We’re still not having much luck on the potty training with Charles. I caught him one morning earlier this week with a dry diaper, so I forced him to sit on the potty. After about 20 minutes. I sent Mom down to get him a sippy cup full of milk. Another 40 minutes later, Charles was still holding out. Unfortunately, he managed to escape and go fetal on the floor, at which point he let loose. Based on the volume the problem wasn’t that he didn’t have to go. I can only assume that he’d rather pee all over himself and the floor than to pee on the potty. Next time I’ll have to not let him off for any reason.
On the other hand, the sleeping by himself effort is finally paying off. Last night he woke up with a wet diaper so he came in for a change. After I fixed him up with a new diaper, I lead him back to his bed and he climbed in with a smile on his face. Oh yes, one of those rare victories that I will savor as a parent.
Linguistically Charles now uses mostly complete sentences, although he isn’t very good at using pronouns. For instance, he’ll say “watch the TV” instead of “I watch the TV”. He has a reasonable grasp of prepositions. His diction is still terrible and it’s really a problem when he’s upset. He tends to lapse into an endless refrain of a short phrase that neither Mom nor I can parse at all because it’s mostly wail with a little bit of vocalization sprinkled on top which is bounced off the floor from his fetal position before we hear it.
Charles also has a tendency to drop trailing syllables (so, for instance, “want to watch T[V]”). It seems to be primary a diction problem because Charles understands fairly complex sentences. I’m sure it’s very frustrating for him to want something and not be able to make Mom and Dad understand the problem. But eventually Mom and Dad will grow and adapt enough to comprehend Charles’ vocalizations.