When Todd and I were first married, he introduced me to a South Park video called "Mr. Hanky the Christmas Poo" that he and his brother, Matt, thought was the most hilarious thing. Well, this year, I would like to dedicate that video to our Matt who, through poo, gave us a pre-Christmas miracle. Let me explain...
First, I have to start with the ugly part of the story. I have pretty profound anxiety about traveling in bad weather. I hate it. Not sure why this irrational fear has become so bad in the past few years, but compounding that with all of the stress in my life right now, my doctor recommended that I start taking an anti-anxiety med. So I did as of last week. Now, my body is a bit funky when it comes to new medications and sometimes I get emotional when I first start taking them. It's weird...I deserve to be made fun of.
A few weeks before heading to Sunriver for Christmas, we realized that the weather might be bad and we also knew that we would likely want to take the jeep. We can't fit all five of us and two dogs in the jeep for the 3.5 hour trip, so we ordered a canopy for the bed of the jeep which was due to arrive the Friday before we left and would solve our space issue. Well, the morning of its pending arrival, we got notice it wouldn't be joining our family until February. What?! That created a massive problem for us because we now needed to figure out what to do with the dogs. My only rule is that they not come in the jeep with us--we had done that once and it was a DISASTER. Claustrophobic, chaotic disaster of epic proportions. So we started looking at options and, miraculously, found some angels willing to take care of our furry family members.
The day of our departure arrives and Adi is very emotional. There are tears, extra treats, extra bathroom trips to prolong our time at home. She is sobbing and the dogs are making it worse by jumping into the jeep repeatedly as we are packing to go as though they sensed they were about to be left behind. We get in the car and wait for Adi who is still in the house saying her 15th goodbye to the dogs, finally pulling out of the driveway with her in a puddle of tears. Obviously we have hearts, but mine is apparently frozen because when Todd started trying to suggest we maybe just TRY to bring them, I immediately went into a passive-aggressive silent protest, only speaking the occasional (firm--as in through gritted teeth with a condescending tone) reminder of my only rule as it relates to the dogs. Rather than patiently wiping away tears and letting them come to their own conclusions about the safety risk it posed and the discomfort for all parties involved, I finally stopped imploding only to explode...loudly...with lots of snotty tears. I yelled at everyone in the car and told them to drive home and get the dogs. When we arrived, I calmly told everyone I needed a break, ran upstairs and threw myself into a sobbing heap on the bed, defeated...mourning the loss of any semblance of "control" in my family, weeping over the complete lack of respect for my one rule. I locked the door, so the children came banging on it and Liam, finally picking the lock, walked over to my sprawled self and tried to give me a hug. I rejected it...still feeling sorry for myself and needing to pout a little longer. We finally all piled in the car--I had a fake smile plastered to my face at this point--and the kids put up a blanket barricade to protect me from the dogs (and likely themselves from me) and proceeded to do everything in their power to make me as comfortable as possible (there may have been some noise-cancelling headphones, eye pillows and other comfort items brought along as props to help in that cause).
Now, all of that was prelude to the miracle. Not the poo one--that comes later. But this one is equally important. In the midst of what could have been an epic disaster and which I anticipated being hours of torture, was the opposite. Matt's iPad died about 30 minutes into the drive, so i thought we were hosed for sure and my entire family was going to realize how right I had been in my recommendation to leave the dogs behind. Nope. Matt, no iPad, was an angelic passenger in a very squishy back seat with his two siblings and two dogs. How is this even possible? Miracle.
Now, Mr. Hanky's miracle came as part of this Christmas break. I have wondered for YEARS how we were going to poop-train Matt. Mind you, pee training was enough of a beast...and then he regressed and we lost all of that--he has been incontinent for over a year now and wearing pull-ups full time. For months and months I theorized (along with doctors and others) why that might have happened. Because it was coupled with other areas of regression, I finally gave up on trying to intellectualize it and just chalked it up to a Mom-fail since the incontinence got worse when I put the pull-ups on and I felt it only appropriate to blame myself for removing the obstacle (wet pants) to the downward spiral. I know, I know...not my fault, but it was how I felt. Well, one of the theories that we threw around for a bit was that Matt was also having poop issues at the time and perhaps he was having trouble differentiating between the push to pee and the push to poop. I stopped worry about that theory though because I had, well, resigned to the fact that he was no longer potty trained.
Fast forward to the week before this trip--all of a sudden, Matt decides that he has to poop all the time. He talks about it in circles (part of his OCD is repetitive language) and frequently (SO freaking often) takes himself to the bathroom and sits on the potty. He then flushes and walks out, 99% of the time doing absolutely nothing. Well, I got a text that Matt had pooped in the potty one day at school--not once, but TWICE! I danced and danced and ugly dance of joy, but assumed it was just a one-off little fluke. The next day, poops again. WHAT?! Could this be a trend? And then it was Christmas break...where all trends and schedules disappear into oblivion and we just try to survive.
This is the miracle--just a day or two before Christmas, MATT POOPED IN THE POTTY! I couldn't believe it. He went in to the bathroom by himself, pooped, pulled up his pants, and came out. I went in only to discover that there was pooped smeared across the back of the seat which clued me in...and a big giant poop in the potty. A Mr. Hanky for me! Don't worry--we took care of all necessary clean-up (still working on that part), but this miracle has happened a few times since! Matt is sitting consistently, peeing frequently (and MUCH less frequently peeing in his pants), and occasionally pooping in the potty! So in answer to my question about how it is going to happen...naturally. When Matt is ready. And I think it is starting! Fingers are crossed....big time.
No comments:
Post a Comment