The psychology of potty training

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Here’s the deal.

I’m not hardcore pushing the potty training thing. I know my child isn’t 100% ready for diaper-free living based on various signs of readiness.

But I do need you, wise People of the Internets, to talk to me about poop and how to get it in the potty. (The toddler’s, not mine. Just in case you were confused.) Because I’m baffled as to how, exactly, this works.

We can get Joshua to pee in the potty with some regularity when we ask him if he has to go. This may be partially due to the fact that there are candy bribes involved thanks to Dr. Schneider’s lecture on potty training his daughters in my Psych 1001 class as examples of classical and operant conditioning a decade (GASP!) ago.

So then we started talking to and asking Joshua about “going stinky” in the potty. To which he says, quite pointedly, “I don wanna go stinky in dah potty.”

And then last night I think we nearly gave him an anxiety attack.

Here’s how it went down:

He came to us around 7:00 and said “I got a soaky butt!” (which he sometimes says but more often does not say). Dan took him to his room to change his diaper and instead of putting a diaper on him, I thought we’d just let him wear some Thomas underwear. There were only about 30 minutes until bath time and the chances of him peeing were slim. I didn’t want to potentially waste a diaper if we could get him to the potty to pee on time. Except he hadn’t pooped in a while and he’s a pretty, uh, regular guy. So we knew we were taking more than just a pee risk.

He was standing in front of the TV and we smelled what smelled like he’d pooped, but he hadn’t, so we took him to the potty and put him on it and told him he could have a popsicle if he went stinky on the potty.

He passed gas and proclaimed “I DID IT!”

Except he didn’t. I was sitting in the floor with him and he kept trying to get up and I kept saying “No, Joshie go stinky on the potty!” all excited-like. And he got less and less amused with my antics and began to cry. Which made me FEEL like poop. Because I was stupid for pushing this and should’ve just cut my losses.

He came back into the living room and played trains and then ventured into the dining room where he turned off the light and got quiet. Dan and I were all “JOSHUA! LET’S GO STINKY ON THE POTTY!!!”

And he got kind of hysterical. So we offered to put a diaper on him so he could poop and when we laid him down in the floor we discovered he was mid-poop and he kind of freaked on us a little bit.

“I DON WAN A DIAPER! I DON WAN A STINKY DIAPER! I DON WAN A STINKY!” ::sob sob sob::

I fastened a diaper with lightning speed, scooped up my wailing toddler, and snuggled him until he was ready to go back into the living room where we waited on bath time until he’d gone back into the dining room, turned out the light AGAIN, and finished what he’d started 15 minutes prior.

I felt awful for the kid.

And last night I realized I have no idea what I’m doing when it comes to potty training except to know that he’s probably not really ready and I don’t want to push it because it’s more “convenient” for me. (And really, after reading my friend Suzanne’s post about a potty-trained toddler, I’m not so sure it’s more convenient.)

His reaction last night also tells me that I am in no way entertaining the idea of Boot Camping him into using the toilet full time.

But tell me, y’all, am I doing this even remotely right? Or should I study up on my Freud and his theories of anal retentiveness?