Since my post yesterday, I have read another seventy pages of Atomic Habits. I am learning so much about how to build better habits and dismantle the habits that no longer serve me. I want to write about everything I am reading so that I don’t just learn it for a few weeks and then move on to the next self-help book. If I write about the things I am learning, and how I am applying them in my life, then I can effectively rewire my brain. I won’t just chew over these ideas for a few weeks. I’ll absorb them and let them change me for the rest of my life.

Before I bought this book (I heard about it on the Awesome With Alison podcast), I was trying to lose weight. I am always trying to lose weight. A few times in my life, I have lost all the weight. Then, for a few months, I struggle to stay at my ideal weight. But since about the time I was fifteen years old, I have mostly been in a state of trying to lose weight.

For my latest weight loss effort, I decided it was time to address my emotional eating. This was not a bad idea. I know everything about nutrition and exercise but over the years, I have gained a lot of weight thanks to emotional eating. But since having postpartum depression in 2013, I have been working at becoming more comfortable with my feelings. And I have become a lot better at feeling my feelings.

But I am still eating too much.

The past few months, I have journaled about my eating habits. I have delved into what I thought might be the emotional and spiritual reasons behind my excessive weight. I had a lot of good ideas, but not a lot of progress. Then, at the end of a recent session, my therapist asked me to pay attention to my eating triggers.

I started to pay attention and took notes on my iPhone throughout the day. What were my eating triggers? I assumed I would make all sorts of connections between “feelings” and “food.” Stressed? Grab some crackers. Sad? Gobble some chocolate. Lonely? Hello, ice cream, let’s be friends.

But as I got curious about my eating triggers and paid attention, I noticed that I did not really have any triggers. Every now and then, I’d have some intense difficult feeling and head for the kitchen; but mostly, I ate because why not. In the kitchen? Eat. Making the kids’ lunches for tomorrow? Eat. Sitting on the couch watching television? Eat.

In other words: I used to eat to suppress uncomfortable feelings; now I let myself feel all my feelings; but I am still eating too much because that is what my body is trained to do.

A few weeks ago, after doing lots of thinking and writing about my eating habits, I started to wonder if maybe I was assigning too much meaning to my bad food habits. I was writing and journaling as if my food habits signified a spiritual crisis. But maybe my bad food habits just signified bad food habits.

When Alison mentioned Atomic Habits on a recent podcast episode, I knew I had to order that book. I wanted it right away, but we were actually leaving for Nebraska. So I put the book in my Amazon cart and ordered it the day before we flew home. It was waiting for me in California as we pulled into our driveway.

The first 130 pages have confirmed what I was starting to suspect: my bad eating habits do not result from some moral or character weakness. As Clear writes:

If you’re overweight, a smoker or an addict, you’ve been told your entire life that it is because you lack self-control–maybe even that you’re a bad person. The idea that a little discipline would solve all our problems is deeply embedded in our culture.

Atomic Habits, p. 92.

I don’t need to address some spiritual failing to become a healthier person. I’m on a spiritual journey, and I intend to be on a spiritual journey for the rest of my life; but I don’t need to stay overweight as some sort of punishment or motivation. I just have to change my habits to become a healthier person.

The past few months have been difficult.

I have done my best to stay upbeat. Freshman year of college, I took Introduction to Psychology and over twenty years later, I still remember reading in my textbook that a smile makes you feel better. I still remember that moment, slouching against a wall in my dormitory, that I smiled experimentally and realized the shift in muscles actually did make me feel a little happier. And since that moment in the hallway of my dormitory, I have found that actions like smiling make me feel better while things like complaining make me feel worse.

Still, sometimes I need to take stock and be realistic about my life. Sometimes, complaining is not actually complaining but being honest with oneself. As much as I would rather focus on the ways that I am blessed, right now I need to acknowledge the challenges of the past few months.

In mid-March, both my kids had a week of spring break. On the day they were supposed to go back to school, Pippa was sick. She had been fighting a fever all of spring break and had already seen the doctor twice. That first Monday after spring break, I planned to take Julian to school and then call Pippa’s doctor.

Life had other plans.

As we drove up the hill toward Julian’s preschool, my phone rang. I answered. It was a preschool teacher. She told me that there was no school that day. This took me a moment to process. I actually wondered if I had somehow gotten confused about when spring break was over, and if the teachers somehow were psychic and knew I was taking Julian to an empty campus… Then the teacher explained a roof repair was not finished, and the director would send more information over email.

Okay. Change of plans. I called the doctor’s office and Julian tagged along to Pippa’s appointment, where we learned poor girl had a sinus infection. I took the kids to our usual pharmacy, but they did not have the medicine we needed, so I had to drag them to another pharmacy. All the time, I was wondering if Pippa would be well enough to celebrate her birthday that coming Saturday (we had already rescheduled her party once.) I remember thinking about all the curveballs of parenthood.

I didn’t realize just how big a curveball was about to be thrown at me.

Long story short, Julian’s preschool was “broken.” The roof had needed repairs over spring break. (Pasadena got a lot of rain in early 2019). The roof repairs dislodged asbestos in the ceiling. The asbestos contaminated the school. The school needed to be closed for asbestos abatement. At first, I hoped the repairs would take a few weeks. Then I hoped for two months. Surely school would reopen for camp!

Three and a half months later, school is still closed. Turns out, asbestos abatement involves more than a snap of the fingers. It actually involves stripping away dry wall, ripping away floors, and sealing everything up with plastic until the school looks a bit like that quarantine scene in E.T. (I am blatantly stealing that last analogy from another parent.) Once abatement is complete (so close, we are so close), the school will need all new floors, ceilings, and walls. We also need to buy/collect all new supplies because we had to throw away almost everything – including the books, toys, art supplies and furniture – that was exposed to contamination. This all takes time.

I have been calling this adventure Asbestos-gate, and for the past several months, I have done my best to stay upbeat and positive. At least the teachers realized the dust and tiles on the floor were a problem! And we were fixing the contamination! And I got extra time with Julian!

But honestly, Abestos-gate has been tough. At first, I thought it was tough because Absestos-gate thrust me into the Vortex of Uncertainty. This whole experience has ripped away a lot of illusions I had about the certainty of my life. I truly thought that when I enrolled Julian in preschool, he would attend for three uninterrupted years, just like his big sister Pippa had. True, we might decide to move and then need to switch preschools but that was something under my family’s control. I took preschool for granted. I assumed it would be there no matter what.

Now I have so much more empathy for people who experience a natural disaster like a hurricane or wildfire. My goodness. It has been difficult to lose our preschool, but that is all we lost. Some people lose everything at once: home; work; school; grocery store; post office; favorite coffee shop; doctor’s office; my god, everything.

Uncertainty is uncomfortable but it is one of the only givens in life. Every day is filled with little uncertainties, from how long the line will be at Starbucks to what sort of mood my kids will be in when they wake up. As preschool undergoes its necessary repairs, I have told myself that the Vortex of Uncertainty is making me a stronger and better person. This is like Boot Camp for Uncertainty. I am being conditioned with extreme uncertainty and at the end of this adventure, I’ll be better equipped to to deal with the daily uncertainties of life. Extra long line at Starbucks? No problem. At least Starbucks is functioning, and not contaminated with Starbucks. Julian wakes up with a fever? No problem. At least he can go to preschool when he feels better. My car battery is dead? Hey, that’s still easier than Asbestos-gate.

I’m glad I have been focusing on the positives, but yesterday, I realized that I have been so focused on the Vortex of Uncertainty, I did not appreciate the havoc that Asbestos-gate has wrecked on my habits. On one level, I knew that Asbestos-gate had interrupted my routines. Duh. But I thought I was just getting some good practice at flexibility. I did not stop and acknowledge just how shocking it can be to have one’s habits up-ended.

Yesterday I started reading Atomic Habits by James Clear. I am only sixty pages in, but I can already tell this book is going to help me make some big life changes.

When I think about habits, I don’t usually get excited. My habits are pretty boring – brushing teeth, getting dressed, putting my iPhone in my tote bag before leaving the house … But the first sixty pages of Atomic Habits have already convinced me that habits are a vital part of my life. Habits are not just the little boring things we do every day. Habits create our identity! Clear says it perfectly: “[T]he process of building habits is actually the process of becoming yourself.”

As he further explains:

Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become. No single instance will transform your beliefs, but as the votes build up, so does the evidence of your new identity. This is one reason why meaningful change does not require radical change. Small habits can make a meaningful difference by providing evidence of a new identity. And if a change is meaningful, it actually is big. That’s the paradox of making small improvements.

James Clear, Atomic Habits at 38.

Asbestos-gate interfered with my habits. I had an entire routine that told me when I would take the kids to school, when I would walk, when I would write, and when I would volunteer in the classroom. Asbestos-gate took that away. I had to completely overhaul my schedule and figure out new ways to get time for exercise and writing.

I knew Absestos-gate had upended my habits, but I didn’t think about how that affected my identity. I am a writer and a mother. But thanks to Asbestos-gate, I lost the routine that gave me time to write every day. That undermined my identity as a writer. Asbestos-gate also interfered with my volunteer work at my kids’ schools. Obviously I could not volunteer at preschool because it was contaminated, but I also had to stop volunteering in Pippa’s classroom because I had a constant three-year-old sidekick. Yes, I still had my babysitter two times each week, but I needed those hours for appointments and writing. So my identity as a stay-at-home mother was also undermined by all the changes in my routine and habits.

I have felt a bit like I was floundering the past few months. Now I realize why: my identity has felt murky and mushy because I have been living without all my routines and habits.

Habits do not just create my identity. They also put things on auto-pilot so my brain does not have to expend too much energy making mundane daily decisions. Before Asbestos-gate, I did not have to think about where or when I was going to walk or write. I had already made those decisions, months ago, when I figured out my routine for the 2018-2019 school year. (Take Julian to preschool. Take Pippa to kindergarten. Take walk in neighborhood. Write at Starbucks.) After Asbestos-gate, I had to figure out my Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays anew every single week. Julian and I had fun, but it was a lot of work scheduling play dates and figuring out adventures that would make us both happy. Plus I had to figure out, every day, when and how I was going to move my body and get 10,000 steps. Losing my habits created more work for my brain. No wonder I have felt some extra brain fog!

I am excited to read Atomic Habits this week and think about the habits I want to cultivate in the 2019-2020 school year. I am excited to get back into a predictable routine. I am excited for new habits that will help me become the person I want to be.

I am very good at eating while doing something else. I am either eating and reading; or eating and talking to another person; or eating and watching television; or eating furtively while thinking about the fact that I should not be eating. The point is, for most of my forty years, I have managed to consume millions of calories without paying much attention to said calories. Then last month, I read How to Eat by Thich Nhat Hanh, and now I want to do a better job of staying mindful while I eat. 

How to Eat is a very short book, but it was filled with a lot of ideas that I am still processing. But one idea that I love is that before eating, we should consider all the things that made our meal possible.

For example, today I enjoyed a shrimp quesadilla for lunch. Before my first bite, I considered the quesadilla. I was about to eat shrimp – shrimp! – that not long ago, were swimming in the ocean. I imagined the fisherman who caught the shrimp.

Then, I took my first bite (#hungry) but I kept considering my food.

The shrimp was processed, packaged, transported and eventually sold to the restaurant where I am currently writing. So many people had to work in order for those half dozen shrimp to reach my plate! Then, I told the waiter I wanted the shrimp quesadilla; the waiter relayed my request to the chef; and the chef seasoned and cooked the shrimp.

And we are still just talking about the shrimp. I have not even considered the quesadilla!

It was a spinach quesadilla, so someone planted the seeds for the spinach. It being 2019, the farmer probably used a tractor. Someone built that tractor. Someone else sold it. And consider the spinach: it was not enough to plant the seed in the ground. It had to be planted in soil that was rich enough for the spinach to grow; there needed to be sunshine and water; so there must have been rain and irrigation…

And that’s just one ingredient for the tortilla! Never mind the salt and flour… or the cheese that was sprinkled inside. The olive oil that was used to marinate the shrimp. The moonbeams that touched the olives, the history of people crushing olives to make olive oil. Who was the first person that realized the oil of olives could be used for cooking?

There are so many stories wrapped in every single ingredient that were used to make my lunch. It’s so incredible to ponder how those stories intersect in a single plate. And I could have just mindlessly devoured my lunch, not really tasting the shrimp, or appreciating the gooey texture of cheese…

The whole world – rain, sunshine, ocean, soil – worked to give me this one meal.

I know I am busy raising children. I know there is not enough time for all the things I want/need to do. But today, this is my prayer for myself: that I find the time to sit and truly appreciate the food I consume and let eating become a mindfulness practice for my heart, body, mind and soul.

In this post from about six weeks ago, I wrote about making my health a priority. I scheduled five appointments to use a fancy sauna with my doctor to help detox my body and accelerate my weight loss journey. I also decided to return to therapy. Now seems like a good time for an update on that front.

Let’s start with the sauna.

I tried the sauna a few weeks ago. It was intense. My doctor has an examination room dedicate to the sauna. The sauna is kind of like a coffin, but not as long, and it’s made of plastic, and it doesn’t look like a comfortable place for a vampire. (But otherwise, totally the same.) To use the sauna, you get naked, open the doors, feel the assault of intense jungle steam, wonder whether you have completely lost your mind, and then get inside anyway, sit on a little bench, and close the doors. Your head pokes out of a hole at the top.

The sauna starts out around 105 degrees and slowly works its way up to 116 degrees. Once I was naked and settled inside the sauna, my doctor’s assistant joined me for the duration of the twenty minute treatment. She gave me sips of ice water and held a fan up to my face. Most importantly, we talked. I can’t remember what we talked about, I just remember it was a wonderful distraction.

I lasted the entire treatment at full intensity. I was a little tired afterwards but felt great, like I had gone on a long run at the beach. I was fully committed to doing another four sessions to help my body detox.

Or so I thought.

If I had been completely honest with myself at the time, I would have admitted that my mind was excited for the sauna but my intuition was less than enthused. In fact, it was completely opposed to using the sauna. But my mind prevailed and kicked my intuition to the side. The sauna was good! It was going to jumpstart my weight loss! Yeah, sauna! My intuition kept whispering, the sauna is not going to fix emotional eating, but I resolutely ignored the treacherous whispers.

I couldn’t see it at the time, but I wanted an easy fix to my weight loss. I have about fifty pounds to lose, and wouldn’t it be nice if I could just sweat it off?

I was determined to attend all the sauna appointments but fortunately the scheduling gods intervened. Long story short, Julian’s preschool had to temporarily close in March due to an asbestos crisis. He had been in school three days a week and spent a fourth day with his babysitter. With school gone (it’s closed until end of August), I increased babysitting to twice each week. The other three days I spent with Julian. We had a lot of fun and went on lots of outings, and we conquered the potty training beast together, but then Julian was invited to join a summer playground organized by three preschool teachers. It took me all of three minutes to jump on that invitation.

The playgroup meets on Tuesdays and Thursdays, which were our babysitting days, but I was able to switch our babysitter to Mondays and Wednesdays, so for the next six weeks, I actually have enough time to do all the writing and walking my soul desires. Heaven! Bliss!

But I had scheduled my sauna appointments on Tuesdays.

I considered rescheduling the sauna appointments to Mondays or Wednesdays, but my intuition put down her foot and said, quite loudly, That’s quite enough of this sauna quick fix business, you are just avoiding the hard work, no more sauna, thank you very much.

I cancelled the sauna appointments. I may at some point decide to reschedule the appointments but I know that if I do the sauna this summer, I might lose five or even ten pounds, but I’ll be glossing over emotional and spiritual work that I need to do. I know I am overweight because I eat too much, and I know I eat too much because I’m avoiding various uncomfortable feelings. I don’t need to sweat toxins out in a sauna. At least, not yet. I need to face whatever it is I have been avoiding and learn how to eat the way I am meant to eat.

That’s where therapy comes in. Today I am going to therapy for the third time this year. Hooray for emotional work! I am only seeing my therapist every two or three weeks. So far, this feels great. I have a lot I could write about therapy (how good it was to take a nearly two break from therapy, the things I learned during the therapy hiatus, my goals for this next round of therapy, etc.), and I think I will. Eventually. But not today because (a) this post has gotten long enough and (b) I need to run to Target now because hey, life is more than therapy and writing about therapy. Sometimes a woman just needs to replenish her household’s toilet paper supplies.

To some extent, I have put my life on hold for my kids. I feel called to do two things – be a stay-at-home mom and write – and those two callings do not mesh easily. At least, not in my current phase of life.

I don’t want to bore you with the details of my schedule, but long story short, I don’t get nearly enough time to write. I am doing my best to get all the writing time I can, because when I write, I’m a better mom. But I also know that this phase of my life is temporary. Julian will spend more and more time at school, and in two and a half years, he’ll go to elementary school with Pippa. Even if I continue volunteering with school, I’ll still have an abundance of time to write and exercise.

I’m just not there yet. 

In the meantime, though, I can’t put my health on hold. I have to put my calling to be a writer on the back burner because I am also called to be a stay at home mom to my kids (a calling which I do not expect every mom to have!), but my health must still be become a priority.

I have let my health slide this past year. Well, that’s not quite right. I have actually gotten much healthier over the past year – I’ve lost 45 pounds, my cholesterol is down, and my thyroid is working better than ever. I saw my doctor today and she’s extremely happy with my progress.

But I want to make more progress, faster. I’m forty, and after all the hormonal chaos of pregnancy and childbirth, I want to be in the best shape possible for menopause. I can’t just wait until Julian is in kindergarten to take the time to do the things that will make me physically healthy. That’s over two years away and that’s too long to put my health on hold.  

So today, I made five appointments to see my doctor every week for sauna treatments. (I’m starting this program in mid-May. I’ll post more about it then!) I’ve known that as I lose weight, I also need to sweat more to eliminate toxins, but I have not taken the time to do that. Now I’m making my health a priority and finding the time.

I did not have to look far to find the time. I have spent a lot of time volunteering with Pippa’s kindergarten. It was great. I enjoyed getting to know Pippa’s teacher and classmates. I’m going to continue my behind-the-scenes work as room parent, but I’m dialing back my hours in the classroom and using that newfound time to take care of my physical health. I’m not going to hit the snooze button on my health anymore!

I’m also going to start seeing my therapist every three or four weeks. I want to work on various self-improvement projects and I know my therapist will help me make better and faster progress. For a long time, I’ve been in a place where I did not need or want a therapist. Now, I’m in a place where I want and need a therapist, so I’m making that happen. Again, that means I’m taking the time I used for kindergarten volunteering and moving it right back into the column for Courtney’s Mental Health.

Pippa is disappointed. She has asked me when I’m going to volunteer at kindergarten again. I explained that I need to do some things to take care of myself so I can be the best mommy possible for her. She seemed to understand this. 

I was going to try to get through the rest of kindergarten before tackling my health issues, but my recent brush with insomnia has prompted me to reconsider my priorities and bring my health back to the place where it belongs.

I have to believe that I am a Good Enough Mom and not sacrifice my personal health in order to satisfy some impossible inner standard about what I need to do to pass muster as a mother. That belief starts with action. By making the appointments and time for my health, I hope to stop feeling guilty whenever I take a little time for myself.

I know people who had epic on-again, off-again romances. (Mostly in college.) I never had one of those romances, but I do have mirtazipane.

I’ve blogged about mirtazipane before, but here’s my personal timeline:

• I started taking mirtazipane in July 2013 when I was first diagnosed with postpartum depression. I took it at bedtime and it definitely helped me sleep. I wrote all about it in my memoir, Adventures with Postpartum Depression.
• My first psychiatrist yanked me off mirtazipane and Zoloft in February 2015 when I learned I was pregnant with my second child.
• When Julian was born in November 2015, I started taking Zoloft again. My new psychiatrist and I decided that I could wait on the mirtazipane.
• Three months after Julian was born, I started experiencing increased anxiety and insomnia. I tried to tough it out then realized I was being a martyr for no good reason. I called my psychiatrist and we decided to (1) bump my dose of Zoloft from 100 mg to 150 and (2) put me back on 15 mg of mirtazipane at bedtime.
• I took mirtazipane for a year or so and then my psychiatrist and I decided I was ready to wean off Zoloft and mirtazipane.
• I weaned off mirtazipane and was off it for several months but then, early 2017, when I made some dietary changes (quitting sugar, reducing carbs), I noticed a surge in anxiety at bedtime. Along with the anxiety came insomnia.
• I realized that I had been numbing some unaddressed anxiety with food, so I went back on mirtazipane for the rest of 2017. I did a lot of journaling to work through the anxiety and food issues.
• About six or seven months ago, in Fall 2018, I started weaning off mirtazipane for the third time. By the end of 2018, I was sleeping beautifully sans mirtazipane and assumed I did not need the drug anymore.

Whew. So that brings us through December 2018 and what I thought was the end of my relationship with mirtazipane. Then the insomnia returned in mid-January 2019 but it took me about two months to realize I had insomnia. Let me recap:

• First, my shoulder went out on January 13. I remember this because it was the day after I turned 40 and felt like a cosmic joke. Around that time, I started having trouble getting enough sleep. I blamed my sleep issues on my shoulder pain.
• Then, I had a cold. I took Tylenol PM and Nyquil and got enough sleep.
• Shoulder pain continued so when the cold was over, I blamed the shoulder again.
• Shoulder pain was brought under control, but I was still having trouble getting enough sleep. I would fall asleep easily enough but wake up and stay awake for hours and hours. Some nights, I’d be up from 2-5 a.m. Some nights, I was just up until it was time to start my day.
• I decided I needed to wean off caffeine. I always sleep better when I’m off caffeine.
• Another cold. More Nyquil.
• Finally, by mid-March 2019 I was fully off caffeine.
• But still, I was not getting enough sleep.

That’s when I took a deep breath and realized I needed to go back on mirtazipane. Which I did, and hot damn, I have been sleeping beautifully ever since. I’m only taking 7.5 mg, and that amount seems to work for me.

I did have a hiccup this past week. I’ve been off sugar since the beginning of 2019, but in honor of Pippa’s birthday party, I had a slice of red velvet cake and a scoop of ice cream. Then I slipped and started having chocolate every day. After about four days of this, I had a shitty night’s sleep. I slept six hours, woke up, and couldn’t get back to sleep. So later that day, when I had a tiny headache, I decided I “deserved” all the caffeine. Which I drank. And big shocker, I had another shitty night’s sleep. So the next day, I had even more caffeine to compensate. And total big shocker, I had a third consecutive night of shit sleep.

Yesterday, after three nights of crap sleep, I shunned caffeine and sugar, and lo and behold, last night I slept beautifully. I woke up to pee at some point during the night, but I got back to sleep within ten minutes. Bliss!

This is what I have deduced:

• I can splurge on sugar every now and then and still sleep fine. But if I eat sugar every day for several consecutive days, I will sleep like shit. (Fruit does not do this to me. I’m talking about refined sugar.)
• I can drink iced decaf coffee and still sleep beautifully, but I need to keep away from regular coffee and soda.
• I still need to take a small doze of mirtazipane at bedtime.

This leaves me with lots of questions:

• Why do I need mirtazipane to sleep?
• Is there some sort of PTSD lingering from the intense insomnia I experienced when I had postpartum depression?
• Or is there some other anxiety that I need to unravel?
• Or is this sleep issue related to some other health issue? I’ve been a light sleeper ever since adolescence. Is something going on?
• Are there additional dietary changes I can make to sleep better? I’ve quit sugar and caffeine, but what else can I quit? Or alter? Or add?

I don’t expect fast answers to these questions, but I want to pay attention, stay curious and figure this out. To that end:

• I’m seeing my doctor on Thursday morning to talk about my overall health.
• Then I’m seeing my psychiatrist on Thursday afternoon.
• I’ve emailed my therapist to set up an appointment. It’s been almost two years since I ended weekly therapy but now, I’d like to see my therapist every three or four weeks.
• I am planning on seeing a specialist to take about my thyroid. But this post is ridiculously long, so I’ll write more about that later. I need to read more about thyroid issues but sometimes, the thyroid can cause anxiety and insomnia. I am already taking a prescription for my thyroid, so I’ll be chatting with my doctor about that on Thursday.
• And I’m going to keep journaling because journaling helps me figure things out.

At the end of the day, I may just need to keep taking mirtazipane for the foreseeable future, and that’s okay. That’s better than okay. Sleep is the foundation of my health – physical, mental, intellectual and spiritual – and I’m not going to let any stigma about anti-depressants keep me from the sleep I need.

That’s the title of the book I need to read, right now, but I don’t think it’s been written. Damnit. Maybe I should start writing it now while I’m in the potty training trenches with Julian?

(Except as much as potty training is my story, it’s also Julian’s story, and I don’t want to publish a book that is literally about his poop, pee and penis.)

I have resented potty training and kept wishing that Julian was one of those children who magically trained himself. Yet the difficulties are actually good. I am learning so much during this poop-ridden adventure. For example:

• There is no single right way to potty train. Just as there is no single right way to parent. (How many more times will I have to learn this lesson. Approximately one thousand billion more times.)
• You have to do what works for you child. Not what works for your friend’s child; or what worked for your parents when you were a child; or what worked for the child you read about on social media. This journey is about your child and what your child needs.
• Shit happens and life goes on. Even when there’s poop in underpants.
• Sometimes you have to regress before you can make progress.
• It’s a big change and however your child feels about this particular change, they are entitled to those feelings.

Until recently, we were under a deadline. Julian was due to move to upper school at his preschool for camp, so he needed to be potty trained by early June. We have been making slooooow progress on the potty training front, but I was concerned we would not be in poop-free undies by June.

Then Julian’s preschool had a minor problem with asbestos, and the school has closed under summer’s end to make necessary repairs. For most parents, this is a big problem. I am completely sympathetic. But for me, the “catastrophe” of asbestos has actually been a blessing. We don’t have to rush and fight about potty training every day! We can relax. Instead of two months to potty train, we now have five. I know potty training will be conquered by Labor Day.

Of course, now that our potty training deadline has been extended, Julian will probably flip a switch and be ready for undies next week. But such is life. Sometimes, you just need a fresh perspective to make big changes happen.