Refusing to poo in potty or loo

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Hi,
I think this is a fairly common problem so I'm hoping for some tips on how to deal with my 3 year old son's refusal to poo in the potty or on the loo. He's doing great with weeing on the loo but goes into hysterics if I suggest doing poo there and grabs his nappy. If we're out he won't tell me he needs a poo and does it in his pants.

I've tried lining the potty with a nappy, and bribery but neither worked.

Any tips most appreciated!

Thanks.

Watching with interest...friends girl is similar and she is going insane.

I'm watching too (in between fruitless trips to potty and clean up operations)...

I have a feeling bribery might work if you find the right bribe . DD was doing all her poos in her pants until I started offering chocolate buttons. I don't know what kind of bribe/reward you have tried but can you maybe up your game a bit? His favourite treat or day out etc etc....

Is there anything - a toy etc - that your son really wants? If there is, and if you don't mind a bit of bribery, then I'd suggest making him a little sticker chart. Each time he does a poo on the potty he gets a sticker and when he has, say, 5 or 10 stickers he gets the thing he wants. Hopefully by then it will seem natural to him to poo on the potty. You can even cut out a picture from a catalogue of the toy and stick it on the chart.

Have tried subtle bribery (stickers), not so subtle (wine gums) and downright obvious (huge cement mixer toy he's had his eye on).

No effect whatsoever. Brilliant at wees,no accidents at all, but never goes anywhere near the potty with poos, not a single one in the potty yet. We've even stopped all sweets and treats and early to bed and he's still not bothered. Can't win here can we?

I like the idea of sticking a photo of the cement mixer on the toilet door though! Might try that....Focus him a bit

My dd 2.3 was exactly the same......cried and got very distressed if we even suggested she may like to try doing a poo in the potty or toilet.....after failed reward charts etc. i read the (tried and tested by many!!)Poo goes to Pooland. I didnt have a printer to print it off, so basically memorised it, and then told the story when i thought she wanted a poo. used this inconjunction with a new step/toilet seat combo that meant she could get on and off the big toilet herself, this worked from the very first time we tried it, couldnt believe it, have had successful poos for almost 3 weeks now! although a slight regression with weeing!!
Hope this helps.....

Wish I could help but I'm in the same situation - DS is 2.10 and brilliant at going for wees on the potty or toilet (or indeed on the flowers) but just won't even consider doing a poo anywhere other than in his pull ups. He now wakes us up in the morning (often at ungodly hours) to tell us he's done a poo in his pull ups so that we can change him, but whenever we discuss doing it in the toilet he just says "no thanks, maybe soon" and is adamant that he's not ready to try it.

We've also tried bribery, and making 'pooing in the toilet' normal as he accompanies both DH and I to the loo and is quite excited about having a good old look at DH's poo when he's been (!!) but just doesn't want to do it himself. I'm trying not to pile on the pressure but am getting quite worried about it I have to say.

Hope someone comes on here with a foolproof answer for all our sakes....!

DD was very reluctant to poo in potty/toilet. She was dry from day one but it took about 8 weeks before she would do a poo. We tried so many things that I'm not actually sure what worked in the end

She was actually holding poo in so that she went from going at least once per day to going about every 5 days. She would then struggle to do them so we gave her lactulose (at GP's suggestion). We used to sit her on the potty (in front of the tv until she went. She was also concerned about the smell, so we put a few drops of dettol/zoflora in the bottom of the potty and told her it was "magic stuff" to take the smell away. Lots of rewards and encouragement when she did go.

On the plus side, once she'd done it a couple of times, she was absolutely fine from then on.

Lurking, have a poo refusnik here too.

Only just starting potty training at 3 yo so don't want to push it and suspect DD is holding poos in till she gets a nappy, which is not great.

I'm having the same problem with dd2 who has just turned 3 too. After the fourth attempt she finally got the wees and pretty quickly too but messes herself two or 3 times a day. she just doesn't get it al all. She always comes and tells me when she does a poo in her knickers but she always has runny poos {boak} not the runs though thank god

Gosh, it's a relief to know I'm not alone with this problem. It's driving me nuts!

Can't even get him to sit on the loo with the nappy on to do the poo. He goes to a quiet place, usually closing the door behind him to do it, all a bit ritualistic!

I like the idea of sticking a picture of a toy on the loo door as incentive. Will give that a go. And will check out poo goes to Poland on Amazon.

Thanks for your suggestions. Do keep them coming!
M

DD did exactly this, and witheld her poo for a whole week Se was very lethargic and upset with it though, so in the end I gave in and let her poo in a pullup.

We then put a pullup on her every time she wanted a poo because for me, it was better than her making herself upset and ill. It didn't stop her weing on the potty, she knew pullups were just for poo's.

We kept on saying "oh what a shame because if you had pooed in your potty you could have had a glass of cola (her forbidden treat!)

She would poo whilst muttering to herself dont poo in your pants, go n the potty" but never did, until one day about 6 weeks later and she never looked back!

So I would say go with it, dont make a fuss, but let him know he's missed out on something great by chosing not to use the potty. He'll get there (although I never thought dd would )

Thanks for the tip. I'll try that!

It's great to hear success stories.

That's pretty impressive, holding on for a week!

M

Thank goodness for the internet and cheap pants from Tesco! Thank you for the reassurance needed to plod on with this delightful area of parenting.

Hey all, I'm in this smelly poo-ey boat too, I thought it was just us and am so relieved to know we're not alone! My son (almost 2 1/2) says he just doesn't want to poo on the potty or toilet, but will when he's a bit bigger! Quite sweet and honest really, so we're trying to be cool cucumbers about the whole thing, but tbh I'm getting fed up of cleaning his sticky poos out of his pants! The other day he asked for a nappy to poo in, so he knew it was coming and was able to ask for something to poo in, which was an important milestone. Now, just to convince him to poo in the loo!

I'm convinced he finds the idea of sitting and pooing weird, since he always stands (in a room, by himself, usually) to poo. Sitting to poo must feel quite different. He also finds it very very hard to sit still, ever. So sitting for long enough to poo is obviously going to be a challenge! We've tried stories on the loo, but he's not interested.

I'm going to stockpile the chocolate buttons and start the hardcore bribery I think. It's been going on far too long!

Hi all,

I started this thread back in July and just thought I'd let you know there is light at the end of the tunnel...we now have a fully co-operative 3yr old doing poos on the loo! Yipeee!

For my son a change of scene worked. We went to my mum's house for a holiday and he did it there. I made a big fuss and bought him a toy to congratulate him. Then he did it again. Unfortunately when we got back home he refused again, something about our loo? About 1 month later we had another trip to my mum's this time for a longer stay. I reminded him of his success on that particular loo and he did it straight away. Fortunately we were there for 2 weeks, so long enough to make a pattern.

when we got back home I watched him carefully and reminded him of how well he'd been doing and he started doing it on our loo, ureka! Then in restaurants loos and friends loos, no problem.

We got there in the end! I think he just needed to make the adjustment in his own time.

Good luck everyone!

Me and my husband are at our wits end. We wash down 5-7 pairs of pants daily. Why is it that you can wash you hands a million times but poo smells just seem to linger on your skin!

Our son, 2.5 potty trained at 2 and has been dry from day one but will not poo in the toliet or potty. we have tried everything, bribes, sticker chart. he totally understands what to do as he tells us he knows he needs to poo in the toilet and not his pants yet he still sulks off and hides and poos in stages through the day.

we have left him with pants off and all means is that I'm cleaning the furniture rather than his pants.
we have tried to put him back in nappies and he goes histerical

he has only successfully poo once and that resulted in Buzz Lightyear and lots of encouragement but has never replicated.

i was hoping that nursery would help but no he has used up all the clothes in the loss property.

is there a supernanny for pooing? any advice please...

Reading this with interest as we're in the same position. My little one is 3.5 and only mastered weeing on the toilet at the end of August this year but poos resolutely in her nappy the minute it goes on at bedtime then requests a clean nappy for the night.
Twice now she's been really tired, not pooed, then filled her pants the following day.
Bribery etc all tried but am reading the above posts and getting ideas.
Also good to hear that there have been some successes!

Poo Goes To Poland?!!!

Great thread. I actually came on here to start this very thread.

Started potty training DS (2.8) last Thursday. By the end of the 1st day he was weeing without us asking him. He is only having 1-2 accidents a day but he hates pooing. Once he did it when I was having my lie in on Saturday and DH was in the bathroom. He was complaining about the smell though and saying euughhh (I could hear him). Got him 2 stars though instead of the 1 for a wee. Then he just kept pooing in his pants. He knew he was doing it and would tell me straight away. His favourite pants are being thrown away as its just not worth cleaning them. This morning I told him I had some very very special stickers if he poos on his pot, he generally goes around the same time in the day.

He sat down and started but got up just before he had finished and some was on the seat bit of the pot. He seemed quite horrfied by his poo and was telling me to get it away etc. I showed him it and said it was nothing to worry about, we all do it. Then I showed him how I cleaned it away after and we got his special sticker. I have told him that if he gets a few special stickers, he gets a treat.

Its just that he seems really horrified and disgusted at the sight of his poo! I'm hoping that will change soon else I will be running out of pants.

I thought I was the only one too so is a relief to know that this is common.

My DS is 3 years 3 months, weeing semi-reliably into the loo, much more of a hopeless case with poos. My HV friend said not to expect him to be able to control his bowels until he's 3 1/2. And although he creeps away into the corner at times to poo in his pants, it seems he's never sure if he's just started or halfway through iyswim.

So, my suggestion is: get a plastic bowl specifically for cleaning pants, some of those gloves for washing up (marigolds? cos the smell really does linger, doesn't it? no amount of soap gets rid of it! so glad I'm not the only one there!) and a bucket/bin with lid filled with Napisan, changed daily. Wash pants in bowl, throw contents down loo, leave pants soaking in Napisan till next hot washload.

And then just do your best to forget about it until DC is 4. With any luck it'll be all over by then, if not seek help.

DS seems to be making progress in his own time with this approach. But I need a lot of patience (and I confess I don't always have it!).

Please can you help me. I have the same problem but it is getting worse. My DS is 3 1/2. We started to potty train him from about 24months.As it didn't work we were advised to stop which we did. We then tried again 6 months later, still didn't work and again stopped. Last December we restarted as his nursery needed him to be clean and dry. We have only been using pants since then. He can we OK but will deny needing to go. If we take him he will protest but do his wee. The real problem is pooing. He has always been reluctant to poo but started to several months ago. However, since starting his new school nursery he has totally regressed with poo and wee accidents several times a day. We sit him on the loo after he wees but he witholds (it can be for up to 2 days).

We have tried sticers and rewards but to no avail. He has a baby brother of 18months whoc is already semi-trained. (We decided to start him as he was telling us when he weed and pood!). We don't know if this is part of the issue as he was born around the same time we first tried to train him and now as he is so successful it has affected him.

Can anyone give any advice to a desperate mum. He needs to be clean as his new nursery which is connected to the school we hope to send him to needs him clean (he has to be there all day):(

Hi I am also in the same boat. My DS is 2 1/2. We have been potty training for a few weeks and he is doing really well with weeing on the potty. In the first week he did a poo on the potty but got very upset and scared at the sight of his poo and it has been an issue ever since. He now runs around in panicked circles when he needs to go. he is also getting upset at pooing in his nappy. am worried that if he gets constipated it will hurt him to go and that will put him off more

I really shouldn't worry about it. I've reared six children and all of them pooed in the loo by the time they were four. Just relax! It'll happen!

Wow Grannyannie. By your accounts I've just got to keep washing our DS's pooy pants for 6 more weeks. I do hope you're right. He was dry since he was 2.5 but poos in the loo or potty he still won't do. Sigh. I feel like I've tries everything but he won't do it unless he wants to and clearly he just doesn't want to. At least I know I'm not alone.