I'm wondering if anyone can offer any advice on how to handle a weird toilet training problem. (Am also posting this under the potty training thread.)
Our DS (3.5) has been pretty much toilet trained for about nine months now. However, he hasn't totally cracked it, and are bemused about what is going on. Wees are no problem, but when it comes to poos, he is hopeless at heading to the toilet on his own initiative and routinely stains his pants with a bit of poo before getting to the loo.
we have learned the signs when he needs to poo, and hustle him off to sit on the loo, but he always denies he needs one, even if it's completely obvious to everyone including himself, and nine times out of ten, he stains his pants slightly before he/we can get him to the bathroom.
So basically every day, we are dealing with slightly stained pants, and we don't seem to be making any progress at all. this has been going on a good six months.
i have tried star charts (he's enthusiastic in principle; in practise, it's made no difference); we have been endlessly patient; and not got angry with him. He is very sweet every time it happens, saying sorry, etc, and that he'll "try again tomorrow" but i don't think he's actually trying to avoid it happening.
can anyone suggest any tactic for dealing with this? we are not sure if the problem is physical or psychological, though suspect it is largely that he's "too busy" to want to bother going to the loo for something that will take a while. he's an extremely energetic little boy.
any shared experiences/advice gratefully received.