How I Got My Toddler to Poo in the Potty

By Tamara Reese

We’ve all heard horror stories about potty learning. From ill-timed accidents to elaborate bribes, teaching (“training”) children how to use the potty turns even the most sensible people into frantic angry shut-ins. I bought into the hype reading “three day potty boot camp” books and prepared to sit in the bathroom with my naked kid eating salty foods, drinking water, and letting his Curious George doll pretend to pee on the toilet.

I was tired of changing diapers. Infant diapers are an inevitable part of my day, but huge man-sized turds from my 25lb toddler were driving me insane. His lanky body was awkward and unstable on public changing tables and the smell could clear a room in seconds. My blood boiled as I watched him walk behind the couch, drop a deuce in his diaper and then demand I change it immediately–or rather hiding it from me until his butthole blazed with a fiery red rash that required a teary mid-day shower.

I wanted him to put that shit in the toilet. Literally.

But learning to use the potty is more than being physically able to sit on a toilet; it is a psychological transition that if handled poorly can result in issues spanning from constipation and UTIs to genital anxiety. More so, my son learning to use the potty was not about me, what I was tired of doing, or how and when I wanted him to take control of his body.

It was about him. His body and his desire and willingness to feel and respond to it.

 Continue reading.

How a Mormon Mother Teaches Her Child to Pray

By Joyce Anderson

This post, part of our month-long series about God, is by Joyce Anderson, one of the winners of our writing contest.

I’m a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Some people call us “The Mormon.” Despite what you’ve heard, what you think about Mitt Romney, or what Broadway musicals say about us, we’re pretty normal people who just want to teach our children how to be godly in an increasingly godless world.

After my first son was born, and after the shock of motherhood started to wear off, I realized that I needed to start thinking about how I was going to teach my son about God, Heaven, Jesus Christ, and all of the other things we believe. I felt overwhelmed at the task in front of me, and I really didn’t know what to do, other than pray.

I prayed for a long time and asked the Lord for help, for direction, and for a huge clue about what I was supposed to be doing. In a very quiet moment the answer came to me like a small, heavenly whisper. “Teach him to pray. Teach him how to talk to me.” But that was only part of the answer. HOW, was my next question? How do I teach a toddler to pray? I prayed for more guidance. Again, in another quiet moment, that same heavenly whisper came and suggested I use the prayer chart from my days as a missionary. Back then we had a flip chart with scripture verses, pictures, and sayings that we would use when we would teach people about our church. One of the pages in the chart had an outline for how to say a prayer. That was it. I would use that lesson to teach my son how to pray.

 Continue reading.
 

Introducing the Kveller God Series

God on Kveller is a huge topic. Like, really huge. Many of us have a hard time figuring out just what we believe about God on our own terms. Throw a 4-year-old in there who demands answers? Yep, even harder.

Or is it? We’re devoting the next month to exploring how parents have talked to their kids about God. We’ll get stories from parents of different religions, from devout believers to atheists and everywhere in between. You’ll see posts from New Yorker editor Ben Greenman, children’s book author Laurel Snyder, a practicing Mormon, the formerly-Catholic half of an interfaith marriage, and many more parents who are currently struggling with what to tell (or not tell) their kids about God.

We’ll be rolling out one post a day on the blog, so check back here to read them all.

Among the articles you'll find are:

• I Tried to Raise a Jew & He Turned Out a Communist
• My Daughter Wants to Know Why I Pray 
• My Sons, The (Maybe) Nonbelievers  

How I Keep My Boys Entertained on Shabbat

By Mayim Bialik

Shabbat is lovely. Shabbat is 25 hours of no phone, no radio, no piano, no driving, no cooking, no TV (which I don’t watch anyway), no pressures of the outside world. You hang out with friends, eat lavish meals, nap, let your kids frolic as you get a “break,” and enjoy the synagogue of your choosing which both enlightens your soul and tantalizes your children. Unless…

Unless you live an hour’s walk from the nearest synagogue and have no friends within walking distance, in which case it’s a 25 hour test of wills: can I keep my kids happy? Entertained? Happy to be Jewish when the day seems like one long list of restrictions?

We sometimes host friends (who drive to our house) but this past Shabbat it was just us. Me and my boys. All day. No plans. Just hanging out. Both boys are fighting a horrendous cough so our usual “Shabbos walk” which takes about an hour was out of the question, as was playing ball and scootering around in the local church’s parking lot.

Here are some of the things we did to pass the glorious Sabbath day. (I try not to perform melakhot (work prohibitions) on Shabbat, so if you have any questions about the halakhic (Jewish law) propriety of any of the following, I suggest you consult with a local Rabbi and not go by my activities as any advocation of what you should or should not do; I’m doing my best and I’m still learning too!)

1. Organize. It’s one of my favorite things to do, and thank you, God, it’s something both of my sons love doing, too. We stack things that need stacking, go through boxes of miscellaneous toys and put things back where they belong. It’s a great way for kids to “rediscover” toys that had been long missing and forgotten, and it usually is good for a nice chunk of time.

Continue reading.