David has a hard time (no pun intended) going "#2", which often results in very pain-filled trips to the toilet. You can imagine my heartache as I sit in the bathroom with him, holding his hands, rubbing his back, racking my brain trying to come up with some way to help him, and cursing myself for forgetting - once again - to give him some MiraLax every day to prevent this from happening.

Today's ordeal was, by far, the longest we've ever been through; from his first tears to final release took almost an hour. During that time period, he moved from seated position on the toilet to standing in the tub in hopes that the straightening of his intestines would help him pass it easier. I used petroleum jelly around his anus, shoved my finger inside to break up the rock-hard formation, and attempted to numb him a little bit with a q-tip-type applicator of Orajel. Hey, in an emergency, you use what you've got!

The last thing I could think of was to simply let him sit in a warm bath and hope that it would maybe soften his stool enough for him to push it out. If nothing else, it would at least relax him and calm him down a bit. As he was sitting in the tub, he made two comments that made me smile, which is saying a lot under the circumstances. At the beginning of the bath:

"Mom, I don't think this poop is EVER going to let me finish my breakfast!"

After he had calmed quite a bit, I left the bathroom to get him a drink, and I heard the pain and crying build up again:

"Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa - Ew!"

Needless to say, that was the end of this bath, and the start of a new one. He's in there now, pretending to be an airplane fish.

Yesterday, Brian commented that he was really, really hungry. David, sitting at the table, said:

"You mean you're 'famished', Dad. That means really, really hungry."

I love to hear him use new words and increase his vocabulary. It's a habit Brian is trying to pick up, too!

David's been fighting getting ready for bed lately; what kid doesn't at some point or another? The past few days, his rebellion comes mostly in the form of taking a REALLY long time to brush his teeth. Last night, it was all I could do to keep from laughing as I eavesdropped on what was going on in the bathroom:

(In his most professional-sounding "announcer voice") Laties and Gentlemen! Our super good singer, Toothpaste!"

He then proceeded to sing a lovely medley of songs including Book of Mormon Stories, Follow the Prophet, I Am A Child of God, and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star.

He also loves to sing "Bob the Builder... Bob the Builder... Bob the Builder... he knows the way!" at the top of his lungs while sitting on the toilet.