Public Restrooms

When you are out and about with a potty training child you are suddenly aware of public restrooms in a way that you never have been before.

For example, Chilis is one of the few restaurants we can easily eat at with our food allergy needs. We went when Dad & Barb came to visit and Gabriella needed to use the restroom. We went and right when I sat her tiny bum up on that huge seat a terrifying WHOOOOOOOSH came from the next stall. The automatic flusher was, in my opinion, ridiculously strong and very loud. It scared the dickens out of poor Gabriella whom I was holding over the potty and before I could prepare her, the sensor decided she wasn't big enough to register as being on the potty any more and her toilet went WHOOOOOOOSH. From then on, every single time I sit Gabriella on a public toilet she asks nervously, "Is this one that flushes by itself?" Fast forward to Amy's visit... we decide to go out for one nice meal during her visit so we head to the mall where Chilis is. When we get there I'm smart enough to take Gabriella all the way to the second floor of the mall where the family restroom is. They have a special small potty just for the pint sized ones and a reachable sink. This gives Gabriella great joy. Gabriella sat on that perfectly proportioned little potty... and nothing. She doesn't have to go. We head to Chilis, sit down for our meal and a small voice tells us... "I have to potty." In a moment of great stupidity I decide that we'll just try out the Chili's bathrooms again. Maybe this time it won't be so scary. I was at least bright enough to warn Gabriella that this was the place with the scary toilets. I perch her on the toilet, it WHOOOOOOSHES resulting in tears and no potty. I had to take her all the way over to Barnes and Noble just to find an acceptable bathroom and I felt pretty awful for subjecting her to the scariest toilet ever for the second time.

Our other potty emergency was after our trip to the Portland Saturday Market on Sunday. We had navigated church, lunch at Wendy's (they issue tokens at the register to use their potty), the Saturday Market and Borders book store downtown with NO accidents. On our way back to the car to go home Aunt Amy spotted that unmistakable I-have-to-potty dance. There were no pottys in reachable distance so we tried to convince Gabriella that she could put on a pull up and pee in it and that it wouldn't count as an accident. She did, but no matter how much we told her how well she did on a loooooong day out she insisted that she had an accident in the pull up.

Not to mention, subjecting your dear sweet little child to disgusting public restrooms is not for the faint of heart. After our visit to the rose garden Gabriella played on the nearby playground a bit and needed an emergency potty run. The nearby restroom was in a cement building called, "The Elephant House." Surely, I mean surely elephants MUST have higher sanitary requirements than the nightmare I found in that restroom. I wanted to wipe Gabriella from head to toe with an antibacterial wet wipe when she was finished. I was pretty horrified, but Gabriella didn't seem to phased and was pretty proud of herself for accomplishing what she set out to accomplish.

Maybe diapers aren't so bad after all.