Pissing Match

Christ Almighty.

This kid is going to give me an early death....

What I don't understand is how I can birth two children created out of the same DNA and they can be completely different. COMPLETELY.

The proof was there from the moment she came into this world. My mother has said, "I've never heard a baby crying while still crowning"....and it's true. Embarrassingly true. I've never wanted to crawl up into that delivery bed and hide in my own birthing goo so badly..but damn that child was loud and irritating. I kept apologizing to all of the nurses and she was like -2 minutes old.



And she never stopped.

They refused to keep her in the nursery because they said she was so fussy she was waking up all of the other newborns. I cried and cried. And never slept and cried some more. I begged Cort to let me surrender her at the hospital. Somehow, I'm not sure that would have gone over very smooth. Here's this middle class 31 year old, rolling up with her husband and 3 year old trying to hand over her newborn because she just can't take it anymore. Here, take the bassinet, Avent bottles...even my breast pump...you can have it all...JUST LET ME GO TO A HAPPY, QUIET PLACE!!

I'll never forget the constant questions from friends, family, gawking strangers "what's wrong with her, what does she want, why does she keep crying?" "Maybe she's collicky, maybe she's got reflux, maybe you should analyze her diet".

OH GOD! You're a fucking genius! Why hadn't I thought of all of those things for the 87 Million days, hours, minutes I've had her freaking the fuck out in front of my face...GOD! I'm such an idiot!

Instead though I was polite and would respond with something like, "i think she needs me to make her a stiff drink and tell her how pretty she is".

But I'll tell ya, that first year was something out of one of those Saw movies. I considered cutting off my own leg to escape.

ANYWAY, I digress. We are now 2 1/2 years old, pretty much out of the crying every 5 seconds (a blog for a different time!) and in full potty training mode.....or so I thought.

Oh funny mommy...always assuming shit will be on your schedule and you will be able to exercise parental authority. YOU'RE HILARIOUS!

I'll be honest. I don't read a lot of those "how to" parenting books. Because I think they're full of shit. But I do know that you're not really supposed to PUSH the whole potty training thing...kind of make it their idea or whatever. Because you can SCREW THEM UP FOR LIFE!

So we started very soft and slow. I would comment on how great the Elmo panties looked at the store and OH WOW! Potty chairs! How cool! She'd come in and watch me go and flush for me. Within a few weeks she started to get the message. So she tried it a couple times and it was great- we did potty dances and made a huge deal out of it and things were progressing nicely.

Now let's be clear...I am only talking about Peepee. Poopoo, I have learned takes much longer to get out of the actual diaper and into the potty chair itself. So WHATEVER! Toy Story pull ups will continue to be a part of the pooping ritual. I gotta say, I think it's a little confusing when Sloane will say to me in a full sentence, "mommy, can you get me a diaper I need to poop". "uh sure thing fully capable child". BUT I'M NOT PUSHING IT DAMMNIT! Don't want to give anyone pooping issues! I don't know what those would be...but I've been warned! Don't do it! Maybe she'd be in her college dorm begging her roomate for a pull up so she could take a dump in the back corner of the room? I don't know? Better than a drug problem right? hmmm...maybe not so bad.

Anyway, so things were sailing smoothly....until summer hit. Damn you summer and you're warm sunshine and kiddie pools and bathing suits and fun outside time! It started as innocent as this: our adorable sitter was playing outside with the girls and accidentally locked the front door. They were locked out of the house for probably 15 minutes before she was able to connect with Cort on text message and figure out where the hide a key was etc. So in that period of time I guess Quinn had to pee. So our sitter just told her to pee in the bushes.

That was it. That's all it took. Sloane had found her calling in life.

What a concept. Peeing somewhere other than the toilet. This was AWESOME!

Every morning we would wake up and Sloane would ask "Can I peepee outside?".
No.
We would pull into the driveway from being out "Can I peepee in the grass?".
No

I thought the peeing in the outdoors was it.
Until I was sitting in this exact same spot just about a week ago and in walks naked Sloane and straddles the dog "What are you doing?" I ask.

"I'm going to peepee on Roscoe".

We invited some friends over the other day and all 4 kids are in the kiddie pool. We are lounging in chairs just chatting away and I look over in the distance to a Sloane still in her swim suit, squatting by the side of the pool peeing on the grass. WHAT ARE YOU DOING?

"I peepee outside".

In the last week she has peed somewhere in the house once a day and not told a soul. I walked into her bedroom and KNEW I smelled pee. It took me a few minutes to hunt it down and there behind the toy box was a puddle....accompanied by floating, soggy Nemo stickers...poor Nemo.

The victim most days has been our downstairs TV room. Which is very, very unfortunate because it's CARPET! EFFF!

We've dumped gallons of that Pet & Kid spray on it but it doesn't matter, that entire room needs to be recarpeted at this point.

It's one of those things that now when I walk into the house I'm paranoid that all I smell is pee.

And honestly, I'm not sure exactly what type of discipline to take on this whole journey. My aunt suggested the angle "well I guess you're a baby and you'll need to keep wearing baby diapers all the time, no big girl panties for you". Which is a good one and I'm kind of doing that but Sloaney enjoys wearing diapers and those things are expensive! So right now, we've just kept on her every 20 minutes "do you need to go, do you need to go?". It's the times where no one knows exactly where she is that she takes the opportunity to do it.

In conclusion: I just never saw this coming. Quinn was such a play by the rules kid. She would have NEVER DREAMED of peeing on the floor, let alone her dog! It's comical to watch this complete polar opposite behave...and I guess that's a good thing, I'm not trying to surrender her still.