So, I wanted to take some time, in lieu of any reader comments to offer my opinions on some mothering situations that have come to my attention, either through friends or from the internet.
The first one I want to talk about, is from a conversation I had with one of my friends from growing up, Ruth. She’s a single mother, and has three beautiful daughters, 4, 12 and 17, now living in Ft. Collins. She is having the hardest time trying to get her 4 year old potty trained, to the point where she had to put her little one back into diapers again. Ruth says that her youngest just doesn’t seem to care if her pull-ups are wet or messy, and only makes it to the potty less than half the time. That is what I would have done too, if the little one isn’t ready, then its shouldn’t be a big deal to go back to diapers for a bit, and try again when the child shows interest.
The middle daughter, 12, is a bedwetter, but I am told that she wears pull-ups to bed, and they do the trick. I think that wet pull-ups, or diapers are much better for a child’s self-esteem than a wet bed, so I think that Ruth is doing the right thing there; although, I would use diapers over pull-ups at night. Diapers hold more, are less likely to leak, and don’t cost as much.
Finally, we come to her oldest, the 17 year old. She’s a great, and responsible girl, but recently, has started having wet and messy daytime accidents. Ruth told me that she said that she has had two so far, and has not seemed to care that she had a load in the seat of her panties. Understandably, Ruth was not sure how to handle the situation. I did my best to give her sound advice. I told her that she has to ignore how hold her kids are, since that’s not important. I told her to compare her 4 year old and her 17 year old’s behavior side by side. After she did that she realized that they were behaving the same way, so then I explained to her, why don’t treat the the problem the same way? After that realization she decided to put her teenager back into diapers alongside her four year old. I told her to just keep and eye on the two of them, and if they show interest in using the potty, then she can potty train them both again, maybe even together. Maybe she can get them both into training pants before Kindergarten and College starts.
She said that both her four year old and seventeen year old seem happier to be back in diapers. Both have been more engaged, and the 17 year old is actually playing with toys, like she’s a toddler again. Ruth even has the two of them on the same schedule to make her life a bit easier! Her twelve year old has really picked up the slack and become a mature member of the family, taking care of both her sisters. Responsibility can lead to maturity. Ruth said that her bedwetting has even become less frequent now.
The other issue I wanted to tackle was one that I found online. A Step-mother has taken in her fourteen year old step-daughter, after the girl’s father had gotten full custody of her. She seems to have some anxiety about using the potty for number two. According to her step-mother, she had an embarrassing experience where she had an extra large BM, and clogged the toilet, causing damage to the house due to some minor flooding. Since then, the Step-mother has been finding poop stashed all around the girl’s bedroom.
I think we all can agree that sort of behavior is not sanitary, and needs to stop right away. When confronting her about it, the teen denied it, and played it off like she didn’t do anything. I can’t speak to how this step-mother approached the situation with her step-daughter, but If it were me, I would do a couple of things. Firstly I would tell her that she’s not in trouble. That way she could be calm about the situation , and hopefully be more forthcoming and honest. Secondly, I would give her some alternate options to using the toilet, either let her go back to diapers until she works out her issues with her therapist that I would start to send her to. Alternately, I would offer to get her a potty chair for her room, so that she could relieve herself, but not have to deal with the toilet. Either way, I would reinforce that she is loved, and that I was there to take care of her, and get her through this.
I hope that advice will resonate with y’all! I hope y’all have a good weekend, and I will be back to post about my first weekend in the nursery on Monday!
See y’all soon!
-Veronica
No comments:
Post a Comment