Huzzah!

I've been dreading potty training for a while. Reading up on all the various techniques it seemed so complicated and like I wouldn't be able to leave the house for months. There are strategies that (supposedly) take 1 month, 1 week, 5 days, 3 days, 1 day, 2 hours. It's ridiculous. I didn't want to spend an entire weekend having Ben run around the house without his pants or diaper, I didn't want to take him out of the house wearing NOTHING under his pants, I didn't want to set a timer and take him to the potty every 20 minutes...

It was seriously stressing me out to think about it, but since Ben started wearing the biggest size diapers they make (before training pants, which are more expensive) a couple months ago I really couldn't avoid it. Finally Heath said why don't we just do it? We don't have to worry about putting him in underwear right away or having him trained within 5 minutes. We can just keep him in diapers and train him slowly.

It was akin to a miracle because for some reason I never thought of that. Well, I know the reason. I'm an Organized Person. I like to have a plan and stick to it. I don't take kindly to deviations from The Plan (I'm sure Heath would say that's an understatement). And so to think about not having a plan and instead just embarking on this journey was oddly liberating. Granted, it's probably not going to make me into a loosey-goosey person, but in this instance not having a plan and just charging ahead was what I needed to do.

So on Wednesday Ben picked a potty chart (out of left field he picked Super Why! and not Thomas), we printed it out and taped it to the bathroom wall and potty training has begun! He earns a sticker for the chart every time he goes to the bathroom in the potty and that's the extent of our plan. I explained to him that if he feels like he needs to pee or poop he should tell us and otherwise I just ask him at random intervals during the day if he needs to go.

Honestly I was expecting it to take a while before anything happened, but we had a victory on the very first day! In the afternoon I was vacuuming and Ben ran up to me and said, "Bathroom!" So we rushed in and he actually peed on the potty! I couldn't believe it. I cheered and yelled and praised him like crazy and he was obviously proud of himself because he grinned from ear to ear.

I'm glad it happened when he initiated it himself. That tells me that he can feel when he has to go. I know this seems bizarre, but it was a very exciting moment. I was seriously pumped afterward and Ben was, too. And it wasn't a fluke. He's peed in the potty twice since then, once when I suggested it and another time when he told me. Doing it this way is probably going to take a while, but I'm okay with that.