A few years ago, when Joey was potty training, the child would not use a public toilet…ever. He wouldn’t pee or poop at school, while out shopping, traveling, and once on the way to the beach he cried for forty minutes because he had to go so bad and was holding it until we reached my parents. We tried stopping at a fast food restaurant, told him to pee in the grass (which he still refuses to do), so I made a purchase of a travel potty, pictured above, in case of an emergency.
Last summer, miraculously, Joey began using public toilets. In fact, now Joey likes to check out every public toilet we encounter. He especially loves the ones that make me really cringe like at the doctor’s office, ball park or any frequently used but rarely cleaned facility. It’s not just that I’m freaked out by germs, but Joey now likes to get “intimate” with the seat. Anyway, the travel potty sat in the back of our SUV unchristened until a couple days ago.
Now, I know those of you who have read my story of one of my last trips to Pittsburgh where I was stuck in traffic, had not peed in seven hours and was forced to pee in a size 6 Huggies Diaper in the center lanes of downtown Pittsburgh during rush hour/holiday traffic might think I was the one who used the travel potty for the first time…but it wasn’t me.
So late Wednesday morning, on our last day in Pittsburgh, we accompanied my mother-in-law and sister-in-law up to the cemetery to plant some flowers on my father-in-law’s graveside. Joey had been there only once and my other two children had never been in a cemetery. On our short drive there I told them they needed to be respectful and although it was a beautiful day, there was to be no running around.
After the initial round of questioning, most of which I didn’t answer (about bones, being dead, ghosts and worms), we arrived and the kids immediately did not listen to a word I had said. Although their general level of noise could wake the dead, we managed to keep things to a dull roar, and after some slight reminding, they stopped walking between headstones and asking if they could climb and sit on them too. Only about ten minutes had past before Jake announced his need to poop. My husband told him he could go in the woods, Jake was decidedly against this because he “is not a bear.” My husband then took Jake to the rear of the car where he proceeded to christen the travel potty in the middle of a cemetery.
So much for being respectful in a cemetery. I’m pretty sure taking a crap is worse than running around, stepping on graves or sitting on headstones. What can you do though? He’s three and when you’ve got to go, you’ve got to go…
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