When I hear myself say things like “Spiderman doesn’t want to be your friend anymore!” while watching my 3-year-old’s face crumble to tears, I feel like a crazy person. I feel like I must be the worst mom ever. Then, 1/16th of a second later, my attention is brought back to the moment, to my annoying son who refused to go to the potty on time, and pooped in his beloved Spiderman underpants. I dramatically throw the underpants in the garbage and say “Bye-bye Spiderman! No more cool Spiderman underpants!” Sobs turn to hysterics and I leave the bathroom before I say something I’ll regret. I mean, that I’ll regret more.
Am I the only mom who is crazy? Telling my son that Spiderman doesn’t want to be his friend, while making a big show of throwing Spiderman in the garbage is not so nice. But, in my defense, I did tell the kid a billion times that it looked like he had to go to the bathroom. I did tell him that I wanted to go to the park but we weren’t going to leave until he went to the bathroom. I did offer him books to be read aloud, stickers as trophies and endless maternal pride. I then threatened him with never going to the park again. None of it worked. My son, who has been potty trained for over a year, decided to hold it in past the point when he could. All when a perfectly nice bathroom was just steps away. And worse yet, he now does this nearly every day. Spiderman is not the first friend to find himself in the garbage can. It started with Elmo, Nemo, and even Buzz Lightyear. I have thrown away many, many pairs of pooped-in underpants.
I know that yelling at L is the absolute worst thing to do in this situation. I know it’s a power struggle. I know that I’m giving him issues. Every time I swear I’m going to handle it like I imagine all the other moms I know do. I’ll say “Oh, Honey, that’s OK, next time let’s try to make it to the potty in time.” In fact, I have uttered those very words only to fly into a blind rage moments later, completely annihilating any positive parenting effects of what I just said. I know all of this, and yet, I can’t help it.
I wasn’t born a mom. I was born just a regular person who thinks it’s really annoying if a perfectly capable person chooses to shit his pants instead of just going to the bathroom. I was born a person who thinks your poop smells bad, and I really don’t want to be near it. That’s the person I was for all my life, and now, suddenly, I’m supposed to just flip some secret, yet-to-be-discovered-in-myself-mom-switch and remain calm? Is that what everyone else does?
OK, back to L who is in the bathroom crying. I go in and begin the disgusting process of cleaning him up. He’s such a gross mess that mere toilet paper will not do and I must use baby wipes. As he catches his breath in big gulps, he asks, “Mommy, is it a messy one?” I want to tell him how absolutely gross it is. How bad it all smells. How I have his shit on my hand. How all I want to do is leave him there and go take a shower, (I wonder if I put wine in a sippy cup if I can take it into the shower?), but instead I tell him that yes, it’s a messy one. And next time let’s try to make it to the potty on time. I then put him in a clean pair of Spiderman underpants.
I almost shit my own underpants (not spiderman) reading this it was so damn funny! Have you really thrown all those guys away? Stupid me! I’ve only thrown maybe 2 pair away, thinking that I was suppose to clean the mess out and then wash them….. duh
I pick my battle there and I am picking not to battle with the mess in those underpants! So not worth it. I actually eventually just confiscated all the character underpants and now L wears boring old tighty whiteys. I thought it would be a great motivation for him, that he’d try really hard to earn back the Spiderman ones, but it turns out he is perfectly happy wearing, and pooping in, the white ones. Damn.
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I just love this! I will forward you one of my ‘Mother of the Year Awards’ that I received in similar situations.
My daughter does the SAME thing and it really pisses me off. What pisses me off even more is that other moms pretend when this happens that its all sunshine and rainbows at their house. I LOVE your blog!! Keep tellin’ it like it is, I love it!
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This is great! I’m so glad to see there are mothers in this world secure enough to admit their children drive them crazy and thir response to it isn’t always June Cleaver-like.
ROFLOL
“I wasn’t born a mom. I was born just a regular person who thinks it’s really annoying if a perfectly capable person chooses to shit his pants”
This has to be one of the funniest things I have ever read. You need to write a book. I would def. be the first in line to buy it!
you have no idea how much I needed to read that. all of a sudden I’m not alone.
Aw, I’m sorry you’re dealing with this crap. Glad I could help!
How funny! I have had my boys poop their pants, because they were too busy playing, but only one time each and it was early on them being potty trained. And considering I didn’t potty train them until late I guess they really got that it was GROSS.
This story reminds me of how I potty trained my Joe. I freaked out a bit irrationally. He is my “L”. (we affectionately call him “destructor”) He had pulled all of his and his brother’s clothes out of the closet and off of the hangers. I FREAKED. I yelled and screamed and then look at my overgrown 3 and a half year old standing in a diaper (wearing 5Ts). It felt wrong yelling at a “baby” so I ripped the diaper off and told him not to pee on my floor and that he is a big boy now. He pee’d on my floor twice that day, but not before peeing and pooping in the potty and he’s been pretty awesome on the potty ever since.
It’s my goal to not have my 2 year old girl looking like a 5 year old before I potty train her this time. I am going to have to write a lot of my memories down. Leaving inspired!—Danielle
Ok so I so hear you on this one! lucky for me my son responds well to my threats and punishments…I have had to toss spiderman underpants! lol and much to my surprise he made it to the potty sooner next time. 2 of my 3 children respond well to my punishments and threats, 1 of them (my middle child, no surprise) is too stinkin independant for her own good! she feels the need to make her own punishments and correct me when mine dont seem ‘bad enough’ she tells me this! lol
Been there done that, My 4 yr old went through this crazy stage about 3 months ago, EVERYTHING was shit in. I am like SERIOUSLY WTF! I screamed too, and cried, and told him some mean slightly less then perfect things that i may regret. But when you have shit on your hands and shit all over the kid and the floor and his clothes and it smells, its really hard to keep your cool
. I also wanted to mention THANK YOU, for this statement right here.
“I wasn’t born a mom. I was born just a regular person who thinks it’s really annoying if a perfectly capable person chooses to shit his pants instead of just going to the bathroom. I was born a person who thinks your poop smells bad, and I really don’t want to be near it. That’s the person I was for all my life, and now, suddenly, I’m supposed to just flip some secret, yet-to-be-discovered-in-myself-mom-switch and remain calm? Is that what everyone else does?”
WELL said and PERFECT.
I am crying. Absolutley hilarious.
My three, almost four, year old flat refuses to poop in the potty. One day we were sooo excited because we found the poop in the potty, so my husband asked him how it got there. He held up his sweet little hands and said, “I need to wash my hands.” Since then he has become a poop art protege. Nothing feels worse than screaming, “What is wrong with you!!” in a three year old’s face. Love your blog!!
I am trying to read some of your posts aloud to my husband after he heard me laughing in bed, but every time I read a new sentence I cannot control my laughter and tears are pouring own my face. I really needed to find your blog tonight. Thank you! By the way I found your blog by typing ” my kids are annoying” into yahoo search engine
Haha. Glad you found me!
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omg…i was laughing so damn hard. my son keeps shitting in his pants too! some weeks ago, he shit in his pants and i thought i got it all out, so i threw a load (really THE load) into the washer. When I opened the washer dor I was like WTF is that smell??? my washer smelled like shit for days. I had to throw all of the laundry away and run my washer like 10 times empty. Thankfully it does’t smell like shit anymore.
I have three kids under the age of 4. This made me feel so normal. And hearing your version of events (which happens all the time around here) sounded really, really funny. Even though I never think it’s funny when it happens to me
Thanks for linking up to Finding the Funny. Hope to see you next week!
Anna
I seriously want to cry at the thought of your son asking if it is a messy one. The sweet thing! He clearly regretted what he did. Who knows why kids do these things? Trust me, I’ve yelled plenty! I have a 3 y/o and 7 y/o and often use noises instead of yells. Noises they’ll remember and make me look very weird. Sometimes I’m so mad that those are all that escape! Ha! Anyway, I’m so glad you linked up to #findingthefunny! I hope you will come back again next week!
I threw every princess, My Litle Pony panties away! Not puttin up with that shit! Also let her run around naked if we were home. Everyone thought I was crazy! It worked!
Hahaa I’m laughing bc my friend was doing this with her son… One day they came over she insisted this method works so she asked me if she could do it at my house…. I said sure I guess…next thing I know he took a massive dump on my couch…. I guess good thing I have leather couches:)
Ahahaa Allison I’m enjoying your blog very much! I do appreciate a good poop story…. I swear i clean shit so much I should add it to my resume ……I recently started a blog of my own wwwtearspoopandlies.blogspot.com I think you may especially like my blog titled “finger poop and rabbit nuggets” -farrah