Ezra stopped using the pacifier quite by accident recently. He bit off the end of his pacifier one day, and I just decided that it’s time he stopped. I left the binky hanging off his favourite blankie for several days, before throwing the pacifier away. Ezra was restless for a few days, but eventually gotten used to it. As long as he still has his beloved blanket (which is now not as smelly as before), he’s able to relax and sleep soundly. Among all his siblings, he was the only one who accepted the pacifier right away. His other siblings just didn’t care about using one, even after I tried buying all kinds for them. It’s for the better, I guess.

On impulse, I also got Ezra started on potty training. The problem is, he never tells or indicated to me when he’ll want to go to the toilet. We’re still struggling with communication. After just one day at home and another day at the day care centre, I decided that potty training for Ezra will have to wait.

Darn, I could have saved on all those disposable diapers.

So much to blog, so little time. Hey, when you have a newborn to care for, housework to do, and sleep to catch up on, menial stuff like blogging have to go on the back burner.

I visited the Community-Based Rehabilitation Centre (CBR; known in Malay as Pusat Pemulihan Dalam Komuniti or PDK) in Likas finally, last Monday. I was driven specifically by a text message sent to my better half by his colleague’s friend’s friend, who happened to gave birth to her child 2 months ago and was diagnosed with Down syndrome.

I followed up with Edry’s first early intervention program (EIP) session on Wednesday with the caretakers there, and I also met students from UMS who, if I remembered correctly what was been told, were doing their practicals. The children participating in the session consisted of older kids diagnosed with autism, who I assumed are around the ages of 3 and above, so it clearly seemed that the session wasn’t actually geared specifically towards infant stimulation program (ISP).

A few minutes into the session, though, Edry and I were taken to a separate room where one of the teachers, Rindah, did Edry’s evaluation. She was quite satisfied with Edry’s condition, particularly because his hypotonia wasn’t as serious as she expected. Edry wasn’t floppy and had satisfactory neck control. He even surprised me when he held up his head for a few seconds longer than I had thought he’d be able to do.

I was advised to go for EIP at the CBR centre at least twice a month, which means that it’ll be a total of three therapies a month including the one session a month at KDSF. Before I left, Rindah gave me three things to do as a bit of homework that I can use with Edry while we’re at home. The first one is the method of pulling Edry up in a sideway motion that would stretch his neck muscles for strengthening. Ah, it’s a bit difficult to explain it, but I can tell you that the technique disarmed me a bit (a little pun there, if only I could show you the technique), maybe if I have the time, I’ll show you a clip of it. The second homework is to spend more time holding Edry in an upright and open position, rather than the usual cradle position. The open position involves propping him in any way possible as long as he’s facing away from your body. This technique is suppose to help expose Edry to more stimuli. The third homework is — get this — potty training! Oh-am-gee! I know! At six weeks?!, I exclaimed. Rindah’s advice is that if I can determined the approximate period of time when Edry passes motion, then it would be the best time to take him off his diaper and prop him on a small potty. At those times, it would help to also make some sound effects to help him pee (by doing the hushing sound) or pass motion (by grunting).

Wow, I don’t know about the third one, but I’ll try as soon as I can find a small potty that’s just the right size for Edry.

Both Joel and I woke up on a Sunday morning with no accident. Yes! He was dry! Half an hour after we woke up, he told me that he needed to go pee.

For the whole day, the challenge was to keep ME focused on Joel. There were SO much I wanted or had to do — clean the floor, the kitchen, do the laundry, cook, taking care of the rest of the kids, on top of catching up with much needed rest — this little one in my tummy wasn’t getting any smaller.

That was where I started relapsing for a few hours. And that was when Joel had a poo accident. Not pleasant. A few deep breaths, though, and I rushed Joel to the toilet, made sure that he really has finished his job, then reminded him once again what he should do. Thank God for baby wipes, they really made cleaning easier. I showed Joel the poo that I cleaned, expressed my yucky face and threw it into the toilet bowl while he watched and hear me reminded him yet again.

I did one different thing that day, after re-reading the 3 Day Potty Training again. I started to praise Joel much more excitedly and loudly every time he successfully tells me he wanted to pee and did his job as he was suppose to. I think that would help reinforce things a bit more.

This was the end of my potty training with Joel. At least in the end, I managed to train Joel to tell me whenever he wants to pee. I didn’t quite remember what else I did differently on the third day as well as the next day (Monday, which I took an leave from work), except for keeping in my effort to focus, focus, focus. I think I was the one who struggled more than Joel. I don’t remember Joel having any day time accidents, either, but just during the early morning when he just woke up. Again, I’m having issues getting him to pee after he had just woken up, and he did complain every time he was put on the kiddie toilet seat when he’s still groggy from sleep.

All in all, though, choosing a potty training program and accessories are definitely more challenging that picking and choosing pontiac accessories, even though not as expensive. This post needs an epilogue. I’ll report what happens after a month.

I kept re-reading the 3 Day Potty Training e-book just in case I missed something. I was a little bit stressed out because of the anxiety I put on myself. I’ve been asking myself all day — what’s next after this 3-day potty training? What can I expect? That Joel goes to pee in the toilet every time? That he doesn’t poo in his pants? What??

In the mean time, Joel seems to be doing okay. I kept reminding Joel to tell me when he needs to pee, like, every other minute. My exact words were, “Tell mommy when you want to pee, OK?”, instead of “Do you want to pee now?”, which the 3 Day Potty Training book told not to do. So, he told me he wants to pee every time he felt like peeing. No accident until night time, except once when he took his afternoon nap. He didn’t wake up in time to rush to the toilet. He seemed to have a problem waking up when he has the urge to go to the loo, so that didn’t help ease my anxiousness one bit. But it’s only the second day, I tell myself. It’s OK. I didn’t want to transfer my stress and anxiety to him. I just calmly told him to tell me the next time he wants to pee, and not pee in his pants.

He didn’t want to drink much, either. I’m suspecting that he had tied two and two together; more water equals more peeing, so he lessened his drinking so that he didn’t have to go pee so often. Again, I stressed out about it after noticing that he didn’t go to the loo for almost 5 hours. After a while, though, I told myself that what matters most is that he goes to the toilet when it was time, so I chilled back, calmed myself down a bit, told myself he has good bowel control, and just went on with my routine as what the book advised.

So that’s pretty much what happened on Saturday, or what I would call Day 2. Again, I can’t really call it Day 2 because I only started Friday night before.

I woke up at 3am that morning to the sound of my hubby telling me that Joel has just peed on the bed. I had a mattress laid out in the living room of my apartment, and while my hubby dealt with the wetness in the bedroom, I took Joel out to the living room. I didn’t take him to the toilet that time.

When Joel woke up at 6am, he had another accident. This time I rushed him to the toilet, hoping that I had just caught him in the middle of peeing. Nothing came out, meaning that he was done. Sigh. I reminded him to pee in the toilet instead of anywhere else. He didn’t seem to care as we was still halfway awake.

I took the chance to re-read the e-book I printed out. Oops. There were a few things that I overlooked and didn’t follow. I was suppose to have him in underwear so that he can feel how uncomfortable his poop or pee is. It’s also a good way for him to signal to me — whenever he has the urge, he just goes to me and pull his pants down while saying “shee-shees?” and I’ll know that he wants to pee. So I started doing so.

Another oopsie I did was to ask him if he wants to go pee. What I was suppose to do is to instruct him to tell me if he wants to go. So that’s another little change of strategy. Now I instruct him to tell me if he needs to go shee-sheesh, but I still did it like every other minute or so. He looked like he was ignoring me every time I said it, but at least I know that I’m reminding him constantly.