Revenge pee

Things to Google:

Revenge Pee

And, of course, it is my son that leads me to Google things like this. The majority of knowledge I have gained from my son in the last 3 years is urine and feces related. Google is my best friend. It has helped me learn  lots of things, most of which are regarding how to remove odors and stains from various fabric-type materials.

For the last 3 weeks or so, a particular pattern has been developing. One which has, honestly, been rather hard to figure out. Periodically V will just pee. A sort of no-warning situation. Often times it’s as a result of a stressful situation, or a situation he just doesn’t approve of. Or, mostly, something he disapproves of.

Or we’d fight, he’d cry and then pee on the floor. Through his shorts. Or, I’d say no, he’d cry and then pee on the floor. Sometimes he’d just run off to a corner of the livingroom, pretend to play with his toys and then announce “Mummy. I peed. Right der.”

*sigh*

But finally I made the connection. Revenge pee. Dude.

Telling one of my friends about my theory, she thought “Did you see if there is anything online? Probably there is a Mum that has dealt with it already…”

Well, I did learn a whole bunch of interesting stuff about people who take revenge on other people by peeing on their stuff. Animals too. Not peeing on animals, I mean. Just animals that revenge pee. That’s what you get when you Google ‘revenge pee’.

When, however, you Google ‘Children pee’ you get all sorts of shizzle. Info that, frankly, I have no interest in really reading as I am living the dream and am pretty sure that all Mum’s are doing the same things that I am. There honestly is not that many actual options.

Comfort (if it was indeed an accident) or reassure.

Obviously clean up is a MAJOR part of the operation.

As of yet, there is no punishment. It is so a total ‘f-you Mummy, let me have my own way!!’ that I pretty much cannot have any real reaction. Maybe an eyebrow raise. Oh, and a Mummy-face. One that I am still perfecting as it has a 50-50 response rate.

Today was a good day though. No revenge peeing. Plus V actively asking to use the potty. AND he pooped. TWICE. ON the potty.

Despite my total exhaustion and low levels of everything (Family health issues that I will not be discussing, except to say that there are some. They make me sad. And I am trying very hard to be adult about them), V filled that potty the m-f-ing up.

Which, I admit, in hind-sight type-wise sounds a little gross, but for real. We were super high-fiving each other and I did not have to clean up any poo from any non-toilet surface today.

Now I have totally lost my train of thought. Pretty sure it’s about pee. Probably poo too. It is my life, after all.

Anyways, any tips on surviving revenge peeing?

xoxo a.m.

Potty-ness

As life centers around the bowl these days, it’s only fair to share with everyone. I am sure Vince will appreciate it when he is older. Or when he can read.

This week has been a week of underwear. As in, Vince is going to and from school in underwear! Wow! Huzzah! Someone can pee in the potty all by themselYes!

Not that this means there are no accidents. As there seem to be many and they are all gross and are all situated around me, post-work and usually when Edward is otherwise occupied. With his ipad. Bastard.

Last week, when we were doing a ‘dry-run’, success was in the works until we hit what I would call a road block, but perhaps other people would call ‘a shower of poo’.

As in, he told me he had to poo. He poo’d. We could ONLY go upstairs to sort out this mess, and with every step he took, there was a shower ‘nuggets. and this was something I didn’t notice right away.

Vince pointed it out for me. “Mummy. Ders poo. Right der.”

“There is?!?!”

“Yes. Der is.” “Where?” “Mummy!!!! Poo right der!” (The floors are dark wood)

“Where honey?” “MUMMY! Right der!!!!!”

And lo and behold, there was. All over my livingroom floor. On the landing. And up the stairs.

“EDWARD!!!!!!! I need you to clean up poo!!!!”

“OK!!!!!!!”

Ok, so anyways, that was awful. And then it didn’t happen again until Tuesday.

“Mummy! I poo!”

Oh god. And he did. In his underwear. And then was so frantic to have his pants changed of it, that the poo splatted on the floor of the bathroom and down his leg. Wonderful.

“Hun!! Is there a problem?”, Eddie shouted from the living room.

And then, I literally super ray-gun laser-visioned through the wall and burned his face off.

And then it happened again. But this time, since I had seen a pattern, I thought I had an answer. Get someone on the potty asap. Because apparently, they do not poop at school, they save it for home and then *attack* poop the house.

So I went in attack mode. I tried to be preventative. Instead, I just caused an international incident.

*A soft whisper from E later: “I think you might have been a bit over-reactive”*

*Whisper back:”Like a nuclear reactor”*

And now I feel awful, hoping that I did not scar him for life. I think we are having poop issues. Boo!

xoxo

a.m. (please pray for me)

Faking it

V wasn't paying attention

And just like that, we are back to food and bedtime issues. It appears to be a never-ending, cyclical thing.

What a huge turd.

Anyways, I’m not going to go through the whole huge complaint again. You’ve all heard it a million times. Won’t eat anything I make blah blah blah… a billion dinners blah blah, hates everything blah blah, won’t go to bed blah blah, lots of crying blah, hates school blah blah blah..

And of course the bipolar switch of ‘loves school, loves everything I make, gobbles down dinner and sleeps just like a little angel’.

It’s exhausting to keep up with.

Last night, during the Battle of the Bed, I though I would try a new tactic. It was called ‘faking it’.

This entails lying still on the narrow twin bed that V sleeps on, pretending to be ‘sooooooooo tired’ that I fall asleep, hopefully encouraging him to feel sleepy too and fall asleep next to me.

And I was so tired that I almost fell asleep too. So I am lying there, faking it, trying not to succumb to the pillow and the blanket. Tough. Very tough.

Things started to get calmer in the room. I stayed awake. Just.

And then a little hand started patting my face. Patting my cheeks and nose. Then my mouth. Then 2 little fingers poked their way into my mouth. I did not move. Mustn’t encourage child. Fake it good.

So I lay there with fingers in my mouth, little nails running over my front teeth. I did a fake ‘yawn and stretch’ type move and dislodged the fingers. 30 seconds later, the fingers were back in my mouth and the second hand started patting my nose and I felt fingers near my nostrils.

And that’s when I ended my attempt at faking it. Fingers up the nose? No thank you!

Faking it does not appear to work. At least not over here. All I get was 2 fingers in my mouth and one almost up my nose. And I got giggled on. (As in he giggled right in my face, all heavy hot breath and all. Few drops of saliva mixed in).

So Edward is dealing with the bedtime battles now. I am on poop-patrol. I have yet to decide if this is a far trade-off. Hmm.

xoxo a.m.

 

 

Monday night poop

The last 2 weeks or so seem to be the beginning of a vocabulary explosion in the Little Man. And sentence structure. And chattering. Non-stop.

Vince’s latest things to say?

“Mummy, that’s funny!”

“Chewie, don’t bite Mummy’s pants. That’s bad.”

“Chewie is too noisy. Be quiet!”

And this evening?

“Mummy? Vincent poo-poo bath-tub! Ewww! Stinky poo!”

I thought it was all talk. But, as it turns out, it was action too. “Daddy!!”, I hollered, “I need you!!”

“What?!” Edward shouted in reply.

“Poop in the tub!! I need help!”

And so while Edward got V cleaned up, pajamaed and read him a few stories, I fished poo out of the tub with a paper towel. This is not a fun game. The motion of the paper towel under water causes ripples that make the poo drift away from your paper-wrapped hand.

And if, say, you had a tub filled with bubbles, it turns into ‘hide and seek with poo’. Not ‘Hide and Seek with Pooh’ as that would actually be fun. Just me, on my knees beside the tub carefully scooping turds out and depositing them into the toilet.

Funnily enough, V was not in the slightest bit upset that this happened. Like the last few times it did. He was just very matter of fact. And then stood there, very patiently, while I fished him out of the tub and rinsed him off. And then promptly told Daddy all about it when he came upstairs.

There might have been a hint of pride in his retelling of the story.

Lord. Help. Us.

What a perfect ending to a lovely day…

xoxo a.m.

Knitting. Again.

Knitting is entirely to blame for my lack of, well, anything social these days.

After last years crochet-fail, all crafty things were put aside. Plus, once it started to get hot down here I forgot all about indoor crafts and focused instead on swimming, running, walking etc.

However, it is now officially Fall.

And Florida knows that because the temperature has dropped about 4 degrees…

With the arrival of cooler weather, my thoughts have turned to the pursuits of Autumn and Winter. And crafts. And knitting.

I drove to Michael’s  on my lunch break one day and picked up some gorgeous yarn. All sorts of eggplant purples, marigolds, burnt oranges and raspberries. Lovely, glowy jewel-like colours. So beautiful, actually, that it was hard to wait until I got home to play them.

Lovely bamboo knitting needles to go with it all, which I have to admit make the most wonderful click-clacking noise. Which I think sound much nicer than metal needles.

Anyways, so all I am doing with my spare time is click-clacking away on the couch like an old lady. And then click-clacking away at work on my lunch break. It’s very soothing. I feel pleased to have something else to do with my hands in the cold, harsh Floridian Autumn.

In between cleaning up puke and poo, I mean. You know, because that is the other thing that is constantly waxing and waning in our household.

Right now it waxing. It’s been a very very long day. One that started very very early with a relatively healthy little boy. And then proceeded to regress as the day progressed. Not that he himself was out of sorts or in poor spirits. He just had a really upset stomach. Something I sadly didn’t know about until we were leaving the library this morning and walking out to the car, when I noticed that it smelled like poo.

I honestly thought it was sewage or something (which it was, in a manner of speaking). I remember thinking “God, it smells like shit out here. How gross for the library!”. And as we got into the car and began driving away, the smell got stronger.

How mysterious.

I didn’t make the connection at all, not until I noticed a discolouration on my arm.

Ewwwwwwwwwwww. I am just going to leave it at that. It was really too awful to want to remember. Plus, it was disgusting. Plus, really gross.

I had to buy him new clothes. I had to clean my arm. I had to go to my in-laws to clean up this whole mess (as we were out running errands when this all happened and nowhere near home)

Ugh.

And then we went home. And Vince and I watched Cars. And I knitted.

A soothing, healing way to end a day that became, well, crappy.

xoxo a.m.

Big Shark

Update update!

Possible breakthrough!

Ok, the smallest possible breakthrough.

And I am attributing it all to Daycare and it’s wee potties. V’s classroom has it’s own bathroom. One for boys and girls, both with miniature potties. Cutest thing you have ever seen.

That, combined with his teachers gentle encouragement, produced this:

“Big shark poo-poo”.

Edward and I made WTF faces at each other.

Let me backtrack a little and tell you where we were eating. Carriera‘s in Lake Nona.

Their dining room has a HUGE shark on the wall, one we always have to sit under when eat there. Which is often as the food there is just amazing. AMAZING.

Well, this evening, as we were sitting under that shark, V made his announcement.

He made it several times actual. Addressed to both of us. Separately.

“Daddy, big shark poo-poos”, he said solemnly.

“Mummy? Shark! Big poo-poos!”

We took this moment and ran with it.

“Vince”, Daddy asked him “Does the shark go poo-poo on the potty?”

Vince looked at us disbelievingly “Noo..potty?”

“Vince? The big shark goes poo-poo on the potty. Just like Vincent!” said Mummy, nodding seriously while rearranging those crazy curls of his.

Edward caught my eye during this whole exchange and we both did some telepathy.

Neither of us could believe we were talking about sharks poo-pooing on the potty. I couldn’t believe V was talking about sharks pooing at all. What were we even talking about? This whole conversation is/was so ridiculous.

But at least we were talking about poo?

And so this is why I was excited.

Yay poo!!

xoxo a.m.

Poop

This morning I got the best indication that potty training is a lot closer than I really thought.

I am so on the potty train and have been for the last few months. I’ve read all those things about how hard it is to potty train boys and am feeling pretty determined that I am not going to fall into that trap/cycle/pattern. Or whatever. Dammit! I WILL train this child!

So a while ago we got a little potty seat for the toilet. And this was quite exciting for a while. V sat on it, he got a treat and we clapped our hands.

And nothing happened. Which was to be expected. I just wanted him comfortable with the whole idea of it.

And then there was the miraculous poop. I redoubled my efforts after that holy event. And nothing happened. There wasn’t even a piddle in the potty.

And so we let the potty slide for a while.

And recently he’s become a little more interested in it. So we are sitting on the potty again. Counting to 10 and getting treats. Mummy goes potty. So does Daddy and Chewie.

V says exciting things to me like “Poo-poo poshy” and I whisk him off to the throne. Where nothing happens. In fact everything seems to happen the second we get off of the potty. I even tried, last week this was, having him sit on the potty while I slowly poured some water in the bathtub, thinking that would move things along.

All it did was made me have to go to the bathroom. And then when I plunked V in the tub after potty-time, he immediately peed in the tub. ARGH!

So over this last weekend, when V learned how to undo his diaper… well, lets just say that meant things were on the move.

And all M had to say about this was “Jame, I wish you hadn’t bought those cheap diapers.”

Well, excuse me for being more environmentally conscious and choosing to hit up the 7th Generation brand instead. Not cheap. But better. But maybe this purchase will bring on the training?

So this morning, while I was running around the house getting things sorted out for this morning, I heard a velcro-like rip and turned around to find V with a naked bum.

Holding his diaper in his hands. He toddled over to me and handed it carefully over. Oh look!! it was full of poo!!

How amazing! What a nice present! “M!! V has another present for you honey!” And he actually came downstairs, and then I handed him some poo. And then we laughed. And then I looked over at V who had this rather worried/scared look on his face.

I just felt awful. “Aw, honey, it’s ok!! Next time you have to go poo-poo you tell Daddy and you can go poo-poo on the potty!!” He perked up immediately.

Update 9:34 pm, so far there has been no poo-poo on the potty as of yet. I’ll keep you posted…

Big Deal

Lord almighty, did life just get more interesting?

And I say this with a question mark because I am not really sure.  And I will explain why. But just a heads up. It does involve poop.

Getting ready for bed last night was a little rushed because Daddy and V went for a long walk (to buy sandwiches) while I went to spin class. I got home just before them and took over the night-time duties.

We are half-assed potty-training right now. He will sit on the potty and get a treat fs he does. So mostly he wants a ‘teet’ and then gets right off the potty.

Last night I decided to make him count on the potty. When we hit 5, he got a treat and when we finished with 10 he got one more treat. The goal here was just to get him to sit a little longer in the hopes that something would happen.

See where this is going?

Magically there was a poop in the toilet.

I literally looked at it and thought “Now where on earth did that come from?!” Clearly it couldn’t have come from the little bum that was perched on top on the potty seat.

Wha?!t It did? I think Vince was confused as well. I had to tell him what was in there. We looked at it. “Vince poopoo in the potty!! Yay!!” said Mummy.

Vince: “Yayyyyyyyy!!” And then he looked confused. “V!! Poopoos in the potty!!!! Yay!! good boy!!! Awesome!!,”, shouted Mummy.

V: “Awesome!! Yayyyyyy!”

We had to call Daddy up, who also had to look in the toilet and then do some really loud clapping and some heavy praising of the event.

Dude. We hyped that poop the m-f up. We clapped. We shouted. We yelled “Yay poopoo!!!” It was an Event.

And so this morning, we tried it again. No dice. I almost expected that.

I went and bought another book about the potty today, complete with a button that you push which ‘flushes’ the toilet. I showed it to him. He said “No book”. I pretended to read it with great excitement. V said “No Mama no book.” Well. Shit.

Wish me luck tomorrow morning. We will be trying this event again… First thing in the morning. Perhaps we will get lucky. Right?

xoxo a.m.

Energy

So today I stayed home.

It’s called exhaustion people!! And holy crap, was I ever worn out. It was just not a good Friday, Saturday or Sunday. And Sunday might have been the worst. And it was just a whole combo of things. Sick V, sick husband and worn-out Mummy dealing with the ‘fall-out’ from both.

Yes, it is another blog about that. You know, my life and my relationship with The Black Lung.

But not totally about that, just mostly about what happened this evening that made M make ‘ick’ faces.

So we made it through a rough night. And it was a total “I need a nap at 10 am kind of day”. But the sleep I got was worth it.

And the day went on, we slept a lot blah blah blah…

Anyways, bathtime!

We did everything early tonight, early bath, dinner and bedtime. So at about 4:45, V and I went upstairs for our bath. He was pretty grimy. As I was running the water and he was running his hands through the water spilling from the faucet, I noticed the dirt-water smears he left on the tub. Must wash child.

So in he went, out came the toys and off we were.

V (while drinking from a container filled with bath water): “Nummy!”

AM: “Is it delicious?”

V (still drinking): “Licious!!”

AM: “Aw!! It’s delicious?!”

V, nodding, “Licious!!!!! LIIIICIOUS!!”

Big new word for him and so cute!! So there he is, in the tub, drinking bath water when my eyes are drawn to the tubwater.

What IS that! Oh lord. Is that what I think it is?? Oh My God. It’s poo.

Little bits of poo floating around in the tub, while V is drinking the water and saying “Nummy!!” and “Licious!!”

‘All done honey! Alllllll done.”, I chimed in a happy voice and I lifted him out of the tub and drained it. And rinsed it. And then re-filled it quickly and plopped him back in for a rinse and then whisked him out again!

I rediapered that butt up and carried him down to M saying “Did you wipe his bum good the last time?” I was assured that his bum was sparkling clean. Ok, good. And then I left a slightly damp and partially naked baby downstairs with Daddy, while I went upstairs to sanitize a tub and a mountain of bath-toys. Some of which WILL be getting thrown out.

Well, life is sure never dull down here. And that bum was clean when I put him in the tub.

And my life is, recently, filled with a lot of poop. Lots and lots of poop. Poop. More poo than I ever thought I would ever deal with. And it doesn’t even faze me now. Thats the funny part. Its all nonchalance over here. Poo all over the place? No probs!! Poo through your clothes and leave a wet mark on my shirt when I pick you up? Whateva!

Poo in the tub and drink the water?! Ok, complete vomit inducement. I am not quite at that level of tough yet..

I was going to put up some links about poo….. but, I don’t want to look at it anymore today. I hope you understand..

xoxo a.m.

Nugget

(of poop)

There they were, waiting for me on the changing table as I carried my squeaky clean V from the tub back to his bedroom…

*sigh*

Not only nuggets, but an open dirty diaper.

….flashback to a few hours earlier….

On my way home, I called M for a quick chat.

“How was your day?”, I asked as I gunned it down the expressway.

“Oh. It’s been better”, he replied in a wry tone.

“Oh?”

“I am in the middle of doing something horrible……”

Not picking up on the wry tone, my mind headed in the worst directions possible… mortgage payments, things to do with money, hot water tank leak, smoke detectors going off, awful things to do with the house…

“V gave me a present”.

This is parent code for ‘loaded up the pants’, ‘made a brownie’, ‘dropped the kids off at the pool’ or any number of other expressions (that I am sure your husband/brother/male member of the family will be happy to share with you, while they snicker that is…)

Oh men, so dramatic. You’d think it was the end of the world.

It must have been though, if I was to find remnants of it an hour later. Apparently it was epic. And there was screaming and thrashing involved during changing time. Good stuff.

….flash-forward to present….

I was sure. So sure. That life was not going to throw feces at me tonight. All signs pointed to a ‘dodge’, especially considering the previous conversation with M.

I picked that poop up, deposited it elsewhere and snuggled that Little Man within an inch of his poop-filled life….

Mumma loves the baby.