Thursday, October 12, 2017

Milestones

I'm hoping to write this in such a manner that it doesn't come off as a rant because it isn't one. But this is a blog I've wanted to write for some time, and just haven't gotten around to sitting down and doing so. 

I'll start from the beginning.

On Hartley's 3rd birthday, a little alarm went off in my brain that said, "3 years old! Time to potty train!" As she's my oldest child, I admittedly had no clue what I was supposed to do next. I'd been having Hartley watch me in the bathroom. I'd been reading her fun potty books. I'd already purchased a cool Elmo potty. And we were all about watching the Elmo's Potty Time DVD. But I wasn't sure what came next so I reached out to Hartley's teacher, a woman and mother with education and lots of experience. I sent her an email and awaited for some magical secrets to come my way. 

Instead of magical secrets, she pulled me aside at pick up, and I could tell she was being careful not to hurt my feeling or disappoint me. She told me Hartley wasn't displaying any readiness signs to begin potty training, and if she wasn't ready, it wouldn't work. She said she might be ready over the summer. Anyone who knows me knows I've come to embrace the individual timeline of childhood so I tried to hit home with the teacher that I was cool with that but I just thought I should bring it up because of her birthday. 

Over the summer, my mom aka Santa Claus, dropped off pack after pack of cool underpants with designs and characters that Hartley loved. So I decided to make a go of it, and go with the whole, "don't you want to wear cool Peppa underwear like a big girl?" approach. Well, I'm not going to delve into details here but after just a couple days I could tell she still wasn't ready. I was honestly okay with that.  

Ok, now it's fall, and she's in school again, and I'm making my hardest, strongest push to date. I've gathered all the tips and tricks, and we're trying them left and right. And I think (maybe wishful thinking, I don't know), it's clicking a little bit this time. I'm determined this will be the time we push through and get it!

But on Columbus Day when I was home with both kids, I was feeling a little overwhelmed. We were probably not even two hours into the day, which meant probably the tenth potty visit with no luck. I was sitting on the floor of my powder room pulling up Potty Time on YouTube for H to watch on the throne. And in that moment I wanted to feel better, like it was okay to have a 3.5 year old who wasn't potty trained. I turned to google - holy big mistake, Batman. The first page it turned up was a mom posting on a mom's board, "Isn't it child neglect or at least lazy parenting to not have trained your 3 or 4 year old to use the potty?"

Now, the internet is all sorts of dangerous for mom's. The most ignorant of people have this beautiful confidence that seems to spawn from being anonymous; they become expert level parents from their years of parenting that don't even fill up a whole hand yet. So I know to take these things with a grain of salt. But it did lead me to want to steal a page from their playbook and come to my space on the internet to talk about what I've learned in my less than handful of years of parenting experience ;)

I'll admit, before I was a parent, I thought I'd do things perfectly. I would have all the answers and the best rules. I had it totally figured out - I just didn't have the kid yet. And then I had a baby. I was humbled a little bit because she was a tricky (understatement) newborn. In her infancy, she was this stellar little human who was hitting her baby milestones early or on time, and that definitely stroked the old ego. 

It was all going great until some point when I started to realize it wasn't. To date, the point when Hartley's development started to branch off from what was typical was the hardest chapter of my life. I felt guilt. I blamed myself. I felt sadness. I felt disappointment. I felt like my world was crashing down around me because things weren't timeline perfect (to say the least). 

If I could go back in time and tell myself one thing it would be this, "Your daughter is bright and brilliant. She's doing things differently. And that is ok. It's not your fault. It's not her fault. She is unique, and that is a wonderful way to be." 

Reading that post online reminded me of that. 

I have two beautiful, healthy children, and they could not be more different from one another. The milestones that came in earlier for Hartley, came in late for Patrick. And vice versa! As parents, it's our job to guide and encourage our children. To give them opportunities to succeed (and also, sometimes fail). It's a tough balance to strike but we need to push them and simultaneously accept them. Side note: for me, that will always be my biggest challenge as a parent. 

Parenting is a long term game in every sense of the term. There are all sorts of little things along the way that help us get to the final goal of our children being well-adjusted, self-sufficient humans. I whole heartedly believe that everyone has their own timeline. And just because some things happen later, does not a loser mother make! If we're working to move forward when we can, we're doing just fine!

One of the most brilliant mothers I know is my own mom. The woman literally had 3 children under the age of two at the same time. I don't even know how many motherhood gold stars that earns a person - an infinite amount. I'm biased but I think she did a killer job. But to give an example, my brother and I didn't walk until we were 16 months old. Doctors say if a child walks before 18 months that is "typical development". But as a mom who had a child walk later (Patrick at 14 months), I can tell you that I definitely received judgement around my baby boy not walking around his first birthday. Gasp, what I must've done wrong! 

I digress. Back to my point - my mom had twins that walked at 16 months. My mom will tell you my brother waited for his lazy twin sister, and there's probably truth to that ;) But regardless, we weren't walking at freshly a year. Guess what happened? We both walked. I write this after I spent my morning jogging on the treadmill. And my brother? Well, he's literally run marathons! So what if we didn't walk early; we're both doing just fine. And let's be honest, my brother running marathons probably puts him in higher than the "fine" category!

Anyway, here I am with a daughter who is 3 years, 8 months, and we're a work in progress with the potty. She'll get there! She's done many, many things early so so what if this is a little late? It doesn't equate to child neglect or lazy parenting. It also doesn't mean that there's something wrong with Hartley. This is just her timeline. 

The thread that my google search populated from was an old one, and I'm not in the business of getting into mommy internet fights. I'm pretty sure hell is just a hot place where you're forced to go tit for tat online with a stranger about breast feeding. Ok, I totally intended that pun because it was too good to pass up! But food for thought I'd pass along to mom's who think that way, potty training your child early doesn't mean your winning motherhood; you still have lots and lots of work ahead of you. And passing judgement on people whose kids might potty train later than yours? Well, that doesn't make you a very nice human being either. 

Let's all try to help our kids move forward, trying to figure out a timeline with goals that are right for them. Let's cheer them on for their successes and comfort them in their failures. I'm so cheesy I can't even take it but these are the words of a woman living on coffee, wine and prayers. And oh, lots of laundry detergent ;)

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