No right time...a talk about poop and the potty

I don't know if it's time or not, but we've thought about potty training for quite a while now. My pediatrician has told me twice that I'm probably nuts for thinking about it, so I stopped bringing it up starting at his last appointment (18 month). My second (or whatever distance we are) cousin has their little boy, who is 3 weeks younger than Zachariah, already fully potty trained. I don't worry about that so much, because she was sitting him on a potty as an infant.

Zachariah has been telling us about his poops since before he was a year old. But I could never get him to sit on the potty for very long. He's been really interested in the potty and everything else for months. He just wasn't ready to take that step, so I didn't push it. I occasionally asked him if he wanted to go potty, mostly before bath time. He always refused. Then there was the time that he was about to poop in the bathtub. He'd been constipated for 2 days, and apparently he liked the warm water. He told me he was going potty, and I could tell because he was trying really hard. I picked him up and told him to go in the potty. He screamed and cried and jumped up off the potty. He wouldn't go, so I put him back in the tub. As soon as I did he pooped in there. That's been months ago.

Since then he's sat on the potty, briefly, a few times. But he's never done anything...until 2 weeks ago. He was doing the same thing in the tub, so I said let's do that in the potty. When I picked him up he didn't protest, and he sat on the potty and finished going. YEAH! We celebrated. He wasn't quite sure what to think of it, but he wasn't scared and he enjoyed the praises.

After that I've been asking him at each diaper change, before bed, before naps, etc., if he'd like to use the potty. He's never wanted to. Once in a while when he comes in the bathroom with me, he'll go sit on his potty chair with his clothes on. He's been doing this a lot lately. Then this morning he told me he wanted to go potty. I was so excited, I couldn't believe it. We got his pants and diaper off, and he sat there. And he sat and he sat. Nothing happened, but it was a miracle for him to sit still. I went and got books for him to look at. He took his time looking over the books, but he still never pottied. (His new-ish diaper was wet, so I suspect that he has just gone.) He sat there for at least 10-15 minutes. This was a huge milestone for us. First of all because he told me he wanted to go potty, then because he sat there for that long. He hardly sits that long for ANYTHING.

So, I'm thinking it's time to get more serious about potty training. I don't plan to go all out. (I think he's too young to push it.) But I want to start taking him to the potty first thing in the morning, after breakfast, after lunch, after nap, and other times throughout the day. If I can get him to sit there for a while each time, I think it will only be a matter of time before something happens (even if accidentally). Then I think he'll catch on. Whether we're ready or not, I think this is what needs to happen. Wish us luck.