Almost 4yr old boy has just stared pooing in his pants

[Kaybeeand2boys]

For the last few weeks my ds has started doing poos in his pants. He has been toilet trained since 2.5yrs but only for wees, he would always insist on putting on a nappy to poo. We went along with this and every so often would try to encourage him to try on the toilet, but no luck. For seemingly no reason he has started running off and hiding and pooing in his pants, it doesn't matter where we are. We still tell him that if he needs a poo he can ask for a nappy.
It's horrible and driving me and DH crazy. Does anyone have any ideas on what we can do to try and stop this?

he obviously knows its wrong to do it in his pants or he would not go off and hide to do it, personally every time he did this i would place him on the loo and make him stay there for a few mins whilst explaining this is where he poops and if possible get rid of the nappies x

What's the consistency/frequency? Any bladder issues? Any incidents with pain or constipation? Trouble going? Any big changes in his life that coincided with the pooing?

At this point I wouldn't go with shame or punishment as there may be a very good psychological or physical reason for this.

My friend's nephew used to do this, and in the end his dad offered him 50p for every poo on the toilet. Worked overnight apparently!

Hi we have tried punishing him and it's not working at all.
I think I might take him to the doctor, he does get consitpated and that's one of the reason we never forced the issue of pooing in a nappy, because he would just hold on and hold on for days and then be in pain when he needed to go...
Nothing has changed in his life or diet in the last few weeks that I can think of.

haha thanks stace, we have tried even offering him a toy to poo in the toilet and he still won't/can't do it!!

My dd used to do this and still occasionally does this. When she realises she needs a poo you can see on her face she goes into a total panic. We have bribed and bribed and bribed and it seems to be working, and the most success we've had has been when I've been bribing and reassuring and not punishing. Each poo is a bloody production with a round of applause etc, but it's better than pooey pants! She also got into the with holding/ constipation/ pain cycle, it took some movicol to sort that out, then once it was pain free we just had to get past the fear! She is fine in the house now but still panics when out and about. I always tell her where the toilets are, remind her to ask an adult etc.
She never did the nappy thing but a friend's LO did, and they basically gave it up when they felt ready (the child that is), it took a whole but any attempts to force the issue didnt work!

It took a while!

This book is brilliant.

The fact that he has previously insisted on a nappy to poo and has suffered with constipation indicates that he has issues around pooing which are more than just wilful disobedience. This is why punishing won't help. Some children can become genuinely frightened to poo and they fear the pain of constipation, the humiliation of accidents and you find they start hiding when it happens. A child who has been constipated or witheld poo finds that normal sensation is sometimes lost. They don't know they need a poo until it's too late or they get impacted and start leaking faeces round the build up. It's all very upsetting for them.

Have a search on here for similar threads and see your gp. Sometimes a medicine like movicol can help the physical side while you work on the emotional side.