There's No Turning Back: Day One of Potty Training Twins

I feel like I have truly handled each phase in the boys' life with ease. I've been intimidated...don't get me wrong, but as each phase has come and I've handled it; birth, NICU, teaching my preemie twins how to nurse and continuing that for a year, walking, naps changing from three to two to one (and back to two in our case) and everything in between...but potty training? TWINS? I am soooo intimidated. However, the boys were showing me signs of being ready a few months ago. Both would tell me when they had to go, or had just gone, they both really liked "using" the potty and we even had a few successful potties on the toilet. At that time, I wasn't ready. We had weekend after weekend of stuff, and I just knew adding potty training to that craziness would be difficult.

Flash forward to now, I decided it's time. They are talking more now and understand more. I went to Target and as we were walking down the boy undies section, CJ saw "Dust Dust" (Dusty Crop Hopper, of course!) briefs. So we got those. I bought two packages, one had 5 pairs and one had 6...plenty for potty training twins, right? Ummm, no.

I'll break this down hour by hour, and honestly my failure was probably starting them in the afternoon...

2pm: Put on briefs and tell them all about using the potty
2:01pm: CJ literally pees the moment I turn around to put HB's briefs on. I think to myself "oh this will be fun"
3:45pm: I AM OVER THIS! I've set my alarm for every 15 minutes to take them to the potty. No luck. But we HAVE had success with 3 accidents. Oh joy!
4:33pm: I am out of clean undies...at least ones that I can find immediately. I will revisit this at a later date...
HB peed on the couch but I didn't know because I was in the other room. I had just told them "remember we use the potty when we need to go peepee. Okay?" "Okay" from both boys.

HB walks up to me with his briefs around his ankles and says "wet"

Me: "oy!"

As I am cleaning up HB and reminding him that we go pee pee in the toilet, I hear "psssssssspssss" "noooooo stop CJ you're supposed to go in the potty honey" as he is using my carpet as a potty pad. They literally are on the same pee schedule too? I mean that's great but makes this process all the more difficult because I don't have one kid I need to get on the potty but two.

I put them both on the toilet (one on the kid's and one the the big toilet) and say, again "we go pee pee on the toilet boys". I go to the kitchen and grab our Woolite Carpet cleaner, get them back off the toilets, put diapers on them and start cleaning the floor. As I am finishing up the floor, just as I am about to spray the couch I look again at the bottle I'm using and see this.

Yeah, that's not Woolite, and I am pretty sure it won't clean my carpet and couch the way I want it to...I just laugh and say "of course, why wouldn't I grab the wrong thing?" I put the GRANITE cleaner away, grab the actual Woolite and go back to my cleaning, but this time I have two helpers. I use the term helpers very, very lightly. There's crying involved (not me surprisingly) because I just want to clean the damn carpet and couch but these two want their towels wet like mine, and they want me to spray their towels, and whatever else was happening the the world of my two, two year olds. Life. Is. Rough....when your two, goodness!

As a side note: CJ and HB are amazing helpers! They love to vaccuum, dust and help with the laundry. I do love their help and encourage it :)

My fear is I missed my window of opportunity with them. Can that happen? It's like now they have no interest when before they were all over it. I know, I am the parent and I need to teach them, but a big thing you always hear is to wait for their ques...

Lessons learned:

• I need more undies for them, like a lot more
• The boys are on virtually the same pee schedule
• Don't give them a cookie for just sitting on the toilet (yeah, made that mistake, I thought if I showed them sitting on the toilet was a positive they would be more apt to do it...nope. They started running back to the bathroom saying "coocoo" (cookie), no boys, that is not how this works.)

I went to my IG asking for advice, this is what I got from experienced and successful potty training mommas:

• Don't do pullups, too confusing for the littles
•  More undies
• Put on the undies and never look back, no more diapers (except maybe for bed)
• Be patient and listen to your kids ques
• Patience, patience, patience (oh wait did I already mention that?)
• M&Ms work good for bribery

Needless to say I need to take another go at it. CJ was really upset anytime he got wet, it made me laugh. His little noises because he was "aaahhhlllwet". He might get this before his brother, since HB seems to not mind being wet. I feel like this week isn't the best because we have doctors appointments along with other things, but that's life right? We are busy.

Stay tuned for more! I plan on writing blogs for each day, so that others can learn or just laugh at my experience!

Muah!

~Nic

H.O.P.E.

So if you follow my personal IG or even my _fittobetwinned_ IG, you know that I have two herniated discs in my lower back. One is worse than the other, but both write ups say that the herniations are pushing on my nerve roots. This explains the weakness and pain I had/ have in my lower back and legs. Needless to say, the last few weeks have been tough. 

A mix of heavy muscle relaxers, my anxiety and a bad mood made the last three weeks feel like I lived in a prison in my body....does that make sense? I've had so much help and I am so grateful. I have my moments of "poor me" because, yeah it does stink having pain daily, pain that I've been in and out of the last three weeks, but there are people who live with pain chronically. How selfish of me.

There are people who don't know when or if their pain will improve. I know mine will, with Physical Therapy, strength and because I am young I should bounce back easily.  Although I know those things, sometimes the pain is annoying and I'm tired of dealing with it, that's when I started Pinterest searching "dealing with pain", which is when I found HOPE.

Hold On Pain Ends

It does, in one form or another. This life is so temporary. The decisions that I bare such weight in, those are temporary. Do you know what is forever though? 

Heaven. That is for eternity. So if I'm meant to suffer, even temporarily here, I know that even though it feels like forever, it's not, because I believe in something more. And by no means is my pain I've experineced the last three weeks even something to compare to what others go through. Yes, for me it was hard and is still hard, because I want to be me again, but it's different from what the person next to me might be suffering...

Pain isn't only physical. It's emotional too. I myself have been tormented by anxiety and OCD, I've wished I was "normal" (a different post on that later). My point is, we can and will get through these pains in our lives. Use it to build you, not break you. I know, easier said than done. 

If I've learned anything from this injury though; it is to stop living my life with so many restrictions, within reason. I want to enjoy things when I can, experience amazing things with my husband and children and stop letting fear rule my decisions, because in the end...I don't even have control. I like to think I do, but the truth is I don't. 

So my friends, have hope. Whatever it is your enduring push through and you will make it to the other side, stronger and wiser than you were before.

-Nic

Where I've Been

The best explanation? 

Life. 

Last year I was doing so well with my healthy lifestyle. Making healthy choices, walking daily, lifting twice a week and consuming more water. Then...July hit. Vegas, my 30th birthday, a river trip, so on and so forth. Before I knew it the holidays were here and staying on track, or getting back on track, proved to be extremely difficult for me. I gained my weight back and lost my energy. 

Oh and did I mention in November I hurt my back...it hasn't been the same since. I have to be extremely careful with my workouts. Even walking. It is so frustrating! I re injured it this week and have been out of commission since Tuesday. Thank God for my mom. She has helped me so much. I can't walk in the mornings, let alone try to pick up my 30 pound twins. 

As I deal with this it is in the back of my mind that I am still trying to get my food back on track and into a routine with exercise. 

It. Is. Hard. 

The boys have been transitioning to one nap a day so that's thrown me off and by the end of the day I'm just so drained it take everything in me to get a lift in. I know that I'm not the only one with this struggle, and I know other people make it work, I know I can too. It's in me, I just need to hunker down and do it. 

So yes, those are my reasons I've been gone. I haven't blogged as much as I would like, and I haven't posted to my fitness Instagram in who knows how long...it's time to get back on track. 

This quote below means a lot to me. I love to feel strong...now if my back would heal up maybe I could at least get back to lifting!