WONT POO! At age 3 1/2 he holds it in for days

[cookiem]

My little boy who is 3 1/2 has been potty training for a year now. He is dry of a night and goes the toilet for a wee no problem during the day and night.

Ever since we started training him, he has never wanted to go on the potty/toilet to poo. We bought every potty/toilet seat imaginable and that still didn't encourage him. In the begining he used to just poo himself all the time but has now progressed in the last 6 months to not letting it out.

He stands rigid and goes red in the face and squeezes his bum together and says nothing is wrong when clearly we know he needs to go. After him keeping it in for about 2 or 3 days we have to finally take him to the toilet and make him sit there until he does it as i'm terrified he's going to damage himself. He looks terrible with bags under his eyes and his behaviour is awful when he needs to go.

I've tried stickers, bribes, rewards, shouting, ignoring and nothing works. I've spoken to his nursery, health visitor and doctors and they just say " he'll grow out of it" which doesn't help me.

Please, if anyone had any suggestions to help me i would be grateful, i just feel like bursting out in tears when he's straining as i know he's in pain and the longer he leaves it the worse it will be for him. HEEEEELLLLLPPPPPPPP!!!

It is vile. I remember this happeneing with dd, I was so upset it used to drive me to tears, as she would spend whole days crying.

Is he having anything to soften his poo? this helped dd.

No help to you, but in the end she did grow out of it....I thought the day would never come, but in the end it did.

Hope he gets better soon

Hi marti, they gave him lactose which just makes him poo himself a little bit each time he strains which didn't really help his confidence and he stopped telling us that he had pooed himself so we stopped giving it to him. He eats loads of fruit and drinks plenty of juice so that helps him.

How long did your dd go through it for and how old was she? This is over a year now and is getting too much and is hard on the heart!

cookiem - my ds2 is exactly the same and is now 4. I have taken him to the doctors who have given him lactulose to soften the stools as it was clearly causing him great distress if he was left for days. The is probably tmi but he started soiling his pants when he was breaking wind as there was clearly some in his back passage but he was unable to move it on his own. Whilst the lactulose seemed to do as you said initially, it is now working so that he is having a bowel movement every other day (everyones cycle is also different so whilst I thought he was possibly going too long, it might be completely normal for that child). I share your dispair as I was distraught when it seemed like he was so uncomfortable but everyone keeps reassuring me that it will get better - not much help I know but wanted you to know that you are not alone

thanks ellenrose, maybe i shall retry the lactose then? Before he started with the potty training he was as regular as clockwork and went every day and you can tell when he needs to go. The big thing is even when you ask him does he need a poo and you can see he does he still says he doesn't! poor thing goes cross eyed and everything! kids hey!

Another thing is that i know he can do it as the other week he asked for a poo 4 days on the trot and we thought that magic day had come where he grew out of it, but he's gone even worse now! no rhyme or reason to it? madness!!

My dd1 had terrible problems with this. I strongly recommend you go back to the GP and say that it is an on-going problem. DEMAND that s/he does something. If it isn't treated it can become a long-term issue with anal fissures etc and great distress for everyone.

We've been using Movicol (on prescr) after 6mo or so of lactulose had no real effect.

Movicol is the bizz. It is a powder that you mix w/water or another drink and you can increase the dose until you get the desired result (dd was up to 8 sachets a day for a while!) THe secret is to keep the poo soft for long enough until they forget it was ever painful - this took about 12mo in our case. She is now p[retty ok, we still have the Movicol but just use it as a trouble-shooter - give her a sachet if she hasn't pooed for a day or 2.

HTH.

Hi sassy, thanks for your advice, the thing about my little boy is that he doesnt seem to be in pain when he goes. He is rarely constipated which is why i can't understand him not wanting to go. Every time he does one even after a few days i ask him did it hurt and he says no? so don't know if that is the problem. The doc and the health visitor both just said it's psycological! with no advice on how to treat it. I shall be going back to my docs though as it is really stressful for all of us.

Thanks very much for taking the time to add on to my thread. will keep it update!

It lasted for about a year and a half, and finaly stopped when she was potty trained. She is anow a noram 9 year old!

I can still remember how horrid it was though.

Just a thought, but little ones often like to poo in private. Can you leave potties in quiet places - in wardrobes, behind doors, in a spare room if you have one? Somewhere he may feel safer. I think it's an instinctive thing, going back to when people had to hide from sabre-toothed tigers, etc.

Hi tooticky,

we've got rid of all the potties now as when he did poo he used to have to stand up at the end of the poo coz it was touching him TMI i know! but he's 3 1/2 so maybe this is a good idea for a younger child and i probably would have agreed with this when i started training him a year ago and maybe would have cracked it if i tried that as he used to go to a private place to poo in his pants! bit late for that now but never mind, keep the ideas coming i am open to anything!!

However, i will ask him if he would like his potty back again and see what he says - worth a go hey?

CookieM
I just came to hunt for a message on this very problem AND HERE IT IS!!! I'm afraid I have no solutions, but really really sympathise as we are going through this with our little fella too. It's awful because we have two or three poo-less days then one in the pants. He's fab with wees now too - it's extremely dispiriting.
Sending you supportive vibes.

thanks axo,

I have had tonns of advice from all different people and at the end of the day i think they will just do it on their own when they are good and ready. I do think we have made it in to a big deal which doesn't help but it's very hard to stay relaxed and calm when you know your little one NEEDS a poo and just won't go. Sooooooooo frustrating.

I do believe if we hadn't made a big deal about it things may not be so bad but i think we have passed the point of no return on this score, maybe its not too late for you though?

good luck with your little one, hope he sorts himself out soon. Lots of love and support coming your way xx

Gosh my son (nearly 5) is going through this at the moment, about three days ago he finally did the most enormous poo in his pants. I can't believe he managed to get it out.

I have reverted to bribery, a jelly bean if he pooes in the toilet. So far so good, last night he did a poo in the toilet !!

No advice really, just letting you know you are not alone.

we used lactulose too with dd1 but ended up at the childrens hosp having to have an enema. not fun at all. poor you. the anxiety did ease within about 1o days- that was a year ago. have had one 'relapse' since. you need to trey to relax about it to...something i found really hard to do. good luck.

Hey noonar,

i think your right its just so hard once you get yourself in a rut its hard to get out of it isn't it. I'm gonna take him back the docs i think just to check for my own piece of mind that it isn't physical. The last thing i would want is for him to have to go through an enema! must have been awful for you all! thanks for your input.

Hey kaz, tried every bribe possible in the world i think! no luck with that for us, hope it works for you, we had a sticker chart that we got off ebay for when he did a poo which worked for a while but that wore off, maybe it may work for you? at the end of the chart we used to give him a treat that he really wanted (i.e a trip to the zoo or something) this worked for a while but has no effect now! good luck xx

you wont believe this cookiem but we've been at the hosp most of the day with what i thought was appendicitis- but turned out to be trapped poo all the way round the intesine causing abdom pain! all a result of dehydration due to recent chicken pox.
forgot to say also, glycerine sepositories really get things moving in extreme/ v.occassional circumstances. you can get them over the counter. we're being refered to a specalist. sthing you could insist on? keep me posted!

hey, cookiem- aren't you playing out tonight?

Noonar
You poor thing. What a stressful day.
CookieM
Thanks so much for your kind thoughts. Reading these messages has really made me change tack on this. I've realised that I'm making the poor little man stressed with all my badgering about it and last night we tried a new approach of being really laid back. He then poo-ed his pants four times and I just kept saying, 'Doesn't matter, you'll learn to do it soon,' and by the second time he was saying, 'Doesn;t matter, mummy, does it?' which was a choker. So I'm standing back and letting him relax again about poos, then we can gently try some new bribes. Fingers crossed! And good luck to everyone else going through this!

Dear CookieM

My son is 6 and a half now and we had exactly this problem when he potty trained and I completely blame myself.

This may be a long post so I apologise but I thought I would give you a run down on what happened and how it is only now resolving itself.

DS toilet trained at 2 years 10 months in 24 hours - literally ... probably had 2 accidents and that was it. Smug mother here at the time. But he was terrified of doing poos in the toilet and after he did a poo in the potty he was traumatised by what it looked like . So he saved his poos for his nappy at night. He would go to bed and 10 minutes later call out that he had done a poo. Only about 3 months later he became dry at night - he would wake up dry at 5am and ask to go to the toilet. So smug me took him out of night nappies and we did the whole 'lifting' him at 10pm thing to get him through the night without waking at some stupid hour needing the loo.
But then the problems started. He used to hold on to poos for days ... he would say he was tired and need a lie down and lie on the sofa concentrating really hard to hold on. It was awful and I did everything - begged, cajoled, scolded, stickers, rewards etc etc. When he had held on for 6 days I took him to the Plunket Nurse (NZ speak for HV) who scolded him and told him he was a big boy, he knew what the toilet was for and he was to use it and not worry his mummy anymore . I hate to say it but it did work - sort of. He got better at going to the toilet but it was still an issue. He would still hold on for up to 4 days.
He was nearly 4 by this time.
It has taken literally till very recently to sort out:
a) I increased his fibre intake - we never have white bread in the house EVER, we only have grainy bread - the grainier the better. He hated it to start with ("This bread has stones in mummy") but I persevered and eventually he got used to it. I encouraged him to eat a LOT of fruit - he is a good eater but the only fruit he really likes is apple. At 'snack' times he has to have a piece of fruit before a 'treat' and he has to have fruit after meals. Luckily he has always been good with vegetables so I increased the amount I gave him to eat.
b) I made him drink a lot more water - he used to only drink fruit juice but now we don't have fruit juice in the house. He isn't a big drinker and I have to remember to remind him to drink - I try to get him to drink 5 glasses of water a day at least.
c) I kept up the rewards -
d) Exercise is good for keeping thing moving too - DS is very active and a long walk or run around in a park often sparks the need to poo
e) Getting older helped ... once he started being more independent things improved - when he could wipe his own bottom was a turning point. He knew that he could just get on with it without getting a song and dance out of me "Oh, you clever boy, you are doing a poo!" ...

He still doesn't go every single day but he does tend to go every other day if he has had lots of exercise, healthy food and lots of water. I also give him a good children's vitamin and omega oils but I don't know if that has helped directly or not ...

I really sympathise with you - this was a massive worry to me for a long time. I wish I had just let him have a nappy when he needed to poo when he was little and was scared of the toilet but the smug git that I was at the time didn't understand that ... many friends of mine let their children have a nappy to poo and the child eventually sorts it out. I really regret not doing that.

I hope this helps a bit and good luck xxx

its incredible that poo can cause so many problems, for so long! ghosty, you've had a rough time, you poor thing.dyou mind if i take this opportunity to ask a question of my own cookiem? since yesterday's drama, dd1 has had a really high temperature that has been controlled with calpol/ibuprofen. she does have a bit of a cold but no flu like symptoms. could the constipation be causing the fever? is that possible?

Hi peps,

noonar, sounds like your situation is a little bit different from mine, your poor little one is constipated, but the good news about that is that it can be helped with medication and once they learn that their poo is going to be soft she will hopefully start going for you. I wouldn't like to say if the high temp is caused by constipation? My little one is not constipated which is causing all the confusions with the docs/HV. If your unsure as to why she has a temp have no hesitation in calling your GP, i certainly wouldn't.

Ghosty, sounds like you have had a rough time of it all, thanks for your big input, as i have just said to noonar, he's not constipated, he eats loads of fruit (he actually enjoys fruit more that sweets) he has a balanced diet and can drink juice till it comes out of his ears. When he holds it in and strains himself and little bits escape, they are soft and squigy TMI!! which indicates that he isn't constipated. It definatley is phsycological but i don't know how to get out of it.

I went to my GP yesterday and told her everything i had tried and she just suggested the lactulose again which is no help to him. She has now reffered him to the hospital but there is probably a long waiting list! there's a surprise.

I'm going to go with a suggestion that ghosty made me think about, i'm going to start being a bit more firm with him i think, i won't shout at him but tell him in a firm voice that he needs to go to poo on the toilet etc.. wish me luck, this is the only thing we haven't tried! BTW he pooed himself 3 times today, caused by holding it in and small amounts escaping!! cheers everybody, feel better talking about it!

my mums friends son who is 10 has suffered with this for a good few years , the docs have said he has "encopresis" which is a psychological problem. he poos his pants and at his age it is awful for him socially.

probably hasnt helped you much but something else for you to think about or too google

Cookiem - forgive me if I get this completely wrong! I think it is possible to be constipated, but still have bits of soft poo escaping. I seem to remember reading that the poo forms a hard plug in the intestine, which then sits there and continues to dry out. Wetter poo can continue to "escape" around the sides of the hard plug.

Perhaps someone else could let me know whether this is right or not in children. I know it can happen with irritable bowel syndrome in adults.

cookiem, my ds has the pooing problem too. We've been potty training for 10 weeks and he still poos his pants. If I even suggest the potty when I can see he needs to go, he gets annoyed and if I take it too him he throws it away.

He's not constipated (eats loads of fruit including apricots & prunes!). In fact, I wish he were more constipated then it wouldn't be so disgusting scrapping his pants out!

And he's not scared of the poo - he always wants to see my DS's when I change her nappy. & sometimes we flush his down the toilet & he's keen to way it bye-bye when we flush it to poo-land!

So, I just don't know what the issue is....no help I'm afraid...but just to let you know that we're there too.....

Cookiem ... definitely psychological with DS too. He wasn't constipated at all but I figured upping the fibre would make it harder for him NOT to go IYSWIM?
Littlefish is right ... it is possible to be constipated and still poo - with looser poo coming around the 'plug' ....
With DS I think he just found the whole thing very unpleasant and so tried to avoid it if he could. At 6 he knows now how important going to the toilet is but at 3 it was very hard to explain to him.
Will your DS poo in a nappy?