That's What She Said: Leslie

Meet Leslie. I guess you would call her a friend of a friend, technically. Let me start from the beginning.

Zack Ailshie was interviewing for the youth minister position at Eastside in Comanche my junior year. We all loved him immediately! Several years down the road, he married Leslie and I am so grateful for was God's plan (we also loved her immediately!). When we asked Zack to officiate our wedding, she sat in on Dusty and my premarital counseling. Since then, she has helped decorate Gunner's first birthday party and makes the CUTEST sugar cookies (that taste AMAZING too!). She is a few years ahead in the parenthood journey which is so helpful, but always makes time for our big milestones. I am so grateful for her presence in my life!

As I parent, I am committed to the process of helping my little one in her development. What I wasn’t 100% prepared for was how difficult it could be to do so.  Helping a child mature and develop the skills she/he needs takes a lot of time, patience, and work.  And I am finding out how much through the process of…potty training. 

I have read so many books and articles about how to potty train your child it’s ridiculous. How to potty train your child in 3 days…blah, blah, blah. The seven steps to successful potty training… blah, blah, blah.  The do’s and don’ts to potty training…blah, blah, blah. How to know when you child is ready for potty training…blah, blah, blah. If you ask me anything about potty training, I can tell you. I can also tell you, my Sweet Pea did not read these books.  

If you happen to be one of those parents who were able to successfully potty train your sweetheart in a week or less, I am genuinely happy for you. Seriously! However, if you are like me and we have been doing this for weeks and weeks (months!) and still not there yet, then I have plenty of anti-bacterial wipes and laundry detergent that I can share with you!

As I was crying (actually I was sobbing), to my amazing husband one evening about the situation, several different things began to dawn on me.
 

1. That this is really hard. It’s stressful and frustrating!  It doesn’t help that I have germ phobia and there is a plethora of germs to deal with when potty training. Obviously.  And I was tired of the smell of urine. I felt like a dog that had picked up a scent and couldn’t shake it off.  I was tired of cleaning her clothes from poop accidents.  To make it worse, the stress I felt, my poor little Sweet Pea felt it too. 
 

2. This was really hard for Sweet Pea too. Learning a new skill…a life-long skill…was going to take some time. Growing up is hard. I began to see that we needed to take this a day at a time and not keep track of how long it was taking. I needed to remember that these are opportunities for growth and accomplishment. It’s okay if it takes a little more time. 
 

3. I am learning a lot about a person’s will. Sweet Pea knows what to do. She does. She can verbalize to me what she is doing and when. But sometimes she doesn’t want to do what I want her to do…like a potty break when I KNOW she needs one! Here lies the frustration and restraint. Since discipline is counterproductive in potty training, us parents just have to take the crap that comes out wherever it happens. Literally. This string of events keeps reminding me of my strong will against God’s perfect will for me. What He wants me to do and when is for my own good and for the good of others too! 
 

4. This season of development is testing my flexibility and causing it to bend more. Not easily but it is. I am beginning to realize and embrace that as she grows it is an opportunity for me to grow as well. I walked into this season of life expecting to teach her and move on. But I think I am going to embrace this as a learning objective for me too. In fact, I have a sneaking suspicion that she will be teaching me just as much as I teach her as she matures.  And that’s okay with me!
 

All righty folks. Now it's time for me to do another load of laundry & to clean the potty.

Cheers!