Potty training is the absolute best thing! Said, NO ONE EVER. After tacking on twins to that, potty training is brought to a whole different level of complicated. I’ve been dragging my feet for months to potty train our twins. I kept thinking to myself I want them to be a little older so it’s not quite so painful. Consequently, I kept pushing it off. I couldn’t imagine cleaning up after two babies at once, running back and forth to the bathroom. It made me tired just thinking about it! But then I recently realized their potty training does not have to be completely simultaneous (such a Catch 22 as you’ll see below). So I phased them into life in undies and started potty training one while the other dutifully watched.
Enter the Catch 22: Here’s an observation that I hadn’t thought through with training the twins one at a time. For the child being potty trained, life is NOT fair. At. All. Our baby girl just wanted to have her diaper on. What’s wrong with that? And why did her brother get to have one on? UNFAIR.
We struggled through that and finally, she got the hang of the potty thing after some major Flamin’ Hot Cheetos bribery (I realize they’re terrible for you, but seriously, don’t judge). Which led to our baby boy questioning why his sister got Cheetos, and not him. UNFAIR. Ugh. LORD have mercy, someone help me.
In the midst of these annoyed and frustrated toddler tantrums, I was reminded that from lots of past experiences, whenever I’ve had a hard time with my children, the LORD was trying to teach me something (aka Mama’s sanctification). Without fail, I had an epiphany (or two or three) waiting to be discovered. When I thought about the situation, it was painfully obvious.
My first (re)discovery? Life isn’t fair. Someone’s got to go first. Someone is going to get something that you want. And we’re just not always going to understand. I could try to explain the situation until I’m blue in the face to my twins, but at the end of the day, they’re still going to be ticked and confused. So I don’t bother. I need them to trust me. Just as I’m not always going to understand why things seem so ridiculously unfair sometimes, I need to trust my Father in heaven. If I expect my children to trust their broken and very imperfect Mama, then I think I should more than be able to trust my loving, perfect Father in heaven. Even when I don’t want to. Even when I don’t understand.
This is a repeated message in the Bible. The LORD never promised a fair or equal life for everyone. Remember the story of the talents (Matt 25:14 – 30)? Jesus didn’t describe three people getting three equal amounts of money. There were three people who were given what they could handle, which was NOT all the same (so unfair, right?). What they did with it was what was most important. They all didn’t end up with the same at the end of the day, but what two of the three received back from their Master was His praise. That should be our goal, too, to one day hear “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
My second (re)discovery? Sometimes the very thing I’m terrified to do is sometimes the exact thing that will make my life infinitely easier. Our daughter was terrified to pee in the potty. She would NOT go for hours. She only had one full out pee accident (don’t ask about the poop – UGH), but she just held it for a very long time. When she finally went, she realized it was not only a huge relief but BONUS, Flamin’ Hot Cheetos! Cha-ching! No matter how many times I would repeatedly tell her, she wouldn’t listen. Finally, when she did what I was telling her to do, as you can imagine, she was ecstatic. Geeze, this made me ask myself, why oh why don’t I obey sooner, pray tell? What the LORD has for us is always so much better than what we think is best.
My third (re)discovery? Holding on to the familiar and comfortable may be holding us back and keeping us quite “stinky” and dependent on others. When a baby sits around in their pee/poo all day, although those little ones are adorable, they stink. It may seem super comfortable and convenient, but wow, life is a lot better with undies! Yes, they needed it for a time, but that time needs to come to an end, people. What the LORD has placed in our lives that He is trying to pry out of our death grip hands was appropriate for a season, but He may just be about to give us something so much better. Will we listen? Will we trust He has our best interest at heart? And plus, we may smell lots better! You never know!
So yes, potty training twins is hard, but I am so incredibly thankful for these two in our crew of our very own perfectly-imperfect-personal sanctifiers. Who knew there’s so much to learn when you potty train twins? If you’d like your own personal lesson on potty training, let me know! You are more than welcome to clean up any messes and learn for yourself the joys and life lessons of potty training twins.
