End of An Era

My daughter turned 4 today and overnight things changed.

 

It’s funny how you say something to your kid, something unthinking, something you don’t even remember saying, and they take it and run with it, refer to it often and make it their mantra.

 

As a passing comment yesterday, I said, “Now that you’re 4, you can get up in the middle of the night to pee, without peeing your bed…”

 

I’d been working with her for months to keep her bed dry at night.
She’s potty trained, but the tricky overnight pee got her every time.
Now I know she’s young, but as she started to gain on 4, I thought it was reasonable to assume not peeing the bed was doable.
Still, each morning, she’d rise from urine-soaked sheets.

 

So, I’m thinking, OK, she’s not biologically ready to stay dry all night.
I’ll just get her thinking about it with my “now that you’re 4,” comment.

 

Magic words those were!

 

Around midnight last night, I heard her in the bathroom, peeing.

Then, again a few hours later.

 

And this morning, she tells me, “I didn’t pee the bed last light! I can’t pee there anymore, now that I’m 4.”

 

She then gave me her favorite stuffed dog, the one she’s slept with since she was a baby, and told me that I could have it. She doesn’t need him anymore, “now that she’s 4.”

 

The last straw was when she shunned a balloon. Seems those are very passe, “now that she’s 4.”

 

I want my baby back.