Sunday, November 2, 2008

Three's a crowd.

It seemed like we were passed the worst of it when the Captain turned 3 last month. Fully potty trained, totally indoctrinated into the Montessori fold and a fierce streak of independence beginning to unfold, the Mediocre Mama and Deviant Dad were finally starting to enjoy some gulp-free moments in our routine. Our function had finally begun to shift from constant kid-appendage to separate and detached. Perhaps we became too comfortable.

Last night after a particularly ornery day for the Captain, he announced that he was going to the potty. He disappeared into his "office" to do his business and moments later came out to announce that he had peed in the shower. We thought it was some kind of weird joke, but knowing him as we do we took the bait. Sure enough there was a big yellow puddle in the middle of the shower.

The logic of a 3 year old is always something to behold, truly you cannot argue with it.

Why did you pee in the shower?

I peed in the shower because I did.

That the subsequent time out and forced cleaup that followed didn't even seem to phase him was troubling at best. He took his medicine, no complaints, and a very insincere, "Oh, sorry," was all that we got. To say that I was pissed off doesn't really get to the heart of the matter.

And a mere minutes later, I noticed the other act of defiance before my eyes. The dog bowl, which was the Captain's responsibility to fill, was half full - the other half of the dog's dinner was floating in the water dish.

Is 3 just about testing limits or is there something much more sinister going on?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I wish that our kids would use the shower when they can't keep it in the toilet or their diaper. We had a big pee-on-the-floor brouhaha with the 3yo this weekend, and we had some poop-artwork-on-a-carpeted-canvas back when the oldest was between 3 and 4. I'd much rather be rinsing up 1 or 2 down the shower drain than trying to get all the ground-in crap out of the carpet.