Blame the Cat

2.5 Years: “Pookie pooped in my diaper.”

My best friend, known to my daughter as Aunt Sarah, has a cat named Pookie who, for many years, was the subject of my daughter’s constant attention. She drew pictures of Mama Pookies with baby Pookies. She named two toy cats Pookie. She played with, snuggled, and petted an invisible version of Pookie. And, apparently, when she did something bad, Pookie was to blame. Even for the messes in her diapers.

There were many times that my daughter would grow quiet for a few suspicious moments, then toddle to me and tell me very matter-of-factly, “Um. Pookie pooped in my diaper.”

If I corrected her, and said that she had in fact pooped in her own diaper, she would respond argumentatively, sometimes with a foot stomp, declaring that Pookie was to blame. When asked how Pookie traveled four hundred miles, climbed into her diaper, defecated there, and then vanished without a trace with no one noticing, my daughter’s only response was another firm declaration of “Pookie did it.”

Pookie eventually must have gotten in the habit of using the litter box, because at some point—miraculously around the time that my daughter started consistently using her princess potty—the mysterious poop in my toddler’s diapers ceased its regular appearances. I am very grateful that Pookie eventually decided that there were better places to poop than in the pants of a toddler hundreds of miles away.