Kate: the first year: Night time potty training and reading

I’ve gotten a few questions about how we handled the night time potty training.  It’s going to get crazier.

Kate has always been a good sleeper, she goes to bed at around 6:00pm and doesn’t wake up until the next morning at 6 or 7am.  Every evening at around 10:00pm, I would go into her room, and in the dark, I un-snap her onesy (sp?) take off her little poquito pants and carry her in my arms over to the toilet.  I would hold her over the toilet and start the whistling.  It’ll take me about 10-15 minutes, that kid would stay alseep and go pee or poo.  Sometimes she arches her back and doesn’t go.. I just come back in an hour and she usually goes.  I would do this every 3 hours or so and in the morning, she is completly dry.

She has never had an accident at night, right now she is 4 years old.  I’m not saying this was easy, it’s was pretty crazy I have to admit.  I trained myself not to sleep more than 3-4 hours.  There were nights where I wished I didn’t have to get up.. or Angie would get up.. But she says she doesn’ know how to hold Kate over the toilet . Kate has had accidents when she has constipation, when she is very sick or when she was very tired and we put her down without peeing her first.  I want to tell everyone the truth.. nothing is 100% rosy..

For those parents, constipation is the going to be your worst nightmare.  You can’t force her to go, once she is afraid to go, she’ll hold it which will make things worst.. Best way is to just comfort her, bride her and make sure understand that it’s best if she doesn’t wait too long.  Lots of vegetables, fiber cereal.

Continuing on the subject of raising Kate:

Every parent I’m sure has felt the pressure of having a normal child.  There are milestones listed in books and doctors always measure your child’s developmental milestones.  Kate was very slow physically in the beginning, she didn’t walk until she was 1 1/2 years old.  People always feel to urge to ask the same questions of your child.  They always ask things that the child can’t do yet.  Can she walk yet, can she talk yet? can she jump yet?  why is she so shy?

Well, it turned out that because Kate couldn’t walk yet, we read to Kate constantly.  She has an incredible attention span.   Angie would read to her for 4 hours a day. I would read about 1-1 1/2 hours.  Kate grew up loving books and stories.  If you wanted to be her friend, just pick up any book, newspaper, cartoon, comics, receipe and offer to read to her.

Another example of what kids are able to learn.

One day, I bought a blow up globe and wanted to show her where Taiwan was on the globe.  Kate looked at the little dot and I pointed it to her.  Then she asked me what the other dots were.. hmmm… weird.. I started tell her and she was interested.  Angie started this routine every morning where she should point to each country and read about the country from an Atlas.  All the food, all the people and history of the country.. Guess what.. Kate was able to point and say 50+ countries when she was 1 1/2 years old.  It’s a visual and memorization skill.. it’s amazing.   The kids knew and was able say all the countries in S. America, Africa, Europe, N. America.  I always like to say that Kate’s brain was opened up to learning and her brain is receptive to information.  Kids can soak up as much information as you can pump thru their brains.  There is a Chinese concept from the Kung Fu movies, where if you open up 2 specific pressure points, your Qi (your internal energy) can be tenfold.  This what I mean about childrens brain.

Always expect more of your child.  Their brains can learn a lot more than our brains.  The brain is a muscle, it needs to be exercised.  Also never test them, testing them is like trying to find out what they don’t know


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