Can someone please help me with my constipated ds, i dont know what to do???????

[fifisworld]

My ds is 18 months old.
He has had problems with constipation on and off since he was about 7 months old.

I had him at the doctors when it first started and he was perscribed Lactulose to help soften his poo's.

He has about a week where he strains constatly, has tiny poo's and he's screaming with it, then it goes away for a while then starts again.
I had him back to the doctors last week and the doctor said he couldnt give him anything other than lactulose and that the problem would sort itself out.

He has a varied diet, plenty fruit and veg, youghurts, drinks plenty fluids, ive even had him on prune juice and prunes but nothing seems to help him.

Has anyone had any experience of this or knows of anything that will work to help him, i cant bear seeing him screaming when he's trying to go to the toilet and i feel so helpless.

[francagoestohollywood]

Yes both my dc have been constipated at times. Fig's syrup worked for dd (but started to work after one week of taking it).
I know suppositories aren't popular in the UK (I'm Italian living in England), but, following the advise of the Italian paediatrician, I have used them at times with the dc (glicerine supp) as a last resort.
The problem does sort itself out at some stage.

[goingfriggincrazy]

Get to your GP and ask for MOVICOL(I'm sure it's ok for 18mth old children) ,it works wonders.We tried everything for ds including Lactulose-which I found did nothing.The only thing that keeps my so now regular is his 2 sachets a day Movicol and hes now 5yrs old,hes always been a constipated child even though he has a varied and healthy diet.

[fifisworld]

thanks for that, can you get it from a chemist or is it only on perscription??????

[fifisworld]

Ive just googled it and it says its not recommended for children under 12????

[EricL]

My youngest DD has suffered from this. We were prescribed Lactulose and it seemed to work most times, but if we didn't administer it she had issues again.

It was confusing for us too as she had a good diet and plenty of fibrous foods.

It has cleared up now. She is now 3.

We actually went to a Homeopath after we were worried that constantly adding a medicine like this to her diet was not sorting the root cause out. After 3 sessions of appointments and remedies she has been fine. You may want to try this as the Homeopath attempts to get to the reason behind the imbalance rather that treating the symptoms. Also at such a young age we were able to discount the 'placebo' effect and trust that the actual remedy worked.

We were very impressed by the depths of her questioning about her lifestyle and history - even through DW's pregnancy. This seemed a lot better than the usual 'Problems pooing? - here take this' convo with the doctor.

The only time she gets problems now is when she has been away for a weekend/night and she has been fed crap by well-meaning friends/relatives!

Hope you get it sorted cos it is upsetting to see them in pain at such a simple bodily fuction - and you want to get it sorted before it gives them issues with it later on in life.

[TheMadScaryHouse]

Hi there

I have become an expert of consitation etc. My DS2 has experianced issues with his bowels from birth and we too use lactelose.

Is your little one is straining then you really need to increase the dose of lactelose, so that all the stool becomes soft.

The longer the stool is in the bowel the dryer it becomes as the bowel sucks out the mosture and it then makes it harder for the muscles in the bowel to contract and therefore really hard for them to poo.

I would increase the dose, you can not OD on lactelose, as it is just a type of sugar the body can not absorbe therefore the bowel can not remove it and it keeps the stools soft. It can take a while to get through, so you may find that the end bit is hard (like a plug) and once this bit is out your little one may be very runny for a while.

If you want to chat about it just cat me

[jackielantern]

I would insist on a prescrition for movico.

I have a four year old who has a pooing phobia which has been going on for 18 months now.

Movicol is the only thing that gets him going.

[MerlinsBeard]

Sounds a bit like my DS2. he has "issues" pooing too. Is it dry when it eventually comes out?

lactulose made no difference to DS2 as, at the time, it wasn't true constipation, he had had constipation and that made him frightened of pooing. He was witholding. It wasn't him straining to get it out but straining to keep it in!

[fifisworld]

Thanks for the responses. I've increased his dose of lactulose, he's supposed to have 2 spoonfuls a day but ive doubled that.
He's actually up on all fours when he's trying to go to the toilet and is crying,growling and is just very distressed.
Its just horrible seeing him like this
Will look into homeopath as well, i'll try anything to help him.

[TheMadScaryHouse]

we also used glicerine supposotories when he was little.

If you are really concerned ask to be refered to a consultant, as it is important not to get to the point where they stop themselves going in a phycological sort of way

[iwouldgoouttonight]

My DS has been exactly the same (I've posted about it before too!) - its horrible to see them screaming in pain trying to do a poo. My doctor also prescribed lactulose which did work, but we had to increase the amount we gave him. The thing that worked for us was tinned prunes whizzed up in the blender and poured on top of weetabix for breakfast.

[iwouldgoouttonight]

We gave the prunes for about two weeks before we noticed a difference BTW.

I would insist on getting more help from the doctor though - my friend's DD has really bad ongoing constipation and I'm sure she has something stronger than lactulose which she has to take every day.

[fifisworld]

Thanks, Ive had him backwards and forward to the doctor, ive had a word with a few chemists and even the health visitor.
Theyve all said i can get anything else for him.
The doctor said last week, it will sort its self out, but its hard to watch him crying and screaming.

[MerlinsBeard]

our drs were like that too. its horible to watch them in so much pain. and it feels like they don't care

[TheMadScaryHouse]

I am so evangelical about this as they told me that DS2 was just dehydrated hmmmm

wekk it turns out he wasnt and after an ospeopath, baby massage and other alternative ther. He was so ill he ended up in hospital at 3 weeks old vomitting.

While there DS1's consultant (he has a respitory consition) came and saw me and he believed me and we finally got things moving - so to speak.

Week later we were 100 miles away at a seeing a specialist surgeon and had an operation and I also had to manually dilate DS2's anus.

He is 16 months now, happy, healthy and pooing on a regular basis (still has lactelose occasionally) and may have some ongoing issues for life, but, after 10 months of crying, straining and horrendous nappys he is happy and so am I.

Constipation is not a small thing in children and it can turn in to major issues

[car25]

Lactulose did absolutely nothing for my child.

We got paediatric Movicol prescribed by the doctor and it has done absolute wonders, my child was a "withholder", it all started with one hard painful poo which made a small tear then my child was just too terrified to go again.

Movicol seems to have done the trick, but it is not a quick fix, it's something that will have to be taken for a while (at least 6-12 months). I've just read the leaflet and it says suitable from 2 years, don't know if they do a babies version.

[runtus]

My son has been constipated since birth, to the extent that even when exclusivly breast fed he only went once a week. We endured months of "it'll clear up" and "breast fed babies can't get constitpated"....all rubbish in his case. After months of Lactulose that as you say, works sporadically, we were insistant ad got referred tp an excellent consultant who prescribed Senokot in conjunction with Lactulose - twice daily.

Only now has DS begun not to think about going to the loo (as he too became scared to go and would hold it for days to stop it hurting) and to become relaxed about it. Basically what has happened is as he has been constipated for so long, his insided has become used to being full of poo and have streched to accomodate it. The Senokot allows him to pretty much remain fluid in his movements, thus allowing the bowel to shrink back in size. I do worry about the medication he is taking but I take the opinion that I would rather he be on a smallish dose of prescribed medication than suffer the agony of screaming in pain and bleeding every day.

We have been told he may grow out of it and he may not - as it affects millions of children, each differently.

I would really really strongly suggest you do not just accept the 'they'll grow out of it' advice and insist on being referred to a specialist. I was dreading the thought of attmepting to potty train my DS and thankfully that now is not such a horrific thought - and he is sooo much happier bless him.

Hope it works out ok for you

[BigBlueHat]

My dd has been on movicol for a while and it is extremely effective. Shes also on senna now on the advice of a paeditrician and things are really moving!!

I never found lactulose to be that effective and it was quite hard to get her to take it, whereas with movicol you can hide it in their drinks and they don't know its there. Best to try and get on top of it when they're young otherwise fear sets in and they start holding on which leads to a whole load more problems.

[dramaqueen]

Yup. movicol here also. It doesn't 'just sort itself out'. It goes on to become a psychological problem where they start to fear going to the toilet, withold it and become impacted.

Go back to the doctor, demand to be referred to a consultant or constipation clinic t ypur local hospital, and tell him you want to be prescribed paediatric movicol. You will be amazed what it can do!!

[Magicmayhem]

If you want instant relief for him I would try glycerine suppositories... will empty him in a matter of minutes

[Washersaurus]

My DS1 had exactly the same problem. Lactulose was useless. Movicol was the thing that sorted him out. He is now 2 and the problem isn't as bad as it was, but he still breaks into a sweat and cries whilst pooing occasionally.

The doctor told me he would just grow out of it; probably at potty training. He also said that it is unlikely that we will ever work out what triggers it.

[Jenkeywoo]

Hi fifisworld, I'm going through exactly the same with my dd who is 19 months and has been constipated since about 6 months. I totally agree that health professionals are utterly uninterested in the problem. Lactulose is virtually useless for problem constipation - we have also had senna which didn't work either. We reached a point last week where she hadn't done any poo at all for 10 days, I saw a locum GP who wanted to admit her to hospital but the hospital will not do a thing till they have not gone for 14 days which is just awful. The hospital recommended Movicol which worked the next day. After 3 days of it she was up to ears in liquid poo so we cut out the movicol but kept her on the senna and lactulose - she pooed for a couple of days but now hasn't been since last Saturday and more worryingly is now on day of Movicol with no results.

God, it's awful isn't it? The worst thing is the effect it has on her whole life - she is a terrible sleeper and we always suspected that she was waking with tummy pain. Last week when she was pooing regularly she slept through the night for 4 blissful nights! Now we're back to the regular wakings again.

I do hope you arew able to get something sorted and would recommend you go back and demand Movicol.

[Jenkeywoo]

sorry should say she is on day 3 of Movicol with no results. I guess we'll have to just up the dose - I just hate pouring all these different drugs down her throat.

[maisykins]

Just to add my vote for Movicol. My DD has it (she is older though). Specialist told me that lactulose just doesnt agree with or help some children - but they always try it first coz it works for some. (In fact it made DD worse - gave her tummy pains and wind etc which apparently is a possible side effect - but can be confused with thinking it is just the constipation).

Other than that the three things to focus on are liquids (not milk - water/diluted juice etc) and up the amount as much as you can; fruit and fibre - and fibre in terms of wholemeal stuff and cereals. Bananas and milk can make it worse though obviously need to give the baby milk - just not more than necessary.

[Washersaurus]

Jenkeywoo - we did loads of stopping and starting the movicol doses with DS, because he was just going from severe constipation to diahorrea, it took a long time to get the dosage right - it is a very fine line

I have to say, I am not missing those horrible explosive movicol poo nappies!