Can I Pee In the Woods Please?

We came out of the planetarium and Naomi said “Can I pee in the woods please.”

“No, Naomi you have to pee in the potty.”

“No pee in the potty.  Pee in the woods.  Can I pee in the woods please?”

This is a hard one.  I know I shouldn’t encourage her to pee in the woods, but my chances of getting her to pee in the potty are zilch!  I think about it for a minute.  “Okay, let’s go.”

We get behind the building where there are several nature walks that I don’t think I’ve seen anyone ever take. We walk a little while in the woods until I get to a spot where I’m pretty sure that no one can see us.  I help her crouch down and hold everything out of the way so nothing gets peed on.  And off she goes.

Naomi has an extremely sensitive olfactory nerve. This sensitivity to smell comes and goes.  She has begged me to bring her to the mall and then been so turned off by the cologne counter that she insists on leaving as soon as we get there.  At one point in time or another, stores, restaurants, churches have all had the ‘smell effect’ on her.  She’ll walk in, cover her mouth and nose and say “Yucky smell!”  I can’t really tell when it’s going to hit.  Washrooms in general, even clean ones, have a smell that just doesn’t sit right with her.   This isn’t the case all the time.  Sometimes she will use a public washroom without complaint.  Other times, she can even open the washroom door.   So, when she wants to pee in the woods, I know it’s about the smell.   If it hits her that way, I can’t really talk her out of it.  It just hits her that way!   So she pees in the woods.   I just cross my fingers and hope it doesn’t get to be too much of a habit. (It does seem to be heading that way.)   For now, the smell of cedar trees or rotting leaves doesn’t seem to bother her and I guess she wants to do things the way nature set them up!  So she pees in the woods.