Your Letters

Star Advice Needed

Dear FabMo

A friend told me that Madonna says all children must be potty trained by the time they are two, and that if they aren’t, it is a sign of inattentive parents. Shockingly, my boy Sidney is 26 months and still in nappies. So I asked my friend what advice Madonna offered to those less attentive than herself.

Apparently she said that to potty train, you should simply remove the nappy and wait for your child to ‘get disgusted’ with himself. Well, I’ve been trying this, but little Sidney seems worryingly slow on the uptake. Yesterday he poohed on the landing and kicked his efforts through the balustrades on to the stairs below and this morning he weed all over the cat. He frequently squidges his little ‘accidents’ between his toes and prints elaborate patterns on the carpet and the finger paintings on the walls are proving hard to clean.

If it wasn’t for the giggling, I’d worry that it was some form of dirty protest. As it is, I’m not sure I can be attentive enough to let this continue until his self-disgust kicks in. Could anyone tell me how to get in touch with Madonna so I can ask her how long it’s likely to take? I also hope to ask her nanny or housekeeper for tips on extracting ingrained pooh from the underside of doors.

Jenny from Bromley

Eureka!

Hello FabMo!

I’ve just had a mothering breakthrough and I wanted to share it with your readers. I don’t need sleep! I found this out the other night whilst chatting to the sterilizer. I hadn’t had more than forty minutes consecutive sleep for three days, yet there I was, able to stand upright and sterilise bottles at three in the morning! Not only was I awake but the sterilizer pointed out that I’d managed to balance all the bottle caps and teats on his rack on only my second attempt. He said that if I could perform like that at three in the morning then maybe I didn’t need sleep at all. And do you know – I think he’s right! It’s such a liberating feeling! Not only do I never have to be woken out of a deep sleep anymore, because I’m never in one, but not bothering with sleep means I have time for fun around the clock. I enjoy playing Kaplunk with the sterilizer rack and the sterilizer enjoys it too. I must remember to let the blender join in sometimes though, because I’ve noticed it’s started to look at me funny.

Name and address supplied but illegible.

Daddy’s Girl

Dear FabMo

I really think my baby Chloe might be psychic. She seems so in tune with her daddy, that anytime he’s about to get stressed at work, she starts to get stressed too! She’ll become increasingly fractious in the evenings and start to cry for hours on end. The spookiest thing is, Chloe seems to cotton on to my hubby’s situation before he does. I didn’t notice the link at first, but over the last six months a definite pattern has emerged. The day after Chloe’s howling starts, Matt comes home late and admits that, yes, things have been tough at work and it looks like he’s going to have to put in some extra hours for a while. Bless our little perceptive one! What’s more, as soon as she senses a let-up in her daddy’s workload, she relaxes too! Then all of a sudden, I’m back having our wonder child tucked up in her cot and hubby tucked up on his sofa by 7.30 every evening.

Jill from Crawley