The Currency of Poop

From M&M’s to stickers to jelly beans to yelling loud enough for the whole neighborhood to hear, I’ve tried a lot of different motivational strategies to help the kids learn how to use their underwear appropriately.  You may remember some of our frustration on that front a couple years back.  Well, we’re now facing a second battle.  Lucy has been (predictably) very different as a potty-trainee.  Some good, some bad.  For the most part, things have “clicked” pretty readily for her and I don’t spend a lot of time worrying about her having accidents.  She is perfectly happy to have jelly beans as her exclusive potty reward (I knew there was a reason I didn’t throw out the bag after Easter!).  Right now the rate of exchange for Lucy is as follows:

Pee in the potty: 1 JB
Put on own underwear after: +1 JB
Poop in the potty: 3 JB
Big brother does something useful in the process: 1 JB for him

One key to the success of this system is the fact that I think these particular jelly beans are gross and there’s no way I’d steal them from the stash. 

Henry, of course, has his own issues (yes, STILL).  While we’ve tried all manner of bribery, promises, threats, yelling, not yelling, etc., we just can’t seem to win this war.  Here’s my current system:

1 day with clean underwear (no poop): 1 book from library
1 week with clean underwear: +1 movie from library

This is a weekly system, with a weekly library trip included.  So far we’ve ranged from as low as 1 book all the way up to 6 books.  We’ve yet to hit our magic number of 7 and earn a movie.  I like this system because I don’t feel bad about the rewards, the goals are manageable and easy to keep track of, and it encourages me to make sure we get to the library once each week. 

The only thing currently missing from our system is the payment for Mommy.  I figure there ought to be some compensation for each pair of poopy underwear I have to hand-wash, every screaming child whose lower extremities I have to hose off in the shower, and particularly for every time it’s necessary to pull out the carpet cleaner to take care of a poop-tastrophe all over the basement (ahem, that would be today).  I initially thought that for each offense I ought to earn at least one glass of wine, but there are some days I look at the line-up of wet underwear in the bathroom and have to admit that we simply can’t keep enough wine in the house for that to work.  Oh well.  I guess we’ll just lump them all into one glass at the end of the day.  Now if only I didn’t have to smell poop on my fingers every time I took a sip.