Boys

[Yes, the long awaited post.]

I've seen a fair number of penises in my life.  Well, not too many, probably the normal, appropriate amount.  Enough to know what they look like and how they work.

But that doesn't prepare you for a baby boy.  You learn quickly that you've got to cover that thing quickly during diaper changes or you'll get splashed in the face by a yellow fountain.  (Despite my own advice, this still happens to me every few days).   And you definitely have to push it down when you put on the diaper.  Always push it down!

To complicate things, within the first weeks of life, if you decide to circumcise, you also have to deal with bandages and vaseline and a raw, red penis.  We are Jewish, and so we did a bris for both our boys.  That means some old guy comes to your house with what he considers to be a "medical kit" and cuts the skin off of your precious baby's penis right in front of you.  I was more than willing to forgo this tradition (and get my kids circumcised in the hospital, where I don't have to be in the room), but my husband insisted on it.  And my dad even watched both times.  Gross.


After the first few months of having a boy, the whole circumcision thing feels like a distant memory, and you get used to the yellow fountain.  Pushing it down for diaper changes is instinctive.  You're getting good at this.

Fast forward a couple of years to potty training.  Let me tell you, this one through me for a loop.

I was determined to potty train Braden by June, because his school was running a camp that I wanted him to attend, and being potty trained is a requisite.  So I did what all the books said.  I bought two potties, books about the potty, DVDs about the potty, reward charts for the potty, potty potty potty.  We planned a potty training weekend, where we would not leave the house and let him run around naked from the waste down.

On Day 1 of the potty training boot camp, it dawned on me that I wasn't sure how this would work.  Does he stand to pee?  Sit to pee?  We decided on the sitting.  And with the first pee success, I realized we had an issue.  He peed, but it missed the potty completely and went straight like a laser onto the opposite wall.  There was a "pee guard" on the potty, but come on.  It's a joke!

We resolved to push it down, so to speak, and try to teach him to do so, with varying success.  I would pick him up from school and see him in his spare set of clothes and assume he had an accident, until the teacher would say no, "it was the aim."  To solve the aim problem, we decided to train him to stand up.  I mean, that's the long term goal, right?

Let me tell you - the whole standing up thing ain't so great either.  How does this possibly work?  So you start the pee - it's going well, doing a nice arc configuration into the toilet.  But then at the end, as it slows down, the angle of the arc diminishes.  Without fail, there's the end dribble - onto toilet seat, the floor, the underwear - every single time.

I decided to do some investigating.  When we were getting ready for bed one night, I casually watched my husband pee.  Not that I hadn't seen this before, but I watched with a critical eye this time.  How did he hold it?  Was he standing upright?  Leaning a bit?

After doing this research, I have come to the conclusion that it is just gross the way men pee.  While my husband did not have the dribble on the floor or underwear, there was definitely the potential for dribble on the toilet seat (didn't happen that time).  There was also the total potential for some splash from the stream out of the toilet.  And no wiping?  Come on.  I know you are supposed to do a little shake shake, but surely you have to get a drop every now and then in your pants.  Who decided that men don't need toilet paper?

My solution?  A designated bathroom for Braden, which I now refuse to use.  It's not the closest one to his room, but we don't have a master bathroom, and I'm no longer willing to share mine.  Let the guest hall bath be urinated on.  No one will ever know.

I'm so glad I'm a girl.