Constipation with overflow in nearly 5 year old.

[Celery]

This has been going on for a year, finally got my arse in gear ( oh god, no pun intended ) and went to the GP today. Feel like a terrible mother for not going sooner. Been referred to the constipation clinic. Anyone have any words of advice or encouragement? Looks like it's going to be a long tough ride. She won't even sit on the toilet at the moment, and is a very difficult independant child. There will be lots of screaming discussions when attempting to get her onto the loo.

Why the heck did I leave it so long? Positives tales would be nice please.

Hello - we ignored the prob for a while too. Has the GP prescribed anything? Ds has movicol which seems quite good. Makes it easier to go and hence he's much more eager to sit on the loo and less focus on getting him to perform(in fact has taken it to the other extreme now and sits on a potty for hours with his leappad when he wants quiet moment.) We've found the constipation clinic pretty good so far, esp as they assigned us a nurse who can advise day to day. She's coming for the first home visit this week so will see how that goes. How old is your dd? Our ds is 4.3

oops, nearly 5 - sorry!

hi celery, my little cousin had this problem and they eventually discovered that she was intolerant to dairy and gluten
after cutting them out she was absolutely fine!

Thanks, yes she is nearly five and just started school this week. No Movicol yet, we need to see the Doctor at the clinic first ( no idea why ). Slowdown, how long has your son been on Movicol? That's very reassuring to hear about the clinic and the home visits etc.

Would be good to keep in touch on this thread for moral support.

thisyesterday, that is interesting about the intolerance, because as a baby, she was intolerant to cows milk - it made her eczema terrible. I had thought she had grown out of it, but maybe it's just displaying itself in a different way now.

He's been on it off and on for around 9 months I think. The thing I find most difficult is knowing how much to give him and for how long. I thought at one point that we were giving too much and that in itself was leading to the stools being too soft and hence soiling. But the hospital Dr seemed to advise more sachets and for longer than we'd been doing to get him into more regular pattern. So it does seem like a long term issue sadly. Better go, am conducting emergency freezer defrost as the door wouldn't shut properly (sigh)! Keep in touch!

this might be useful

celery, in that case I reckon it would definitely be worth seeing if it improves if you cut it out again. you have nothing to lose, and if it doesn't make a difference then at least you've ruled one thing out!

Celery, I agree with yesterday. DS had terrible eczema as baby / toddler due to cows milk and also constipation. now if he has any cows milk, the constipation is back.

We didn't get to a constipation clinic - I wasn't aware there were any. We were under a paediatrician who helped.

Thanks, I will cut out the cows milk, of which she does drink rather a lot, because she like it. She used to drink goats milk, which didn't effect her eczema at all, but I wonder if I should cut out all milk altogether.

Celery how's it going this week? We were advised last week by the nurse that ds needs to drink around a litre of fluid a day as well as maintain good fibre intake. And reduce his milk. Fruit juice (watered down) but not stuff from concentrate (the more expensive the better I suppose ). So we're trying this week! It is not easy monitoring everything what with being at work half the week. The aim is for him to go once a day and told it is likely to be a long process with the Movicol... . Hope you're both doing ok and not focusing too much on constipation!

don't give wholemeal bread, it will just absorb the water in her gut, drying out & hardening her poo. Or high fibre cereal, children need soluble fibre, e.g. oats.

Give her juicy wet fruit - kiwi's, pear, plums, mango, pineapple, strawberries at every meal. Tinne prunes & dried apricots soaked overnight in water are also good.

Cut down on her milk, to get her eating the above.

Insists she drinks water throughout the day.

My daughter suffered very badly. I took her to a private paedatrition & he prescribed sodium docusate which I used to mix with vile lactulose. Now she poops for england !

HI there. My daughter has been suffering with a combination of consitpation and witholding for over 6 months. Took her to a ped. who prescibed movicol but said to also try with diet. Have been trying with high fiber diet and seemed ok for a week - started to poo okish, but now back to square one all of a sudden - refusing to poo and getting an unbelivibly sore bum from little bits that come out.. am going to try the movicol... but at my whits end with it all.. seem to get on top of it and then go back to square one all in the space of a week!!

There is a current thread running on this subject here and another one from earlier this summer here...

hope they help....