Triple P

Last month The Husband and I celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary. We commemorated it by getting him an apartment of his own. In Augusta. He recently took a position that is based in Augusta, and we decided together that it was the right decision but we didn't want to move. So now he's there three nights a week and then home. He's going to be gone more than he was, but we're hoping the schedule is going to be more consistent. Plus, Augusta is better than Alaska/Jacksonville/Little Rock/wherever else he's been traveling, because at least he can be back in case of emergency.

Tuesday afternoon I picked The Boy up from after school and took he and BeYoYo to get haircuts. (BeYoYo doesn't stop talking the entire time). By then it was 5:00, so we'd killed enough time to go get dinner since The Husband was out of town. The Boy wanted to go to our local BBQ joint. This is the kind of place where you find all the best BBQ: it's tiny, they have plastic checkered table cloths, all the dishes are disposable, and someone will probably call you Hun.  Also, there's some taxidermy, obviously.

Hun took our orders and BeYoYo said he needed to go potty. That's a thing recently. He's been in big boy underwear for about a week, and he's mostly* got it down, but sometimes we don't have a lot of lead time when he says he needs to go. So I gave Hun my card and ran him to the bathroom, calling over my shoulder that he was new at potty training. Hun understood and told us it was no problem.

We came back, got my card, and I fixed everyone's drinks. We sat down at one of the checkered tables and waited. BeYoYo asked 100 times when the food would be ready, since he hadn't eaten in, oh, about 90 seconds. Hun brought out our food and I made sure everyone had the sauce they like, the drink they needed, and something on their plate cut into bite sized pieces. We FaceTimed The Husband and he knew immediately where we were. We chatted. The children ate, one calorie at a time. They got up, they got down, they sat with me, they took a bite, repeat.

Then BeYoYo stood up beside his chair and made a little face. I asked him if he needed to go to the bathroom, and he said no. We continued eating and he said "Ashwey I do need to go to the bathroom." He doesn't call me Ashley, that's just how he pronounces actually.

We went back to the bathroom, and I hurriedly pulled down his shorts and put him on the potty. "I poo poo" he said, and then I saw poop in his underwear. Gag. I implore you, what is the proper poop protocol (Triple P) here? Do you try to dump the poop into the potty with his underwear still on, and risk it falling into the floor? Or do you leave the shorts and undies on and try to scoop the poop out? Or do you have him completely undress while having poop in his underwear? I had already pulled down his pants, and inadvertently gotten poop on his legs in the process. He was visibly upset, and how do you remain calm for the sake of your child when there is an actual shit storm to deal with? I put on my best momsmile and 'you'll get em next time, Tiger!' attitude and tried not to gag out loud about the log cabin he'd built in his underwear.

Can you imagine if your best friend or your mom was here with you and she would instinctively and intuitively know how to be helpful? Imagine the opposite of that, and that's what a 5 year old will want to do. Like get between you and the poopster so he can get a better view of the poop in the pants. And narrate the whole thing. And touch all the surfaces of the bathroom. And spin in circles, even though this BBQ bathroom is approximately 6 inches large. And come up with some dances and generally not be chill.

Here's another dilemma. The wipes and spare underwear were in the car. Do I take both children, one with poop pants, out to the car to retrieve them? Or do I leave both children inside and go out on my own to retrieve them? I decided neither, and just cleaned him with wet toilet paper and let him go commando and said a prayer. Lord, please don't let him poop his pants with no underwear on because we may be asked to not come back to this particular BBQ establishment, and it is so close and convenient and delicious. Amen.

When we finally got him all cleaned up, I was exhausted and impatient and no longer hungry. I was talking through my teeth at them telling them to come on and not touch anything else. The boys were both no-big-deal-just-a-little-pants-poop-let's-go-finish-eating, and we all walked back out to our table. I imagine that the other people in the restaurant heard everything that went on in the bathroom since the walls are basically cardboard partitions, but we strode out shamelessly nonetheless. And then I realized I had the poop underwear in my hand. BeYoYo was commando and we'd all cleaned up, but I'd forgotten I was still holding them. What is the Triple P there? Do I get up, walk by all the other patrons to the trash can across the room and throw them away? The people who come in after us might not appreciate that scented gift. Do I leave the kids unattended and take the undies to the car? I decided to just keep them with me, so I folded them as small as I could (origami!) and laid them in the chair beside me. The boys finished their dinner about 100 hours later, and we prepared to leave.

Although I had hit my limit on fun and functioning for the day, the boys were just as pleasant as could be. BeYoYo charmed and waved to everyone in there, and the ones that looked like they could be grandmas got an extra charming grin. The Boy told them about haircuts and BBQ. Two older ladies stopped to chat with them for several minutes and BeYoYo just charmed them to mush. "They are so precious!" They said. Yes, they're real stinkers.
Bye, Hun.