Potty Learning Continues... for now.

The Hubs and I had a conversation about potty learning with Buddy's teachers at the end of last week. He had only peed in the potty at daycare once and would only sit on the potty with 1 or 2 of his teachers. Buddy isn't telling us as often when he has to go or even after he wets himself. Do we keep going or take a break for now?

Buddy doesn't seem quite ready. We knew this going in but were hoping he'd catch on with some encouragement. He has showed interest in sitting on the potty, even doing so through 3 or 4 books at times. He thinks it's funny to walk up to the potty, stick out his pelvis, point his penis at the potty and say, "PSSSSSSS!!!" Our noise we make when he is peeing, his cue-word. He never actually pees while doing this, but is proud of himself for trying. When he starts doing this and signing "potty" he usually goes within 15 minutes. A sign to me that he feels he needs to go, he just can't quite figure out how to relax his muscles to make the urine come out.

Why do I hesitate to put him back in diapers when he obviously needs more time? When he won't be one of those kids, at this moment, who decides he's ready to  be potty learned and almost never has an accident again? Because he is so much happier in underwear. He doesn't writhe in pain and discomfort when we wipe him. He doesn't push away our hands, kicking and screaming, doing everything he can to keep everything away from his bottom. His rash has completely cleared. His penis doesn't rub on the underwear like it did on every kind of diaper we tried, rubbing off skin to the point of bleeding, scabbing up and making urination difficult and painful. (Yes, we have talked to his doctor several times about this, have tried everything he suggested, but to no avail). Creams, gauze with petroleum jelly, cloth diapers and going naked whenever we were in our house didn't help. Underwear, that breathes and is lightweight, has helped him heal.

We aren't pressuring Buddy to potty learn. There is no discipline if he has an accident, we just say, "Uh-oh! You peed in your underwear, next time let's try to pee in the potty." Then Buddy helps us clean up any urine from the floor and we change his underwear and pants and move on. It's not that much different from changing a diaper, except we also have to change his pants. Buddy's teachers are willing to keep moving forward, he will sit on the potty now and they hate to slow down this tiny bit of progress. So why not? I don't mind the extra laundry if it means we can avoid the rashes and painful urination.