Toddler pooing on floor and smearing it around

[BornSicky]

My friend has a two year old that she is potty training at present. She's doing OK, except for at bed time, when her little girl gets out of bed, poos on the floor and smears it everywhere.

She's concerned about it and not sure what to do to encourage her to stop doing it, or what is causing it.

Does anyone have any ideas?

The book Toddler Taming has a section on this. It is more common than you think ...

thanks.

google seems to yields extremes between - "it's normal, but gross" and "it's a sign of autism".

No idea what to think. I'll see if i can get a copy of this book and give her the relevant section.

Does anyone else have any ideas in the meantime?

The child needs to be supervised at bed time. That is all.

agree with last post, if it happens at a regular time sit in room with with her on the loo. and offer a reward. I am all for bribing children in matters such as these.!!.

My DS went through a phase of doing this, not always easy to provide constant supervison all night waiting for it to happen! I found it to be a sensory thing for him, he found the texture interesting - disgusting as it sounds its more common than you may think. I made sure he had lots of malleable activities during the day - playdough, gloop etc so he could experiment with texture, senses in a controlled way. When he smeared, I removed him from the bedroom so he didn't see me cleaning up - if it was an attention thing didn't want him to see me giving him a response. OH took him downstairs, changed pj's. No eye contact, no chat - nothing. Simply said, 'I'm very sad you didn't use the potty/toilet. Next time I want you to use the potty'. Hopefully it'll be a phase that passes x

thanks for the advice.

she's trying putting her in a onesie that is harder to get out of. It's tricky to sit there all night, because she's going to bed fine and going to sleep, but then wakes up and does it.

I'm dreading the possibility my LO could do this!

I think the texture comments sound about right, so will mention this.