The Tub is Half Full
What clears out a swimming pool faster than screaming “SHARK!”? Anyone who has seen the movie “caddyshack” can tell you. A floating baby ruth clears out a pool in approximately a nanosecond. In fact, it doesn’t just clear out a pool. A baby ruth in the pool catalyzes a screaming, disgusted mass exodus.
On one hand, I can say that we have our daughter potty-trained at 18 months. Hooray! It’s a miracle! We have a genius on our hands. Clearly such an accomplishment means we are master parents. We are practically professionals. On the other hand, instead of going in a potty chair or “the big pot”, our daughter considers our bathtub to be her personal toilette. Like clockwork. Put the child in a warm tub for more than seven and a half minutes, and dollars to doughnuts, a floater will eventually gently bob to the surface. This is my cue to shout “all-done!”, grab her under the arms and unceremoniously heave her out of the funky water in short order.
I am not sure what it is about the warm water, but it works like a charm every time. Madge + warm water + seven and a half minutes = floating terdlets. Every single time.
This could be considered a good thing. I mean our failsafe recipe for poop is certainly a reliable homeopathic cure for constipation. Speaking from experience, it hurts to watch your child struggle in pain to evict their own feculence. As a caring parent I am more than willing to don rubber gloves, fish around for floating terdlets, and soak her tubby toys in Lysol, as long as the end result is a happy child with a lighter load.
In fact, if this warm water laxative phenomenon last into the teenage years, we can use it as an extra-credit exercise when she reads Dante’s Inferno. We can drop Barbie and Ken into Malebolge, the ditch of excrement, and watch them suffer for their sins of flattery. If she is a real academic go-getter, she can videotape and edit her own reenactment of the eighth circle of Hell. Perhaps we can hook up some kind of tubing so that offal spews forth from their mouths when they speak.
A pessimist might be saddened, disgusted and disappointed by their child’s penchant for pooping in the bathtub. Not me. I see it as an opportunity to show off some good parenting, a homeopathic cure for constipation, and a potential multi-media extra credit exercise to help her gain a fuller understanding of a timeless literary classic. Chalk one up for our family! Way to go Madge! Keep up the good work!
Comments
Way to go!
It's always a huge parenting achievement to be able to look at something so crappy (ha ha - excuse the pun) and view it as a positive. Good job! :)
Posted by: Rachel | March 3, 2006 12:05 PM
My daugther is almost two and not even close to being potty trained. Oh, she loves to sit on the potty and talk about it. But, then she'd kindly like her diaper back when it is really time to get to business. Poopin' in the tub is still pooping away from the diaper...so I give you props for getting there!
Posted by: Steph. | March 3, 2006 12:06 PM
Don't tell my daughter I told you this, cause she's fourteen now, but when she was 18 months we used to have to fill the bath three times everytime we put her in there. And we didn't have the 7 1/2 minute window you have. I swear she would wait all day for her bath and release all the minute we put her in. Poop. Empty the bath. Scrub. Fill it up again. Poop. Empty. Scrub. Fill.
Our water bill was hefty for a good couple of months!
Posted by: Vicky (Desperate to be a Housewife) | March 3, 2006 12:39 PM
Maggie has never gone in the tub.
She's a once a day girl. Always has been. And luckily (for me)her time is mid morning while she's at daycare. With the $$$ I shell out every week, they can deal with her stinkies.
Also, CONGRATS on the potty training! Mag's will be 3 in June & we're STILL working on it.
Posted by: Catizhere | March 3, 2006 1:47 PM
I think the trick is in the timing, how about a carefully placed potty at the seven minute mark, or a catchers mit.
Posted by: Maddy | March 3, 2006 4:24 PM
I only WISH my two year old daughter would poop in the bathtub! Most toddlers finger paint with um...Finger Paint. My daughter creates murals on the wall. With. Her. Own. Feces! I've got pictures. I figure when she becomes an Artiste, I can say I knew her when...
That, or they'll make good blackmail photos to show to her first boyfriend.
Posted by: Erin | March 3, 2006 6:37 PM
*laughs at "floating turdlets". ha ha
Posted by: Suzanne | March 3, 2006 9:51 PM
As much as I'm sure you enjoy bleaching the tub, you may want to try Fletcher's Castoria if Madge is seriously constipated. It tastes good and works gently. Even warm baths never worked with Tacy (and neither did suppositories, prune juice, or frosted mimi wheats).
Posted by: Julie | March 3, 2006 11:17 PM
I got me a tub pooper too!
I often give my 22 month old a bath with her 4 year old sister. Several months ago, the baby pooped and it totally freaked the 4 year old out. She's been refusing to share bathtime. The other night I finally convinced her to give it another go -said it's been months and Raena hasn't pooped ONCE in the bath. I finally convinced her and put the two of them together in the tub...
Seven and a half minutes later? The 4 year old will never trust me again...
Posted by: JustLinda | March 4, 2006 10:25 AM
That is the shittiest literary idea that also involves Barbies that I've heard in a long time :o)
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Posted by: prevacid for infant reflux message boards | March 10, 2006 11:19 AM
This is a hilarious segment about bathing your kids including the infamous POOP IN THE TUB!
http://www.dadlabs.com/general_parenting/bathtime101_poop_in_the_tub.html
Check it out!
Posted by: DadEO | April 6, 2007 11:03 AM