I have failed my four year old. Don't get me wrong, I recognize I have probably failed my other children too, but it has never been so obvious until now.
Kevin and I discuss our parenting decision in terms of therapy hours - how much therapy will this cost our kid in the future if we handle the situation this way? We think that way because even the best intentioned parents don't really know the harm they have done to their kids until the kids are grown and realize they are fucked up.
Well now, at the age of four, I have realized the damage I have done, and he is only four.
How did I find this out? From the very lovely Caroline, the preschool teacher. I wanted Ellis to start preschool last year, but he wasn't potty trained. Many of my friends told me their children didn't really get potty trained until they were pressured into at preschool. If this was a daycare, that would have been fine, but this is real preschool.
So, over the summer one of my main goals was to get Ellis potty trained. We had been working on it since he turned three without any real success. He just wasn't interested and would pee his pants while sitting in your lap (yes, pee in your lap) without any problem. We tried pull-ups, but to him it was just another diaper.
The summer came and I was on a mission. It worked. By the end of the summer, he was wearing underwear and using the potty. I didn't realize that there was a problem, well I did, but I was just happy there were no more diapers. I put off starting him in preschool for the first six weeks of the school year because I knew he wasn't quite ready, which is parent speak for normal.
Ellis knows when he needs to use the bathroom. He strips his clothes off completely and climbs on top of the toilet. He puts his feet on top of the toilet seat and squats into the toilet to do his business. I tried to show him how to pull his pants down to his knees and pee standing up. The result of this was him simply peeing his pants for a week, so I let him go back to squatting.
Of course, this isn't the only problem. When he takes all his clothes off, he can't get them back on himself. Part of this is real, part is faked helplessness of the youngest child. For six week, I told him he can't take his clothes off. For six weeks he ran out of the bathroom stark naked and brought me his underwear and pants to put back on. I let him do it himself most days - that is a sight. He usually ends up with the underwear sideways and no pants on at all.
Finally, I decided the peer pressure of preschool would help more than I could. I warned the teacher his first day, and she kindly told me not to worry that he would get the hang of it. I was a nervous wreck all day his first day (it didn't help that Emmett used to get sent home from preschool at least twice a week). Kevin and I worried that they would call and tell us it was hopeless. But, he did fine. Yes, he did run into the class naked, but the teacher just told him to stay in the bathroom until he is dressed. On his third day, she started showing him how to stand up to use the bathroom. It hasn't quite sunk in, but she has made me feel better about my parenting.
At least until last week.
The end of his second week in school, I go to pick him up. Caroline, his teacher, is so sweet. She comes up to me to tell me how good he is doing and that she is still working on the potty stuff. She tells me we just need to work together, and he will get it. Then, she says: he doesn't know how to drink out of a cup. I am puzzled by this. Of course he does. He drinks out of a cup all the time.
No, she tells me - not a sippy cup, a real cup. Oh crap, she is right. When we give him a regular cup, we give him a straw. I never, ever thought of this.
She explains she tried to show him, but he keeps putting his tongue out. She tells me to practice at home, and that if he gets thirsty enough, he will figure out how to use a cup.
That night I get a cup of juice for him. He tells me wants a sippy cup. I tell him he needs to learn how to use a big boy cup. I set it on the table. He just leaves it there, and I see him drinking out of my water bottle that has a straw.
The next morning, I serve his milk in a cup. He ignores it. I am sure he drinks out of other people's drinks (with straws) that are laying around the house, but I can't be the drink police. I recognize I am failing.
At dinner, I make him a cup and put it to his lips, he puts his tongue on the outside of the cup, pours the milk into his mouth. I think - SUCCESS - until the milk comes pouring back out onto his shirt. How hard can it be to drink from a cup? I quit for the night. I figure I will just keep offering it, and eventually he will get it.
The next morning I have renewed confidence (patience) and serve him a cup of juice. He insists he needs a sippy cup and I deny him. I look over a few minutes later, and he is using the cup WITH A STRAW IN IT.
Yup. He got a straw out of the drawer to drink his juice. I have failed to teach him the most basic human skill: drinking from a cup.
I think to myself maybe drinking from a straw for the rest of his life isn't such a bad idea.
Yet, I am heading to Target to see if I can find a training cup, one with a lid, without a spout, that has a rim, and that I can take the valve out of - like a sippy cup but not a sippy cup. Hopefully, this will work. If not, I accept defeat.
Don't even get me started on his eating habits....
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