Training Days...

These days we're doing all sorts of training in our house. The first variety was sleep training during nap. This was such a fiasco when we started it. If you are curious about how it was going, go back a month or so on the blog and read about the terrible mom I was as I tried to ferberized Collin during nap time. It didn't work, and instead I turned my adorable toddler into an anxious and sad little boy during naptime. It was awful. On the day I decided to curse Ferber and give it up forever the following happened: just as we were about to go into Collin's room to get ready for naptime, before I had even sat down to read a story, he clung to me and started crying. He had gotten so worked up about naptime that just entering his room during that time caused him tremendous anxiety. It was awful. That day I decide to forget the Ferber "cry it out" method, even if it meant wrangling two babies at once until Drew got home. I couldn't handle making Collin so sad. Imagine this face, stained with tears yelling through his sobs: Momma! No, Momma! Rock momma, please rock momma! It was HEART WRENCHING.

That night, I turned to our tried and true guide for sleep training- Kim West's Good Night Sleep Tight. We used her "sleep lady shuffle" with Collin when he 6 months old or so. I didn't think it would work for naptime because it requires that you slowly move out of the room and I worried that having Owen with me, his crying (or potential to cry) would keep Collin awake. But here we were, struggling to figure out how to get Collin to nap on his own, at our wits ends, so I was willing to try anything. I should have just used what worked from the beginning and avoided the whole "worst mom in the world" fiasco.

The sleep lady shuffle worked like a charm. Not one tear. Not one rebellious effort. He was reassured that I was close by and willing to go to sleep, making for an easy nap time after a week and a half of "shuffling". Live and learn, I guess. I should have just listened to my gut to begin with and stayed clear of the crying game...er, Ferber method. Stupid Ferber.

At the same time Collin decided it was time to be potty-trained. Which really is such a surprise to us, but, whatever. We're running with it. Its difficult to be potty training with an infant because I spend the whole day dealing with someone's poop or pee, either in the bathroom or on the changing table, but we're making good progress. Today we tried out the "big boy undies" which Collin loves because they have Thomas the Train on them. I'm hoping that wearing them around the house helps him figure out how to tell us he has to go. We'll see where we are in a few weeks...


So, while we are on the topic of training, does anyone have any tips on how to train your dog not to bark? Because that's about the only type of training we aren't doing right now, and its not because we don't want to, its because we think our dog is hopeless :)

If nothing else, all this training has reminded me how much children need our patience. Time and again I had to take a step back and just laugh at the pee/poop/toilet paper/wipes all over the bathroom floor/potty/Collin's pants and remind myself that all in good time....