What is swimming upstream?

When picking the title for my blog I immediately thought of the name Mike and I have called our life recently. Swimming upstream. That title wasn't available and after many attempts for other names I found Swimming upstream in life. Because, after all, that's what we are often doing. Case in point, today. Molly is still visiting the potty quite often. And every time she needs to go in there her little sister needs to go to. Mike just wants to tell Amanda no but I have let her try and we go through the whole process. We set the potty seat out, take our pants off, take our diaper off and sit. And then we sit some more. And we sit longer and no pee comes out. We look in the hole and can't believe it's dry. Amanda looks at us in disbelief that it is empty. We sit again and it's still dry. This whole charade goes on for 10 - 15 minutes. Then we put a diaper back on and go back to life. It's OK as long as we aren't trying to rush out the door. If we don't let her try Amanda is reduced to a puddle of tears with a temper tantrum erupting. I realize that we are suppose to be supportive of her trying but, come on. It's too early, it's too soon, I have doubts that it's time to be potty training. I guess that is the feeling of swimming upstream. When you try and keep life simple and yet it's still harder than it's suppose to be. It's like toys. I have been trying very hard to keep things picked up and to teach the kids the importance of picking up. It can feel like an uphill battle. It can feel fruitless because after all the work of getting everything picked up within an hour it's a mess again. In the blink of an eye. If I didn't care so much I'd just wait until they went to bed and do it myself. but I feel I need to go against the grain - swim upstream - and try and teach a lesson. I hope these life lessons eventually pay off. Feel free to give me reassurance that they will - I could use some!