You know what sucks?

Potty regressions.

From both kids at the same time.

It’s been a rough week or so on the potty front here at Casa in Progress.  Both kids have been reliably trained for quite a while.  Rebecca since about March, and Daniel since the end of the summer.  A small handful of times they’ve come home in the “spare” clothes from school, but generally it’s no problem at all.

Until last week.

Suddenly, BOTH kids are having accidents left and right.  Initially, I almost blamed my own push to get rid of the little potty chairs.  While both kids are perfectly capable of using the large toilet, they were often still using the little chair. And I was just plain tired of them taking up space in our small bathrooms, not to mention cleaning them and the inevitable spills when the kids wanted to dump the contents by themselves.  So I sold them to another twin mom, and nobody minded.  But then there were several “almost made it” accidents, and I second-guessed my decision.  Maybe I was too hasty?

Except the accidents are even more random than that, now.  Half the time, they are literally STANDING STILL in the middle of the living room, or sitting in their chair at lunch, and WOOSH.  “Mommy……  I peed in my undies.”  OMFG.

For the love of pete, the pee laundry is really getting on my nerves. The Oxi-Clean supply is being depleted. We’re blowing through our big bottle of Nature’s Miracle.  I can never seem to fully get rid of the pee smell in the bathroom. (I know, now you’re DYING to come to my house, huh?)

I’m at something of a loss.  The kids are already potty trained. They know full well HOW to use the potty, and have demonstrated themselves very capable over a long period of time. There is no apparent anxiety with regard to anything bathroom-related.  So I’m really not sure where to go.  I’m certainly not putting them in pull-ups during the day, that just seems like a gigantic step backwards. A sticker/reward chart seems a little silly for something they’ve already accomplished, though if it would get us through this, I’d be happy to spend a few bucks on some sheets of stickers.

I can only hope it’s related to a growth spurt or something similar (they chowed through an entire bunch of bananas today), and I have to assume it’s one of those “grit your teeth and get through it” phases.  I’ll try to up the active reminders for preemptive potty breaks, but even those were not immune from the floods today.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go do YET ANOTHER load of laundry.