Mary Frances

I wrote this blog about 6 months ago, but never posted it.  It was about my trials and tribulations of potty training the most hard headed little girl to have ever walked the earth since I was little.  The good news is that Mary Frances is now potty trained and this all seems like ages ago.  And by pottied trained I mean during the day except if you exclude her peeing in my bed this weekend.  Ok, so maybe she is only 80% potty trained, but we'll call it a success for the purposes of this blog.


Mary Frances.  For most, the name itself evokes the mental picture of mint juleps, sorority houses, and debutante balls.  For me, the name conjured many of those thoughts before Mary Frances was born.  Mary Frances was my Great Grandmother's name and all of our children have family names and I love that, but Mary Frances had her name picked out for her 20 years ago.  I loved the name and wanted to give it to my daughter if I ever had one, but my original plan was 4 boys and no girls. Thank goodness God had other plans.  Without Mary Frances our family would not have been complete or as rich as it is.  Obvious quote - "I love all of my children equally, they all hold a special place in my heart and are all individuals."  All mothers would tell you this though, it's nothing new.

I say all of this to talk about by breakthrough at 7:34 this morning.  Mary Frances is 2 and a half and has moved into the 3 year old class at school.  Is she ready for this?  In some ways yes and in other ways no.  No matter what class or stage of life she is in, she will always walk to the beat of her own drum, be strong willed, and reply with "No!  Bean do it!"  Side note, she has the daintiest of girl names that I picked out 20 years ago, yet refers to herself as Bean.  Go figure.  Back to the story at hand though, she is 2 and a half in a 3 year old class.  One of the pre-recs was she be potty trained, but she is not, mainly because she does not want to be.  Back to the strong willed part.  She does ok while at school, but pitches a fit when I put her on the potty which is exactly what she did the 4 times I made her sit on the potty this morning and she NEVER went.  After a lot of debate, ok, yelling and frustration on both our parts, I realized it is just not worth it.  Mary Frances will potty train in her own time and I am not fighting her.  I got down on my knees, gave her a hug, and told her I loved her with all my heart.  It was in that moment of hugging her little squishy body and looking into her blue eyes that she and I agreed we would do it her way.  I have a feeling that we will be doing it her way a lot over the next 20 years, but don't tell her I said that. 



Post update:  Even though Mary Frances is potty trained, she still does not use the bathroom in the mornings before we leave for school.  She knew what she was doing even then, even if I didn't.