he played between his room, my room and the porch off my bedroom.  About 20 minutes later he walked into my room, crying.  "I pee-peed, Mommy!" I took of his wet clothes, cleaned up the floor where he'd peed, and let him run around naked.  After I rinsed out his clothes, I walked out to the porch where he was playing and saw a puddle on the ground.  "Did you pee out here, Finn?"  "Yes, Mommy!  And I poopied, too!" and he proudly pointed to the little mound of poop by the railing. 

So it was back in diapers for our errands and naptime, then this afternoon we had naked time.  I was in the bathroom  and he walked by with a diaper in his hand. "Hi Mommy!" "Finn, what's in that diaper?"  He brought it to me, and showed me the poop in the diaper. He had gotten a clean diaper and pooped in it, rather than coming to the bathroom.  And, as I later discovered, he had peed into another clean diaper and left that one in the living room.

I think he's telling me he's not quite ready to give up diapers.  But he looks so cute in his little underwear!  (No pictures of that, yet!)

My computer is officially damaged...I took it to the Apple Hospital Saturday, and am expecting it back later this week.  I'm using my work computer, which is a pain.  I can't comment on some blogs (that use Discus for comments), it's doing weird things when I try to post, it's really slow, it looks to me like it messed up the picture on this post, and it's driving me crazy with other websites as well. I may not be around much this week, if i can't get this computer working better.

Potty Time

I was going to blog about how Finn is driving me absolutely crazy this weekend - I think the terrible twos have hit a few months early.  But I decided that would just make me grumpier.  So instead, I'm going to post about Finn's new obsession with the potty.

About a month ago, he was in the tub, and suddenly started saying "Poop! Poop!" I asked him if he had to poop, and he said yes.  I was so surprised that he was telling me he needed to go, that I asked if he wanted to get out of the tub to sit on the potty.  And again, he said yes.  Before then, I hadn't given a thought to potty training yet.  I do always show him his poop in his diaper, and he "helps" me flush it down the toilet, but aside from that, we haven't been doing anything.

He sat on the toilet, me holding on to him, and passed some gas.  He then was done, and went back to the bathtub.  I took that as a sign that it was time to move towards potty training, and got out the potty seat that a forward thinking friend gave me at my shower.  When bathtime was over, I showed him the new potty seat - and he was instantly interested.

I like this seat!

He then asked for me to take off his diaper, and he sat on it again.

Does this seat make my tummy look big?

He peed the first time he sat on it without his diaper, and was so excited when he stood up and saw the pee in the bowl.  He got on and off over and over again, trying to replicate the pee, but he just couldn't do it.  Finally he got tired of sitting there with nothing to do and ran out of the room.  He came back a few seconds later and got comfortable.

He's reading Julie James, "About that Night"

I've left the seat out, and got a couple more for the other bathrooms. He'd ask to sit on them occasionally, until a few nights ago, when bathtime was interrupted by "Poop!" He first wanted to sit on the big potty, so I put him on, and he peed and pooped!  He went back to the tub after that, but when he was done in the tub, he spent another 30 minutes getting on and off his little potty.  He'd squeeze a few drops of pee in the bowl, yell "Yaaay!!!", stand up, dump the pee in the toilet (getting drops of pee everywhere in the process) and sit down on the potty again.

He's done that every night since.  Over and over. It's cute, and I'm glad he's showing an interest, but we've now had to move preparing for bedtime up 45 minutes to make time for this routine.  Mostly it's been pee, but last night there was poop again.

He hasn't done this at all with Nanny M, and hadn't shown any interest in not peeing or pooping in his diaper, either.  Until today when we were driving he started crying in the back seat, saying and signing "Poop!" I asked him if he had to poop and he said yes.  I told him it was ok to poop in his diaper, and he stopped crying.  But he didn't poop.  I wonder if he would have asked to use the potty if we'd been home?

As I wasn't really planning on potty training just yet, I'm not sure where to go from here.  I'd love to offer him the potty multiple times a day, but if each time ends up being 30-45 minutes of off and on the potty, I'd rather change his diapers until he's 3!  

Any suggestions?

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8dpIUI - I'm testing on Thursday, at 12dpIUI.  I haven't the slightest idea if I'm pregnant or not.  

I hate the two week wait.