After a certain age, it is hard to notice the passing of time. When you are growing up, each birthday feels like this really big deal. Turning 10 and finally being in the double digits, turning 18 and being able to smoke cigarettes, buy porn, have sex with 40-year olds, drink legally in Canada, and something else that is important… I can’t think of it right now. But after your 21st birthday, you are no longer excited about getting older. It is just something that happens. And the less you look forward to your birthdays, the less you notice one year passing into the next.
But nothing will make you notice time more than observing your child grow. In the past 2 and a half years The Munch has learned to roll over, sit up, crawl, walk, run, talk, feed herself, brush her own teeth and hair, use an iPad, do a perfect summersault, jump off the couch, and most recently, shit and piss in the potty. The Munch has accomplished so much, and in that time, all I have learned is that maybe I should eat less sugar.
It is truly remarkable how fast kids grow and absorb information. They learn even when you aren’t trying to teach them anything. I really wasn’t pushing The Munch to use the potty, mostly because diapers are super convenient for me. I don’t have to pull over for her while driving so she can pee, I don’t have to negotiate gross public bathrooms, I don’t have to wake up in the middle of the night to escort her to the toilet. In fact I kind of envied the whole getting to wear a diaper thing, because nothing is more of a drag then having to leave to go to the bathroom in the middle of movie while at the theater.
Besides, I didn’t want to force potty training, because that seems like a lot of effort. Every once in a while would talk about one day using the potty, but we also talked about her learning to massage me she is not even close to being good at that. And why rush someone into wiping their own ass? You will have to do it for the rest of your life, so enjoy the luxury as long as you can? So I took my mom’s approach and reasoned that I never heard of a kid in college still wearing diapers, so figured she would work it out before then. And this weekend that is what she did, all by herself decided she was done with diapers and now is on to bigger better things.
At first I didn’t believe The Munch and kept putting diapers on just to make sure. But Munch resented my lack of trust and would make me take them off. So now I have all these semi-used diapers that have cupped her crotch and bum area, but have not been soiled. Seems like a waste to throw them out, so I figure I will use them like paper towels and napkins.
“Seriously Mamma, do not wipe your face with that. And can you give me some privacy please?”
