Poo handling driving me mad - lost it with DS2 tonight

[sphil]

If anyone's read my thread in Health you'll know that my whole family has been down with a vomiting bug this half term - and now DH has it very badly, with diarrohea as well.
This is a bit of an excuse for the post that follows Apologies to those who've heard parts of the saga before...

DS2 (7, ASD) has been toilet trained for wee since last Feb. but we've had no success at all in getting him to poo on the toilet. He goes in his pants - and usually scoops out the contents with his hands. During the day he has recently taken to putting it down the loo (which we see as positive) but at night, even though he has a porti-potty in his bedroom, he deposits it over the stairgate we have on his bedroom door. Tonight I went up very soon after putting him to bed as I knew he needed to go - and there he was covered in it, throwing it over the barrier and laughing. I got him into the bathroom where he started trying to hug me with his poo covered hands - which is when I lost it. Normally I'm very calm where poo is concerned - and DH and I have made a recent decision to be deadpan when he does it, as the ' No, DS2, poo goes in the toilet' approach wasn't working at all. But I spent all day in bed yesterday feeling like death, DH is really poorly, and I really, really have had enough of this. I was much rougher than I needed to be when I was washing his hands and I even smacked his hand at one point when he was trying to get to his bottom again . Of course, this just made him scream and shout - I KNOW it doesn't work with him because he just doesn't get it . Now feeling very guilty - have been up again and he's fine - but who knows what effect it had on him?

The wonder is that we don't get bugs more often, the amount of poo that we, and he, must be exposed to.

My DS (ASD) has similar problems and we have regularly had to clear up a poo smeared room. He is still in a nappy at night and the only way we have managed to stop the problem is to dress him in a 'sleep suit' which does up at the back. Racketys and KC Sleepsuits do a range of sleepsuits but they are quite pricey £25. If your DS is small for his age - La Redoute do sleepsuits up to 104cm (age 4) for £9. I know this is probably defeats the object as you are trying to get your DS to be independent but we couldn't take the mess anymore!!

Good luck and you have our sympathies.

We have two of the Rackety's suits and they are brilliant, though DS doesn't want to go back into them now he's been in PJs for a few weeks. I did wonder about using this - ' If you throw your poo then you'll have to wear a sleepsuit' but I don't think his receptive language is good enough to understand this.

I hope you are feeling better soon. Nothing like feeling ill to disrupt the careful cool calm po faced act in the face of pooey hands and home!
We had to use the 'no reaction' technique but quite by accident ( yes I lost my cool) discovered that ds had matured enough to understand poo in wrong place = 'very upset mummy'. I was showering ds off in the bath as you do, (it was everywhere), ds was protesting as usual, and at the end of my tether (also unwell) I was slow to notice the water heater had cut out and the shower was chilling rapidly! The effect of the chilly shower had rather greater effect than a chilly attitude! Ds has not soiled the bath since (well the odd accident)! Better still ds is able to notice absolutly furious mummy and will not seek this out in the way he used to! I now use 'hammed up cross' to get points across, (wavy arms, hands on hips or to mouth).

I am not suggesting torturing with a cold shower but there may come a point when frosty behaviour does start to communicate rather than entertain.

sphil, I think you have done so well at keeping your cool all this time, honestly!
I lost count of the number of times i had to clean poo from the floors, it took a year to potty train DS, so I really really feel for you.

I tried magso's cold shower thing, or rather, washing his bum with slightly cool water rather than warm water (mentioned it here in mumsnet but some people seemed to think I was torturing him) anyway, this didn't work for us.

What do you give him to eat in the evenings? I find that fruit makes my DS go for his number 2s soon after, maybe you could try to avoid the night poo by changing his dinner?

You know a lot about ABA right? If he is doing this night poo thing on purpose then he is enjoying the outcome of the whole situation. Is there something he really dislikes? The problem I had with DS is that I couldn't find a good enough reward for pooing the toilet and I couldnt find a good enough consequence for pooing in the pants, but I think the ABA logic would really work in this type of siguation.

Right - new plan. We've removed the barrier altogether and I am typing this camped in the corridor to stop him wandering about. He keeps coming out of his room and peering at me, but I am ignoring him (not horribly but because I'm on MN - he's used to that). He's not particularly excited which is good.

This afternoon I made ' My Book about Poo' with Communicate in Print - very simple social story with words and symbols about sitting on the loo to do a poo and not touching it with hands etc. He was fairly interested (more than usual in a new book) - and I'm going to keep reading it to him. After much deliberation I did put in a page about poo being dirty and smelly and another one about Mum and Dad being cross if he touched it/threw it, though I know the perceived wisdom on potty training is NOT to mention these things.

I am trying to think of an aversive, Mojo, but I can't - the only thing that might work is a loud noise of some kind, but that seems so cruel. I'm sure you're right about ABA principles though - atm we're trying to analyse his behaviour using the ABC method, but I'm still not absolutely sure why he does it.

Interesting - while I've been sitting here he's gone into the loo twice for a pee (both tiny from the sound of it) and is pacing about quite a bit - I wonder if he's gearing up?

The BBC give you Autumnwatch - I give you Poowatch

You are doing well sphil, keep with it. Do not feel you are being cruel - in the long run, you are teaching one of the most fundamental social rules which will stand him in good stead for all his life.Good luck on the poo trail!

Tuning in to poo watch!
Sounds like all is going well! Hope the social stories work. It all sounds very carefully thought out, though I do hope you don't have to camp too long in the corridor! I too felt that some acknowledgement that (all) poo is dirty (difficult to wash off the carpet/cloths) was required for our ds as he did not seem to understand this.

I did not finish my post (distracted by ds) so missed the point which was that IMHO it is good for my son at least to see emotions as they are and that loosing ones cool very occasionally (showing that disgust we carefully hide) can be less harmful to our kids than us!

With the benefit of hindsight I think my ds did not like the feel (or smell) of poo in his pants (especially in bed or sitting) or on his hands so tried to get rid of it usually by scooping and wiping his hands. I used to sit ds on the loo (dressed/nappied at first)on a secure padded child loo seat with footrest whilst I ran his bath and eventually (very eventually) it went from there. I am sure the why? is unique to each child.
Good luck!

Well tonight he has scooped but came straight out and put it down the loo, so I think the barrier was the association for throwing.

I want to ask about bottom wiping but will start separate thread.

great result!!!

Very positive! He knows where it should go!

DH managed to get him to do a poo in the loo tonight - I think it just dropped in rather than actually being 'done' on there iyswim - but he seemed really pleased when we all got excited and even more pleased when he got a fruit pastille .

Brilliant! -there should be a champagne icon!
(thats how we started too)

Fantastic - keep with the fruit pastilles! We started also by bunging him on loo as bath ran, sometimes for an hour.