January 5, 2005
Potty training humor down the drain
By
Herald Editor
After 2,436 diaper changes, I'm losing my sense of bathroom humor.
As our daughter approaches her third year on Earth, life begins to revolve around the toilet. Unfortunately, Ella is hardly flushed with excitement. In 2005, the potty chair could become the seat of a power struggle at the Leiva house.
A year ago, Ella jumped feet first into toilet training - sticking her footed pajama leg into the potty chair should have tipped us off. Instead we laughed and took plenty of pictures for the teen-angst fodder years. These days, however, our toilet talk has turned serious; as in a tinkle timetable.
Thankfully, our daughter is not a potty school dropout. She isn't performing bodily functions art school material, but she ranks above flushing flunky. However, I'm worried that she might be hanging out with the wrong crowd at daycare - the Huggies Six kids.
I just hope she doesn't become a potty school juvenile delinquent tinkler. An Arnold Dingfelder Horshack in Pampers.
Naturally, one thing worries me about Ella's inability to get down to business about doing her business: advice from others.
Family, friends and sanitary workers offer well-meaning and utterly useless recommendations. Parent magazines do the same and charge $18.95 a year (which is half off the well-meaning and useless newsstand issue price). Bookstore self-help shelves are also lined with traumatic toilet training stories - the single ply pages can be used in a pinch, although they lack stretchable waistbands.
Of course, there is the Holy Grail of inadvisable answers: the Internet.
Search engine the words "potty training" and up pops results from a quarter million Dr. Phils (15,000 related to good doctor). Advice falls into two categories: potty training secrets and tips not requiring major credit cards. One site offered this tip: "if you spend a lot of time outdoors, have a spare training seat outside ..." perhaps next to the yard gnome or lawn jockey. Just remember to shovel a snow path so Junior can find his spare chair in January.
Potty training for boys, girls, twins, a cocker spaniel - it's all a click away. Good luck, however, getting a male spaniel to put down the seat.
Up or down, getting Ella near her potty seat is like first year medical students - a test of patience. After an eternity of coaxing and cajoling, our toddler sits on the toilet for two seconds, stands back up and proclaims "I tried." Evidently she is gearing up for a career in politics - on so many levels.
Part of the potty problem might be that a whole cast of copyrighted characters are always in line. First Elmo has to go, then Barbie, followed by Tinky Winky, Dipsy and the entire Teletubbies cast. By the time Winnie the Pooh is ready to live up to his name, it's time to call Mr. Rooter on the SpongeBob cellphone.
Truth be told, I should cherish this time. Twelve years from now, I won't be able to get our princess out of the throne room. I'll again be searching for my bathroom humor - and the snow path out to the spare chair. Hopefully, the yard gnome left the seat up so I can find it.
Grand Traverse Herald editor Garret Leiva can be reached at 933-1416 or e-mail gleiva@gtherald.com