Sunday, September 28, 2008

Automatic flush toilets not so good

Thursday we left for Disneyland. We were going to stay three days and return home on Monday. Our trip was cut short and I will give you the details later. For now I need to complain about automatic flush toilets!

I understand the idea behind them. Many people don't flush toilets when they have finished their business and it helps to keep cleaning down for staff. However, does anyone out there realize how difficult these toilets can be on children??? Both of my girls are sensitive to sound and these automatic flush toilets are always VERY loud and the flushing action is quite hard. Yes, my girls have been stuck on the toilet and had it flush on them. They are both terrified.

Luckily my 5 year old we are able to reason with. So with her we have showed her that you can put toilet paper or a toilet seat cover over the sensor and it won't flush until you remove it. However, my youngest daughter who just turned three doesn't really understand this concept and she is terrified of these toilets. What did this mean for us? Total bathroom issues at Disneyland. You see, the entire park only has automatic flush toilets!

So what is one to do when their three year old grabs onto you clenching her legs around your waist screaming she won't use those toilets. All the while you know she is dying to go to the bathroom and has been doing the pee pee dance the past ten minutes. I looked at my MIL for guidance and we tried everything we could think of. She tried showing KK she would keep her hand over the sensor. We let her watch Aly first. You will not believe what we resorted to. In fact, you will probably look at me in total disgust. But, alas, desperate times call for desperate measures. So we did the only thing we could think of. We let her pee in the sink! Yes, I know, how disgusting letting her pee where people wash their hands. But we didn't know what else to do. KK would have either peed her pants or gotten a bladder infection from holding it too long. She has been potty trained for almost ten months so the idea of peeing in a diaper is foreign to her now and we didn't have any anyway. We also didn't have a change of clothes at the park with us. Yes, we rinsed the sink out afterwards.

So have any of you had this problem with your child? What did you do? As much as we could we tried to time her potty breaks around being at the hotel or somewhere there were flush toilets but we couldn't always do that. So I think about three times she ended up peeing in a sink. If you have any other clever ideas please share. I would love to try something else if possible as we plan on going back in December!

2 comments:

Lia Freitas said...

Don't you remember me dealing with this? Ashley was so terrified that we finally just had to put her in pull-ups. She would still just ask before going in them but we couldn't think of anything else to do.

Busymama Kellie said...

My daughter is terrified of these things too! I don't know who invented these things, esp the ones so sensitive that they flush with a gust of wind. The trick I discovered? Post-it notes. Keep a pad in your purse and stick it over the sensor. Toilet from hell won't flush until you remove it!