I suspect that this is a common manifestation of the human condition, but comfort with the status quo at the expense of progress is alive an well in this preschool-oriented household in two significant ways:
A) She is still refusing to give up her pull-up for pooping. I’ll not regale you, gentle readers, with any of the messy details, but know that she can, she simply won’t, and it’s driving me nuts, especially as pushing on this is developmentally a big no-no.
B) Swimming.

Today was Rhiannon’s first swim lesson without me in the pool. The photo above was this morning, shot by me (all dry and perched in the observation deck) on my phone (sorry, no telephoto), of Rhiannon and her instructor Christina, an inordinately patient woman who spent 25 minutes in the pool with Rhiannon… without me.
Normally, we are in the Tadpole class. This is babies from 12 months to that teetering edge between toddlerhood and preschool… and their dads. It’s a Saturday morning class so it is almost all dads, and me and maybe one or two other random moms. There are three-year-olds in these classes, but not many. Most kids get comfortable enough in the water to move up to being in the Starfish class by their third birthday.
Rhiannon, however, has been showing no interest in letting go of me. For the last month and a half, her teacher Tommy has been taking her from me every chance he could to get her to do things without me in the water. And sometimes it worked and sometimes she wailed. Finally last week she had a stellar class. She went under without sputtering. She went to Tommy no problem. She said, “Okay” when “Let’s do it again” was suggested.
The problem, of course, is that Rhiannon is comfortable with being in the water with her head safely in the air and me to hold onto. It’s the same thing with pooping — the pull-up works just fine, thankyouverymuch, and whyEVER would we want to change this comfortable setup for some unknown?
But while pushing the pooping can easily result in all kinds of repressed behavior, pushing swim lessons might just result in some crying. And the kid needs to move on from being a Tadpole.
So we took a chance. She started just fine. But the flippers threw her. Starfish kids wear flippers — the resistance helps strengthen and promote muscle memory. But Rhiannon was just plain freaked out by it. I called Brian a few minutes into the lesson to say it was going fine, but as I was hanging up I realized she wasn’t really doing anything with her legs except crossing at the ankle (”Like Ariel, Mom. Like a mermaid princess.” Sigh.) So as soon as Christina tried to get her to actually use her legs, pandemonium ensued.
Screaming. Wailing. Pleading for “Mommy! Mommy!”
And upstairs in the observation desk, where I was chatting on the phone with my friend Teri about this major milestone, I suddenly realized things had turned south and simply said, “Uh-oh.”
The lesson was supposed to be a half-hour. But Rhiannon was done and after ten straight minutes of crying we pulled her five minutes early. But we are not giving up. The instructors said that this is not unheard of, and it’s certainly not the first time Christina has been wailed upon, and if we were game then we could certainly try again next week.
“Do you want to try again next week?” Christina, still in the pool, sweetly asked Rhiannon, snug now in her fluffy towel.
“I want to swim with the babies,” she sniffled into my neck. Please don’t make me leave this comfortable status quo!
“Sweetie, but you are a kid now. You get to swim with Christina now.”
Plaintive wailing. “But I want to swim with the babies!” Note: Both adults worked hard not to giggle at this.
“Does she have to wear the flippers?” I asked Christina.
“In the starfish classes, well, yes. But with me right now? No. We can work up to that.”
So I worked for a minute to reel in the wailing. Finally, “Rhiannon? How about next week, if you swim with Christina you don’t have to wear the flippers,” I negotiated.
“I don’t like the flippers.”
“But you like Christina?”
“I like Christina.”
“Will you come swim with me next week?” Christina asked Rhiannon.
“And the babies?”
“No.” Christina said. “Just me.”
“Like a big girl,” I added.
She looked at Christina. She looked to me. She looked back to Christina. She chewed on her lower lip. “Okay.”
Baby steps. She’ll be in that starfish class in a matter of months. We aren’t almost there, but it won’t be forever. And I am confident she won’t be going to her prom in a pull-up.