Monthly Archives: March 2015

Still-no-poopoo-mum

Posted in children, parenting, toilet training by

potty

“I did a poo tomorrow!” she screams at me. In the mind of 3 year old Mini Me, this makes perfect sense and should be sufficient in getting mummy to leave her alone and stop asking her to “pleeeeeeeeeeeease do a poo in the toilet”.

If only.

We’re potty training.  Actually, no.  She’s been potty trained since Christmas. And I’m a very proud Mum as it really only took a fortnight and 3 wee accidents to get to no nappies/no pull-ups territory.  It’s wonderful.  We can leave the house without a suitcase of paraphernalia.  A spare pair of Peppa Pig pants and a pair of leggings are now popped into my handbag, and off we go!

While I am of course, enjoying the utter joy of carrying my grown up handbags again, (in place of her baby bag/Minnie Mouse backpacks which have served as Mummy’s handbag for the past 3 years), I’m still terrified.

What if she forgets to tell me she needs to pee?  The ball-pool is after all, just too much fun to think of such banal bodily functions

What if she announces that she has to pee while we’re in that bloody retail park in town that doesn’t have a public toilet?

What if she pees herself when she’s away from me, and someone scolds her for not telling them she needed to go?

What if she poops?

Because, my little darling, while “potty trained” for the number 1s, is refusing, point blank, to poo in the toilet.  She promises me every day that she’ll “do my poooooos in da toiiiiilet cos I’ms a big gurl” She proudly announces to Daddy at bedtime that she “dood a poo in the toilet yesterday.” (Her lack of time awareness is quite cute and utterly comical really!)

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The reality is that she holds it in for days on end, resulting in a sore tummy, spotty blemishes on her porcelain skin and huge tennis-ball-esque poops protruding from her little toochie as she comes out from her playhouse or from behind the sofa.

She announces innocently that she needs the toilet, then, when she hears the plop of said tennis-ball hitting the water, she beams her sparkly smile, gasps and announces “I dooood it!  I pooed in the toiiiiilet!!”  (usually followed by “I need a Kinder egg” – thanks Granny!)

How do I tell her proud little self that actually, no. You did a poop that an adult would struggle to produce, in your pants, and the toilet/my hands/your little legs are now covered in it. In fact, sometimes, the offending poop looks ironically like a bloody kinder egg! (or in her own words…”It’s only Playdough Granny!”)

I’m living in a playdough nightmare.

I am quite literally. in. the. shit.  And I don’t have a clue what to do.

Everyone is offering advice.  I am taking it all gratefully and have tried everything from blowing bubbles while on the toilet, having whistling competitions to encourage the muscles to move, scolding, blackmailing and crying.  (me, not her!)

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I explain to her patiently that Mummy put the poopoo into the toilet, after she did it in her pants, and that she’s a big girl and should tell Mammy next time.  I’ve turned the poos into little crocodiles who want to go for a swim in the toilet with the peepees.  I’ve tried the “You can show Baby Cousin how to do poops in the toilet“… I’ve tried everything.

So, tell me.  What have I not done? And more importantly, what can I do?  Because I know that “it’s just a phase”, “that they all go through it,” and “that she’ll be grand”, but as Mummy, I need to know how to avoid scarring her for life and leaving her afraid of the toilet! And yes, I know I’ll look back on this and laugh.  Yes, I’ll be well prepared for next time and it’ll be a breeeeeeze.

Yes, maybe she’ll just decide suddenly that the fear she has is gone.  Maybe, I’ll have another 3 months of poops in the pants.  Maybe one of my aunties or friends will untap the secret for me.  Maybe I’ll find something that works for us.  Or maybe she’s actually a psychic child and she will “did a poo tomorrow!”

Whatever.  While we wait, I am indeed “Still-no-poopoo-Mum.

pottyblackmail

I am Step-mum

Posted in Uncategorized by

“Will you marry us?”

stepmum

Not exactly your typical proposal is it? But it’s how many proposals should now be phrased, because let’s face it, for most of us now, marriage is not just between the traditional two people. Sometimes, there’s the ex.  Sometimes there’s a dog who thinks he owns the bed.  Sometimes, there’s a child.  Sometimes, there’s the children.  Regardless, there’s the reality.

As a child, I did the “Monica“; marching through an aisle of appreciative teddy bears, wearing a pillow case as a veil, happily telling Ken that “I do,” while my sister practiced being bridesmaid.

I’m a Disney girl, so I’ve always been pretty sure that someday my Prince Charming would appear on horse back to my castle, to whisk me off into my happily ever after. And appear he did, (after a loooooong string of kissed frogs), admittedly however, not on horse back.  He arrived in a taxi to a house party, but he did indeed sweep me off my glittery stilettos and we’re doing a mighty fine job of the happy ever after!

But when I dreamed about my wedding and my future husband, at no point did I dream of marrying two men.  But that I did.

It wasn’t in my plan.  I’m pretty sure it isn’t in anybody’s plan.  When a couple are expecting a baby, it surely doesn’t come into their thoughts that someday, another woman or another man, will be parent to that child.  Of course it doesn’t.  But then, sometimes, our plans don’t quite work out the way we dream they will.

Families are complicated.  When you marry the man, or woman, of your dreams, the “us” you dreamed of can suddenly include a whole lot of people you never imagined having to deal with:  The child.  The other parent.  The parent’s partner.  The other baby. The mother’s family.  More often than not, things get messy, but if you’re in it for the long haul, you’ll quickly realize that the fighting has to just end in order for anyone to get on with things.

Of course every circumstance is different.  I’m one of the lucky ones I suppose.  My husband came with a perfectly wonderful mini-him.  I’ve had the pleasure of being mini-him’s wicked stepmother since he was only a wee toot of a four year old.  He doesn’t know anything else except Daddy and Me. And he is his Mammy’s own Prince Charming.

He’s wonderful with our own Mini-me.  He knows he’s part of a wonderfully functional dysfunctional little unit.  He knows that there’s been the obvious  difficulties in the past, but he also knows that he has a whole lot of love directed at him, from many different angles.

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I had friends at the start who thought I was crazy taking on another woman’s child.  I’m sure some of them still think it.  But, what some of them didn’t realize was that watching my manfriend be the best father in the world to his little person, was one of the reasons I loved him so immediately.  He would go to the ends of the earth for him.  He did actually, and you can’t buy that level of love and commitment. So as I stood on the altar and promised to love him, “and all the children we’d be blessed with“, forever, I was making that vow to not one, but two, men…And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I’m also blessed that his mother knows that I love him and has allowed me the pleasure of helping to raise her precious one.    Granted, I’m sure that I was never in her plans.  I know she was never in mines. But guess what? The universe threw our happy ever afters together whether we liked it or not.  We’re not in charge.  Even in my own self-righteousness, I’ve never underestimated how difficult it must be to allow a step-mum into your child’s life…I’m not sure I could do it. That takes guts. That takes a supermum. 🙂