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Is your child ready for potty training at nursery? Here's the place for all your toilet training questions.

Is your child ready for potty training at nursery? Here's the place for all your toilet training questions.

Potty training

Won't poo in the potty

20 replies

Cheesewithbread · 02/10/2015 09:12

Hi

Trained my 2.11 yr old August bank holiday. Since then we've been fine for wees but only a handful of poos have gone in the potty. I feel like I've tried everything:

bribery
books, toys in the toilet and scheduled toilet time
chair in the loo to rest legs on
taking all presure off, not saying anything when accidents happen
more recently trying to talk to her and understand why won't use potty
book Liam goes poo I the toilet and poo goes to poo land app
increasing water intake and offering dried apricots

This week we have got to the stage where I keep catching her pooing and taking her to the loo. She will sit on the loo sometimes but won't go. She'll hold in the poo until everyone is out of the way and then finish in her knickers at a later point. She seems to like pooing standing up. I've talked to her about this and she's willing to try and poo in the loo but just doesn't find it easy. Even when she's mid poo and then is put on the loo she won't finish in there. Sometimes she gets really embarrassed when I catch her doing a poo and wants to be left alone to finish but she generally isn't embarressed by all the accidents.

We went out for the day last weekend and she held her poo all day and then we got her to do it in the potty when we got home. She got shock late, cheers, praise for that and seemed really pleased with herself.

Any advice? Anything I havent tried? Understand its still relatively early days.

Thanks

OP posts:

Report

Cheesewithbread · 02/10/2015 09:13

She got chocolate not shock late!

OP posts:

PetShopGirl · 06/10/2015 11:52

Bumping this for you as we are having exactly the same issue!

CrayonShavings · 09/10/2015 20:10

DS is still figuring poos out, but what I find helps (and cracked it for DD) is if they have a bare bum. Then they don't get that nappy-like feeling of pooing in their pants.

I'm not going to lie, the first time your DD will probably poo on the floor, but after that my Dc have got the idea better. You just need to work out a time to do it every day. Good luck!

Naty1 · 19/10/2015 13:06

sticker chart to get toys worked for us.
i think 1 poo in nappy all week.

Lilliana · 19/10/2015 13:10

We have the same problem so hoping for some genius to have the answer here! As a pp said I find if she's naked at home she is more likely to use the potty but she will still try to hold it in and only sit down and finally poo when she can't any longer. It does avoid the poo in the pants though. This clearly isn't an option at nursery / out and about so really need another way.

Butterfliesprettybutterflies · 19/10/2015 13:20

same problem here so following for any suggestions! He's just got home from his first day at nursery and held it all the time but kept trying to go in his pants on the walk home..... but since we got home he's sat on the potty/toilet every five mins and still no poo!

Cheesewithbread · 21/10/2015 15:49

Thanks for all the replies and the bumps - so relieving to know we are not alone!! Tried no pants and have had one poo on the carpet yesterday evening. Was off out so husband had to clean it up after putting kids to bed

Will see if she does it again if I leave pants off after tea tonight.

Since initial post we are also on one sachet of movicol a day. She was going daily but it was Bristol chart type one droppings. Am glad that's all sorted for her but we are still having daily accidents ... Which are now messier!! AND she's started to have wee accidents as well.

Really don't know what to do. Read a book by a consultant on this subject and he suggested giving negative consequences for "accidents" if they know what they are doing. Not sure how I feel about that given she's not yet 3 till next month it seems a little harsh but at a loss at what else to try. Perhaps I need to give movicol a bit longer but she has no accidents at preschool or with others or out as she'll hold it and then when she feels safe at home with me it all comes out in her knickers!!!

OP posts:

Lilliana · 21/10/2015 15:54

What kind of negative consequences? Everything I've read says don't make an issue of accidents and I don't like the idea of 'punishing' her but clearly this isn't working! Not sure what to do?

Cheesewithbread · 19/11/2015 11:39

It is this book

Constipation, Withholding and Your Child: A Family Guide to Soiling and Wetting

It says that one way would be to get the child to wash their own clothes at a special time (when their favourite programme is on or their siblings are doing something nice).

I have started to get my daughter to clean up after her poo which isn't pleasant and isn't working. I have no idea what is going on in her head. I've caught her about to poo today and yesterday and have tried

allowing her to stand and then mummy will get the poo in the potty before it falls
chocolate
offered a nappy
tried bare bum

She will hold the poo and if I go upstairs for honestly 30 secs she will then do the poo. Today this was 2 hrs after I initally caught her trying to poo and offered a nappy.

I've been in tears of frustration and up since 4:45 this morning so knackered and crying! Has anyone else got a child who has this much control of their bowels but won't poo in potty!

We are on half a sachet of Movicol a day as when we started PT she was constipated.

OP posts:

UptownFunk00 · 19/11/2015 11:50

DD 2.7 doesn't like the feel of the potty against her bum for some reason.

She has had constipation issues too wondering if this could be connected?

Hoping to potty train around Christmas holidays as have DC2 due in February so might be difficult to start after then.

FannyGlum · 19/11/2015 16:40

That's interesting. I have a 3 year old that will not poo on toilet. She potty trained in August and has done 2 poos on toilet since then. She says she can't, and soils herself everyday. It's driving me mad.

Chiddles09 · 25/11/2015 08:44

I would love an answer to this. My 2.5 yo was properly and reliably potty trained for a couple of months, but has increasingly been pooing in his pants to the extent that he is now only pooing in his pants. I'm not sure what has gone wrong. He tells me where poo is supposed to go (potty or toilet), he tells me where he has done it (in my pants on my bedroom floor or similar), but even if I catch him mid-poo now, he resists coming to put the rest of it on the potty. I really recognise that idea that he can hold onto the poo for hours, but then as soon as I leave the room for 2 minutes he will do it in his pants.

Has anyone found any good books that could help?

My middle son is autistic and does not like the feel of pooing, so we have had problems with him getting constipated. We have to sit him on the toilet with a step under his feet and blowing bubbles (apparently that makes it difficult for him to hold on).

I don't know what to do, any ideas gratefully received

ChampagneTastes · 28/11/2015 15:30

Oh God I'm so glad it's not just us. DS is 3.5 and does his wee in the toilet but just dumps in his pants. I think he doesn't like looking at so I've promised to flush it away while he's still sat on the toilet. I'm hoping someone will come along with a magic wand.

whatsoever · 29/11/2015 20:26

Another one joining the thread with this issue hoping for some wisdom. DS is 3 yrs 1m. Potty trained for wees since September & virtually no wee accidents since week 1. A couple of poos in the potty early on but not since.

Knows when he wants to do one but he just can't get his head round pooing on the potty. Sometimes he tries but just can't and he gets quite stressed and upset about this. He always ends up asking for a pull-up and doing it in there.

We just have no idea how to move him on from this.

Cheesewithbread · 04/01/2016 06:44

We had success here. Not sure exactly what did it. The elf on the shelf took the cot sides down on the cot bed one morning and she started going poo in the toilet soon after. Maybe because she felt like a big girl now. No idea.

Other thing she said was she has started going poo in the toilet so Santa won't bring her toys. It seems a family member (I think grandparent) told her that Santa brings toys to girls that poo in the potty. Normally very irritating comment but in this case I think it contributed to her getting it.

I realise now Christmas has passed this doesn't help much but thought I'd report back. We had a slight set back between Christmas and new year but said that Santa needed to know what she wants for next Christmas and he'll start making it now if she keeps up the good work.

So I don't know whether it was her feeling too old to soil herself once she was In The big girl bed or the ultimate threat of Santa not visiting.

Onto the next phase or problem! :-)

OP posts:

Moving15 · 04/01/2016 06:52

I had the same issue with my son at that age. I had to stand outside the toilet with the door shut and wait patiently for a long time. He is a private pooer! Could you try explaining to her that it can take a while to poo and she should just relax and wait until it comes. If it takes ages then so be it. When she has got the hang of relaxing on the toilet then you should see some progress. Do you have one of those portable toilet seats thingys to make sure she is comfortable on the big toilet?

JasperDamerel · 04/01/2016 07:03

DS wouldn't poo in a potty or toilet for over a year after he toilet trained for wees. He would ask for a nappy, and I would give him one, he would poo in it, and we would flush the poo away and clean up. After a while I made it a rule that he had to do his pops in the bathroom, and then encouraged him to do them sitting on the toilet with a nappy on. We then started cutting holes in the nappy, and eventually got rid of it altogether. We talked about when he would be ready to stop using a nappy, and although he was late to toilet train, the process was pretty straightforward and free of stress. And he was properly independent in terms of wiping effectively etc earlier than his sister who was using the loo when she was two.

whatsoever · 10/01/2016 00:56

JasperDamerel - your post gives me hope, I had started thinkingy DS would still be pooing in a pull up at school!

We've been trying to move him on to sitting on the potty with his pull up still on over the last few days but he just can't. He's ended up going 4 days without pooing and making himself feel ill so we'll have to knock that on the head again for a bit.

And glad to hear things are working out for your DD, OP.

chiibbs · 21/02/2016 00:13

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

Sallyhasleftthebuilding · 21/02/2016 00:21

We had a poi fairy that delivered (whatever) overnight - like Santa every day

We had a magazine only readable in the toilet which had lots of stickers in

Worked well when DH had business trip and I was left to stick with the plan because he would give in!!

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