Potty training is one of those rites of passages everyone must master.

While some rites of passages can be questionable, the only question for this one is when.

When was the last time we really chose where to go to the bathroom?

People can survive with maladaptive patterns of behavior in a lot of areas except where to go to the bathroom. That one is a given. A must. A requirement for humans… and dogs and cats.

I began so-called “potty training” when Polina was a newborn. I used cloth diapers every day except when we went camping or stayed with my mother-in-law. Since we lived in an apartment with shared washers and dryers, I made a conscious decision not to subject my neighbors to my daughter’s bodily fluids. So we paid $100 month for a diaper delivery service.

I used cloth not only because babies in cloth diapers tend to potty train earlier than those in disposables, but because I read that the chemicals in disposables may interfere with a baby’s, particularly a girl’s, reproductive organs. I didn’t want to risk adding any disadvantage that the world already planned up its sleeve. That and the environmental impact of plastic whose half-life estimate is into the thousands of years made the decision really clear for me.

I practiced elimination communication. I made the “psss psss psss” sound when I changed her diaper to encourage her to pee and to associate that sound with peeing. I made the “ugh ugh ugh” sound to signify number 2. The few times my sounds coincided with her actions, I was ecstatic.

At 10 months, I put Polina on a real potty and made those sounds. When she went on “command,” so to speak, I was very happy.

In fact, my first sign that Polina could hear me happened on the toilet, when I said “Ugh ugh ugh” and she said “ugh ugh” back.

It was a bonding moment. In my mind we were on our way to having Polina fully potty trained by 2 years.

I remember being in a park and listening to a young boy’s observations and inquiring about how things work. It was summertime, and I noticed he was wearing diapers.

“Ha!” I scoffed to my husband later that evening. “That little boy is so intelligent, and he is still wearing diapers. If he’s capable of making intelligent conversation, he’s capable of saying when he needs to go to the bathroom.”

At my local gym, I didn’t understand why children who spoke in complete sentences still wore diapers. Polina, who followed directions but didn’t speak much, was almost fully potty trained.

At her one year check up, I confidently told my doctor Polina would be potty trained by two.

And she was.

In July 2014, one month before her second birthday, Polina began wearing underwear full-time. For the most part, it was beautiful.

“Ugh Ugh,” she would say when she needed to go potty. It happened in restaurants, in parks, at home, with company, without company. The only inconvenience was having to stop what you were doing and having to use a public bathroom. She even woke up dry in the mornings more than half the time.

I was really proud of her.

During that summer, we were planning to buy our first home. This required me to meet with real estate agents, go “house hunting” with my husband after work, interview potential bankers, and review paperwork, among other things. It was a very stressful time for me because of this added responsibility. The few times she peed in the car seat I dismissed as my fault for spending too much time in meetings and forgetting to take her to the bathroom. She had been doing so well I took her potty training for granted.

Gradually, the accidents became more frequent. I began carrying an extra pair of pants in the car. Eventually, I put her in disposables to avoid having an accident while I was in meetings. The quantity of pee increased and cloth diapers couldn’t hold the smell anymore. As much as I dislike, borderline hate disposables, they were my best option at that point.

“This is temporary,” I told myself and my husband. “When we move into the house, she is going back to wearing underwear.”

The move into the house would have to wait. We bought the house in August but didn’t move in until October because of the repairs that needed to be made. I was at the house at 6 am some mornings working until my husband came by with Polina four hours later on his way to work. It was the only way I could get work done.

Someone broke into our home in October. He/She/They took some of our tools, our mudding supplies, our ladder.

We began sleeping there that night and officially moved in not long thereafter. We had no cabinets so storing food was an issue. There were boxes everywhere that needed to be unpacked. After we moved in, it was stressful time part 2.

By that time, Polina had been wearing diapers for four months.

Finally, in December, five months after she started having accidents, I began potty training her again.

Polina would have nothing to do with the potty. She screamed as if I was putting her in an electric chair.  She flailed when I even took her into the room that contained the potty.

I tried reading to her, something she enjoyed doing before on the potty. No dice, she continued to scream. I sat beside her, held her hand, gave words of encouragement. She continued to scream and gave me the “finished” sign by rubbing her hands back and forth.   I tried stickers as a reward, the potty dance… nothing.  Sitting on the adult toilet with a child adapter didn’t work either.

This potty training is harder than anything I experienced when she was a baby.  Her screams pierced my heart.  I began to dislike going to the potty as much as she did.

Then came a “relief” period where she would take her stuffed animals with her to the bathroom and put them next to her. It would of course take time to collect her animals. Then when she finally sat on her potty, there was nothing.

There were times when we read several books on the potty together and still nothing.

I took off the diaper and put her in pants, thinking that feeling the wetness would get her to change. That didn’t work either. We went through 4-5 pants per day and I ended up doing her laundry every other day just to keep up.  I went back to using cloth diapers inside the home.

This past week, I put her on the potty, to no avail. Five minutes later, before I had a chance to put a diaper back on, she ran to me saying, “messy.” She pointed to a puddle on the kitchen floor.

“Polina!” I screamed.

Polina laughed.

“It’s not funny!”

“Not funny,” she repeated, smiling..

Fortunately, she doesn’t like the feel of poop in her diaper, so she always tells us when she has to go to the bathroom if she has to go #2.

Otherwise, when I ask her if she wants to go to the bathroom, the answer is always an immediate no.

“No pot pot,” she says insistently if I ask again.

What makes it more frustrating is that cognitively, she knows what she needs to do.

“Where does pee go?” I ask.

Polina points to the potty or the closest bathroom.

“Does pee go in your pants?”

“Noooo,” she responds.

She has been saying all of this for months yet continues to pee herself.

“No pee!” she announces when we pass her peed clothes in the dishpan I set aside in the bathroom for that purpose.

Ironically, she says the same thing after she has peed herself.

Prior to this happening, we bought four boxes of diapers in 2.5 years, mostly when we traveled and for nighttime (which we reused when she woke up dry). This past week, my husband went to buy another box. He came home with a size 5.

“27lbs +” it says on the box. There isn’t even a maximum weight anymore. After this, what’s next? Depends undergarments? .

For the first time in our 2.75 year relationship, I am disappointed in her, in a way I can only imagine with older children.  I am disappointed that she has not return to her previous potty trained behavior.  I was so emotionally vested in this one area.  It has been a battle of the wills, and she is winning.

Maybe it’s a lesson for me, not her.

I remembered a comment my sister-in-law made, that we cannot control whether a child eats, sleeps, or goes to the bathroom. That’s when I threw my hands in the air and gave up on potty training. I began putting on diapers as a routine.

Yesterday afternoon, my meditation teacher, Valya, said her daughter went through similar troubles when she had a bladder infection and couldn’t feel herself pee.

“It’s not her fault,” she said.

Oh my goodness. I had gotten so angry at times, and if this wasn’t her fault….!  My plan was to read up on that.

Later that evening, when Polina sat on the potty before bedtime (to no avail), I was in the bathroom cleaning the sink when suddenly, she ran back in, lifted her dress from behind and sat down on her potty.

She got up and I saw she peed where she was supposed to go.

I hope this story ends with her being fully potty trained.

The only question is when.