A sort of shitpost?

As any parent knows... the period where you are trying to train your children to use the toilet (or the potty...) can be one of the most frustrating and messy times in the whole parenting experience. Oddly enough, with our oldest child, it went pretty smoothly... however, our second child is a different kettle of fish (perhaps that is why things don't go as well, she is neither a kettle nor a fish...).

We had some early success with the pee into the potty... and even into the big toilet! Every time that she manages to do it right, she gets to choose something from this little treasure box that we have for her (pictured above...). It's mostly stickers and stamps with a couple of little toys... but mostly she chooses the stickers (our oldest would have the stamps when she was training...).

However, after that initial flush of beginner's luck... we had many weeks where both myself and my wife were busy... and this is the sort of thing that only really works when you are prepared to spend quite a bit of time monitoring and reminding and sitting the child on the toilet seat... Lately, we have started up again.. and with the pee it has been improving.. we are seeing less wet puddles on the floor or outright soaked through underwear...

We know that she knows what to do... but it is weird... she is scared of letting it out in the potto. She will sit there for ages, and then if we have to leave to go outside (and thus put on a nappy) she will immediately do it then (in the nappy...). Or she will let out the barest little trickle and say that she is done... a few times she has let it all out... and said that it wasn't scary at all! We're hoping to continue that trend...

However, on the back end... things are not going so well. Well, we aren't really trying to train the poop awareness yet... just working on the front end of things. However, when you have one end exposed, you are running the danger that all ends are exposed... and we've had a couple of disasters. First one was not so bad... it stayed in her underwear and that was that...

... last night, was a different thing. My wife took her to the toilet... where she did her thing on the front... and then she (my wife) had to leave for work. Which meant that there was a 5 minute gap where I was finishing up the dishes downstairs where the little one was not monitored and free to poop at will... and unfortunately, she did... and it was big... and then she decided it was a great idea to sit down on her bed...

... let's just say that I heard calls of "POOOP"! from my oldest... and I ran upstairs... too late. There was poop all over the covers and the mattress that was aided by the addition of pee to help it spread everywhere. Sigh... I didn't have the presence of mind to take photos this time... more in an emergency mode of get kid to tiled area (toilet), quick scan for other potential poop spots.... and then get to work cleaning kid and bed.

It's weird, I change her nappies everyday... with varying sloppiness of poop, and it never bothers me. However, cleaning poop of sheets and the covers before putting them in the wash had me retching and wanting to throw up... strange reaction, given that it is exactly the same thing!