Soiling

[ash677x]

So for weeks my 9 year old daughter has had a habit of hiding her soiled pants down the side of her bed, we addressed this and now she puts them In a wash basket. Then it turned into she had stained bedsheets, and stained fingers and she couldn't tell me why she was doing this. Now I have found actual poo down the side of her bed. This is a behavioral issue and my mum has recommended me to take her to the doctor. I have no idea why she is doing this. She's perfectly capable of going to the toilet and she doesn't do this in school. Has anyone else been through something like this?

I would be talking to the GP about this too. I know it probably sounds a bit odd but I'd do this simple SLT progress checker before you see the GP. My DD has a few "quirks". She also has some issues with speech and language that aren't obvious and were completely missed by the school.

Could she be constipated? It can have a funky effect on when they poo. The ERIC website has some good resources on constipation.

Do you think a book like Love Your Body might help too?

This is very,very unusual behaviour for a nine year old girl, she's likely to be extremely embarrassed about it so I would be very sensitive about it. This is probably already hugely affecting her self esteem, she may not know why it is happening to her and she needs you to be understanding and on her side. If she is with holding she might have lost sensation and not know when she needs to go and/or she might be compacted and leaking.

If she is choosing to do this then unless she has quite severe SEN it could be due to some very serious trauma such as sexual abuse. Much more likely that it is constipation related but whatever the case I really think you need to go gently.