Diaper Days to Diaper Years...

People are always asking us how the babes are doing, and thankfully we haven't had too much to update on lately.  Will is rocking his feeding therapy and meeting goals weekly, blowing us away with all his improvement. (God is good!) Thanks to our incredible chiropractor we see weekly, and the grace of God, we are in a pretty steady routine and have found some nutritional supplements that really seem to help both of the kids. We are SO grateful to be where we are today.

We are in a bit of a holding point for any more answers with them, as we don't go back to their GI doctor until March.  We have some questions regarding Bryleigh's spine and spinal cord as well as her nerves, all of which we will address once we see him again.

Our biggest prayer request right now is for our Sweet B to get potty trained!! If you're praying for us, and that's all you need to know, then you can just stop here, but if you'd like a little more background on WHY and HOW you can be praying, that's what the rest of this post will include.

We brought this tiny white potty home for our tiny little girl when she was just 17 months old.  Sometime between the end of June and the beginning of July 2015, we wanted to go ahead and get some things we would need for potty training in case we started to see any of those early signs that say, "HEY MOM AND DAD...I'M READY!"  And then she did it.  The day we brought the potty home, she sat right down, and she tee-tee'd on it, and we all jumped up and down, and we danced, and we cheered for her. She LOVED it.  And a little later on that day, she did it again.

I REMEMBER telling Brad, "Now just so you know, this is probably not going to actually be this easy."  I had NO idea what to expect, but I knew that none of the major parenting milestones were going to pass us by quite that simple. (But one can certainly hope.)

First time's a charm, right?

And then it happened.  The bottom fell out. (Kinda-sorta literally.)  Bryleigh spent the next 2 solid weeks without 1 solid diaper...if you get my drift. Although some "solid" diapers returned, she would continue to have diarrhea everyday for the next 60 days.  We would spend the next (almost) year, going back and forth between somewhat normal to something well beyond not-normal.  Needless to say, potty training was out of the question.  Each time we would start to discuss it and get all geared up, Bryleigh would have another flare up that would shut everything down, sometime for weeks and even months at a time.

Right at the one year mark (July 4th is pretty easy to pinpoint, and that holiday in 2015 AND 2016 will be ones we won't ever forget) we noticed a big shift.  Bryleigh went from going too much to not going enough. Like hardly at all. And when she did, it was almost unbearable to watch (and sometimes hear).  I won't get in to any more details other than that, but those first days are something I'll never, ever shake from my memory.  I can still picture the exact first time I ever saw it - and then a thousand times since then I've seen it in some form or another...including about 30 minutes ago as I typed this up.  (I shared way more about what she's gone through HERE a little while back.)

So here we are, 2 and a half years later with a 4 year old girl that's not so "tiny" anymore and a cute pink potty that resembles our own...and we are no closer to being potty trained than we were that day in 2015.  We've started and stopped more times than I can count, gone about it every different way (Rewards System, Punishment System, hands-off-go-when-you-want, set-the-timer-every-15-minutes...), and questioned everything we ever thought we knew about what parenting would be like. (Brad sent me a text just this week that said "Parenting is hard work." Bless him. Please don't tell him it gets harder than this.)

Even Princesses have to potty!

We've talked to each of her doctors about this issue, and they've all brought up new questions.  There are different, actual medical possibilities that we are questioning that require time and testing to determine, and then there's the possibility that it's just a strong-willed and stubborn 4 year old, or the possibility that she's just behind developmentally because of all of the other issues she's faced that it will just take her some time to catch up.  (Our sweet chiropractor and go-to for ALLLLL medical questions essentially told me to treat that area of her life like she is a 2 year old, because that's essentially where that part of her body is.)

I don't love that my 4 year old isn't potty trained.  I hate that she has missed out on a year of school because we couldn't get that area of our life together.  But I haven't done one thing to hide the fact (like covering it up in pictures on social media...the girl went clothes-less for almost a solid year.)  It's not something I'm going to be embarrassed about or allow Satan to attack me and make me feel like I am failing in any way.  We've done the very best we could with what life (and God) has given us.

I know that some people pray big-picture (Lord, show favor on Bryleigh and allow her to get potty trained) while others take each part and pray for specifics, so that is why I wanted to share a little more in depth with the details of where we are. 

I am praying that the Lord would give me wisdom in this area - when to push in and when to back off, when to look at things medically and when to let go of the "what-ifs".  I am praying that the Lord would make those medical issues clear - if there is something going on that is causing this difficulty, that we would be able to get those answers.  I am praying for perseverance and patience, encouragement and compassion.  Mostly, I am praying for our sweet little girl, who has already been thrown so much in her little life, to "get it," for each day to bring a little bit of light for her in this area...and if He wants to bring it all at once, I'm good with that, too. ;)

Over the past few years I have learned so much about God and my relationship with Him, about how to pray and what to pray (we pray ultimately and always for HIS will and His glory), and to always, always be thankful no matter what our circumstances are.  So that's what I'm doing today.  I'm praising Him and thanking Him while I'm crying out to Him, telling Him that I desperately want our girl to be potty trained for so many different reasons, but also telling Him that I trust Him completely, even with this area of our lives that seemed like something I'd never even think to pray about before I was a momma.  It's gonna happen, and we give Him all the glory and praise for that.  Thank you for the way you love us and pray for us.

Just a little note on this...it fits perfectly with my thoughts today - desperately praying for Him to answer my prayer just as I'm asking Him, but knowing that I have SO much to be thankful for in Him and from Him, and trusting that even this is His will for our lives...But this is a picture I found in my files while I searched for that tiny 17 month old sitting on the potty.  I saved this very verse at the very beginning of this journey, having no idea where God was leading me and how much we would camp out on this very verse, struggling through it as we learned just what it meant. We REJOICE.