Playful, Rebellious and Loving

My Echo,

You are pretty much potty trained. We diaper you at night, but you wake up dry. You stopped pooping on yourself forever. But lately, you've been having too many pee accidents. We've been doing a ton of carpet and floor cleaning, and extra loads of laundry. You refuse to sit on the toilet and pee. Both at home and at daycare, pee time became a stressful and time consuming ordeal involving incentives, entertainment and frustration. You stiffen yourself up so we can't make you sit by force. Last week we went to the movie theater. On the way out, I asked dad to take you to the bathroom. "Nothing came out" you said. 2 minutes later in the car "I need to go to the bathroom" you said. We stopped the car, your seat was already wet. I pulled you out and held you on the grass, to let you finish your business. You started pooping, like dog, outside some stranger;s house. My arms and legs were hurting from holding you hovering above the ground. Worried that the owner of the house would step out, I asked if you were done. "I'm pooping I'm pooping. OI'm not done yet!" you said every time. Papa gathered your droppings in a bag, as I wiped your butt. We were beyond frustrated as this was only one if the many accidents that weekend. In the car I said that if you continue with not going to the bathroom we might have to give it away. You became quiet. Zoe started crying.

Since I wasn't really going to give you away, I had to resort (re-resort) to the oldest trick in the book: Bribe you with M&Ms. Of course, it worked, but for how long do you expect to get M&Ms in exchange for pee?

You continue to love me and want to be with me. I feel the same toward you. You climb on my lap on the couch and say "I want all of you. I don't want to share you." At bed time, all three of us cuddle for a little while. "I want to be so close to you," you say, as you snuggle up against me. At other times, you continue to say "you are mine! I'm going to keep you forever. And you are not going to die." It's tricky to deal with such statements. I don't want to scare you but I also don't want to die. So I try to balance it all. "Everyone dies, but I'm not going to die soon," I say sometimes. Once you kept probing and I said I'll die when I"m older, not now. "But you are not getting old," you said. I let it go. Yes, I said, I'm not old yet.

I want to be with you forever too, Echo.

Love,
Mommy.