Toilet training really stinks

Project Toilet Training is going quite horribly. I think Nico may be the oldest in his class now. He has seen many a friend move on to the advanced class but he doesn't seem to mind at all.

Right before Christmas, we heard some great news. His teacher called us at home one morning. Vic answered the phone and was alarmed. "What happened? Is everyone OK?" Vic asked. Miss Maria said she had good news to share. She put Nico on the phone and he announced quite proudly, "I pooped in the toilet. I pooped a BIG one."

We were thrilled.

Even though he never repeated the act again, Miss Maria instructed us to bring Nico in underwear after Winter Break. So I thought I'd do a test run first. It didn't go too well. Here's the breakdown:

- Underwear 1 (Thomas the Tank Engine): Soaked it with pee
- Underwear 2 (Finding Nemo): Soiled it with a "BIG one"

I was so annoyed about the second pair of underwear. Nico had not had a bowel movement in two days and I finally said, "I've got to go to the bathroom. Wanna come?" He politely declined and while I was gone, he took the opportunity to unload his baggage, so to speak, in his pants. I couldn't have been gone a minute, but he took care of business very quickly, apparently.

When I hauled him off to the bathroom to change him, I guess he decided, what the heck. So as he stood in the bathtub waiting for me to figure out how to remove his poopy underwear, and possibly, pants, he peed himself. I swear, I think he did it just to spite me. It was as if he were saying, "Ha. You may think you call the shots, but I will decide where and when I'm going to take a dump, thank you very much."

Vic and I don't understand why Nico would rather walk around with poo smeared all over his butt cheeks than just unload in the toilet. It's like he would rather suffer extreme discomfort just to have this smelly moral victory over us. Why is he so stubborn?

I had called a hotline about a month ago. The woman told me to tell Nico, "Now that you're three years old, it's your responsibility to keep you body clean and dry." Then he was supposed to remove his soiled diaper, wipe himself, and put on a new one. That advice was terrible.

Man. I was really hoping to avoid posting any more stories about toilet training. I was hoping that 2006 would be about new adventures, new frontiers. I guess I'll have to wait a while longer.