Childminder kicking out child for not being potty trained is she BU?

[minniemango]

My niece is currently not able to attend her childminder as SIL isn't a keyworker. SIL has contacted childminder about care resuming from March 8th and been told she will only have DN back if SIL can guarantee she will have no accidents.
Is the childminder being unreasonable, is this even allowed?
DN is 5 and in Reception, no SEN.

@playnoh

Whether it's discriminatory or not, your niece can hardly remain in an environment where she's unwanted.
And I don't blame the childminder for not wanting a 5 year old who has frequent accidents in her home.

There’s no chance in hell I’d clean up someone else’s 5yo’s poo every day, not for any amount of money. The main person who is being unreasonable here is this poor child’s mother who isn’t taking appropriate steps to find out what’s wrong and get her help. I feel really sad for her ; at five she’s probably embarrassed by it as none of her friends will be pooing their pants.

CM is not discriminating.

DD was still have poo accidents in reception and wrap around provision linked to the school. The difference being that we were working closely with health visitor, GP and school and they were very supportive and understanding due to recognising we were doing everything we could.

I was surprised that it’s more common than I thought, but nonetheless it still needs looking into to find the cause.

With DD she had become fixed in a cycle of holding her poo in, getting impacted, leaking around the impaction than finally passing the beast. It seemed to have stemmed from a general anxiety of pooing on the loo and got worse and worse.

We had to use medication for a long time to keep her regular, help her recognise what normal pooing felt like etc. It took a while and lots of accidents but we provided a bag full of spare clothes to school and loads of wet wipes, so DD could wipe herself clean and put clean clothes on. Sometimes if it was a particularly messy one that she couldn’t manage I’d go into school to do it.

It takes a lot of effort and communication with everyone involved in her care. Your DS needs to seek advice, make a plan and support your DN.

The sad part about this seems op your concern seems to be about whether its discrimination not how to help the child.

I am a childminder worked with various challenges- not this one at 5.. but i worked with it because the parents were. This is the bit that seems to be missing here.

I would give notice too.

[quote DinosaurDigestive]@BenoneBeauty one of my DC whom is autistic was in pull ups for a lot longer than a NT child would be. The school knew this and accepted her into the school. She was changed there. She had the appropriate medical persons involved in her care when this was happening so everyone knew this was ongoing.[/quote]
That's an entirely different scenario.

There is a huge amount of misinformation on this thread regarding discrimination. The ERIC website states this regarding continence and protected characteristics:

The Equality Act 2010 states that schools must not discriminate against or disadvantage disabled children or those with special educational needs. A delay in achieving continence - or not being toilet trained - is considered a disability. It is therefore not acceptable for a school to refuse or delay admission to children who are not yet continent.

It sounds very much like your niece needs a referral to a continence team as even children that poo daily can be impacted and have overflow. If anything, soiling is a classic sign of constipation.

Other than that, I am shocked at how ignorant many people are on this thread in regards to continence for both NT and SEN children. I say this as a parent of a smart, happy (but largely in continent) NT child.

A childminder is not a school

Or even anything remotely educational

@Menora Yes I'm aware of that. My point is not about whether the childminder should or should not accept the child but replying to those posters who adamantly claim that a child isn't protected by the Equality Act if they are not toilet trained by the time they start school.

It is not discrimination for a childminder not to want a child of 5 soiling herself daily inside the childminders own home, probably affecting her home and other children in her care. Regardless of how this works at school or in the families own home, this is what the whole thread is about. Some kind of pod fo of threat to the CM about discrimination. So thanks you have now helped the OP in their mission to either threaten the CM with something or the other, instead of get help for the child and retain their contract with the CM

I want to second the constipation.
My ds often had dirty pants, and a few other things, yet he poohed every day, so constipation never occurred to me.

It was only years later, reading stuff on here, that I realised that was what he had.

My dd had wee accidents every single day in reception. I worked with the TA who sent her to the loo before she went out to play and before lunch, and before she put her coat on at home time. That finally stopped the accidnets. Her wee signal was always poor and it was year 2 before she was reliably dry without reminders.
It does happen. But it is not the norm, and parent should work with professionals to solve it.

@Menora I'll spell it out again for you, seeing as you seem to think I'm on a one woman mission to threaten childminders:

1. People on this thread have adamantly claimed that incontinence is not a protected characteristic.

2. I have provided evidence from the ERIC website that this in not the case as it is actually classed as a disability.

3. I have advised the OP that it sounds like her niece is suffering with impaction and should be referred to the relevant medical professionals.

4. I haven't made any comment on whether the childminder should or should not accept the child.

The childminder's refusal isn't discriminatory under the Equality Act. However, if it were, would your SIL actually want to force someone to care for her DD who didn't want to do so? Most parents wouldn't leave their dc with somebody they knew resented looking after them.

Put the child elsewhere. Kids can wet themselves when stressed. The kid may be stressed at the childminders, have you thought about that.

Sorry, I've not read every single reply, but does your SIL really want her child to be in the care of someone who clearly doesn't want her there and has said that she can't cope with her toilet issues? Image what that could be like for the childminder and the child on a day-to-day basis.

I agree with the childminder, I wouldn’t want your neice either.

DD had constipation from coeliac disease. It then took a good 2 years to sort out. It’s exhausting and unpleasant and time consuming. I know the school weren’t happy about having to deal with it and I understood why completely so I made every effort to sort her out ASAP.
The CM is planning the ages of children she looks after so she can adequately look after them. Part of the point of taking older children after school is that they self manage and don’t need heavy supervision/intervention.
If your niece has constipation it needs diagnosing and sorting. It can be a long road. The quicker the better.

Cm can absolutely refuse care on that basis. Your DN needs a gp, not a chat with the hv. It's not normal for a 5 year old child to be having full poo accidents (your words) and if this is behavioural, I can see why she's refusing. I would be too. Sorry but your SIL is failing her daughter. It's lazy she's not attempted to get to the bottom of the problem. The cm is the least of your worries. Stop obsessing over that and get her sorted. The poor thing will be ripped apart in school, and no one is helping her. Primary teachers won't change her either, they'll send her home! Unless you'd sil wants to be called to school daily, and her daughter be bullied, she needs to get off her arse and get her child help.

@Carycy

My Neurotypical son had Pooh accidents regularly in reception. Largely in the summer term as he was too lazy to come back from playing outside. I regularly had to come into school and take him home. He grew out of it. He is fine now. He didn’t have to be bloody assessed. We don’t have to label every god damn child. Every child develops at their own rate. I wish we would stop labeling children and assuming they have SEN for every little thing.

Why did school send him home?

But also this isn't about labelling anyone as having SEN or assuming any child late to toilet train has SEN.

Regularly when you know damn well he can feel it and just cba is one thing, every day when they may not have full sensation is quite different m. And it doesn't mean they have SENT l, it means they need seeing by a doctor's. Constipation is so easy to miss of your child poos daily

I just can't understand why people are not potty training their children anymore.... My son was fully potty trained at three, it was bloody hard work but we did it. I don't think people want to put the work in, they just assume they will train themselves eventually.
Good for you. At 3 DS, still non verbal, couldn't tell when a wee or poo was coming out
We could sit him on the loo half hourly and he'd still piddle on the floor in-between. And at 4. At 5 we finally had constipation picked up - easy to miss when your child does at least one poo every day, sometimes more and no discernible stomach pains etc.
We saw the hospital and resolved the constipation but because it stretches and presses lots of stuff, it takes months forcth to get sensation.
He's 6 late Spring. He's been out of day nappies since early last month but he still doesn't have proper poo sensation and can miss the odd wee queue. We didn't work less hard than you, we had a different child. But then perhaps you're the kind of person who would judge us for not teaching him to talk either.

Primary teachers won't change her either, they'll send her home!

Schools should not routinely be sending children home. It will need some sort of an intimate care plan put in place. Teachers can't be expected to routinely be the person responsible for changing a child. but even the guidance I've seen from unions suggests that it may occasionally be necessary for a teacher to do it. Largely because no reasonable person thinks a child should be left in soiled clothes.

Yes the family need to seek help, but that doesn't give some settings the ability to duck out of their responsibilities under the equality act. I accept I might have been wrong about childminders.

This is not normal!! What child poos themselves every day at the age of 5?! At that age my daughter had one accident when we were waiting in a long line at Legoland because we had been waiting for nearly an hour and she didn't want to tell me to leave the line. She was so upset and embarrassed 😞 she burst into tears and certainly was no longer in the mood for any rides. How can your niece be ok with this happening on a daily basis?!

My youngest was soiling himself a few times a week until he was 5 and a half. However, he does have SEN and potential brain damage from an incredibly traumatic birth, so school were pretty understanding about it. I still did everything I could to mitigate it as much as possible, even knowing that his brain was just needed to catch up to his body. We spoke to paediatricians, nurses, health visitors, GP's. We got special pads that go into underwear to make it less messy. I went into school several times to clean him up myself, although, bless them, they really hated calling me in and were very grateful that I offered to do that in the first place. Your SIL and BIL need to be doing more to deal with this and the childminder has every right to refuse to have your niece in her care. It can take a significant amount of time to clean up, especially if she's fully emptied her bowels, and then the other children in her care are just left to it whilst she deals with it. Your SIL and her partner need a kick up the bum.

Primary teachers won't change her either, they'll send her home!
You can't just exclude a child from education on the basis of toilet training. They aren't allowed. And it's ridiculous to leave a child sat in pokey pants in a classroom for an hour waiting for a parent to collect them.

However at 5 they can be directed on doing lots of it themselves. DS, 5, was changing his own nappy when school was in under supervision