Toilet Troubles with Step Children

[WickedNOTevilstepmum]

Please Help, Im a mum of 1 & step mum of 3. My step daughter is shortly turning 8 however she will NOT wipe when she goes to the toilet.
Im banging my head against a wall with how many pairs of soiled underwear we find. It stopped for a while but has started again. She doesnt flush the toilet or use any toilet roll. Ive tried talking to her & she just laughs, her dad has tried talking to her & her mum has tried.
Please has anyone been through this? or have any suggestions at all? we dont have any of this with the 3 boys.

is this part of a wider, ongoing problem or just started in isolation? Ie is she happy to bath and shower and has had typical progress through potty training and beyond?

What response do her parents have to this?

New baby, dirty protest? A way of showing distress she can't voice?

Or practical reasons - sore bum? Tactile sensory issues? Scented paper? If so, a personal bidet might help - it's a squeezy bottle with a tiny shower cap. Fill it with water and it gives a surprising powerful jet spray.

Or is it video gaming - a quick rush to the loo and must get back to the game asap? Can't be arsed to flush, wipe or wash as it steals valuable gaming time?

At 8, she should be doing this and if she won't I'd say someone needs to go in and check that she has done it each time she goes, or insist on doing it for her until she starts to do it herself (but this will only work if she's actually reluctant for someone else to do it and not hoping for it!).

Hopefully this will soon make her start doing it.

@MeridianB she LOVES a bath! she would stay in for an hour if we let her.
She wasn't potty trained until the age of 4 (each to their own but this was not my doing as I wasn't on the scene until then when I immediately bought a potty)
mother hasn't much tolerance for patience & has taught her that if she soils herself to just bin her knickers & get a new pair on. she is also a shout first kind of mother. so I also have that to contend with while trying to help her.

@SpaceshiptoMars she does have a phone but all devices are banned in our house on school days yet she is still doing it.

@GlitteryGreen please believe me I know she shouldn't be doing this at 8, my son was potty trained & dry by 18 months which is why i really want to get a handle on it. she's such a lovely beautiful kid but for some unbeknown reason with the toilet she is a nightmare (can you say that about a kid)

@WickedNOTevilstepmum can you take her to councillor as this isn't normal. You sound like you have been doing a Brillant job .Any type of ND going on or you suspect going on?

8 is a bloody hard age it comes up again and again on parenting board. Must be precursor to teenage years !

please believe me I know she shouldn't be doing this at 8, my son was potty trained & dry by 18 months which is why i really want to get a handle on it

you want to get a handle on it because your son was potty trained at 18m?

don’t compare. It’s not the same and whatever you did for your son to be dry by 18m does not apply here. I was with you until you brought your son into it like a smug competitive mum.

this isn’t “potty training”. It’s a different issue. It also isn’t your responsibility- she has a mum and dad who you say are trying to talk to her. Yes you can encourage and help, but mainly you should be working with her parents, not going gung ho yourself because you see yourself as some sort of expert potty trainer.

@WickedNOTevilstepmum Sorry, wasn't trying to imply you didn't realise she should be doing it!!

Tbh we had similar with my SCs where they just didn't do it for themselves until they were much older than is really appropriate, but I just stayed out of it and refused to ever do it myself once they reached a certain age. But obviously that's different from your situation if she's just not interested in doing it at all.

How would she react to being told if she won't do it then her dad is going to have to do it every time? Would she care about that or just shrug it off?

It also isn’t your responsibility- she has a mum and dad who you say are trying to talk to her.

If SD is sleeping in OP's sheets, then, unless she makes Dad do all the mucky washing (fat chance...) it ends up as her responsibility. Just like the teachers at school will take action if they catch a whiff of the stuff on her!

@GlitteryGreen don't be sorry! I didn't take offence. My OH/Dad works long hours so I tend to be there a lot in the week with the SC, he does help in the weekends though. I think she would happily let either of us do it for her but then gets upset & says she doesn't want her brothers to think she's a baby.
We split the 50/50 but they 50% that they go home there is very little rules or structure (I know that doesn't help her at all)
I fight a weekly losing battle with a woman who's favourite line to use in an argument is 'I'm a good mum & I do everything'

Not quite the same but I used to nanny for a girl that was very similar. It was really tricky because she just didn't seem bothered and a bit like you the parents wouldnt want to keep soiled knickers or clothing so she seemed happy to bin rather than properly wipe.

I'm afraid I probably slightly overstepped as a nanny but couldn't bear the smell (not to mention discomfort she must've been in) and potential for teasing so decided to take charge on the situation - I should add I was in loco parentis for 12+ hours a day plus some nights so not totally ridiculous not to invoke parents although did tell them I was going to try and crack it and they were happy to let me get on with it.

I sat her down and said she's a big girl and it's time she learnt how to look after herself. Every time she went to the toilet I would go in with her and make sure she properly wiped. She did need showing how to do it properly at first - things like how to fold the paper, keep wiping until the paper was clean etc. If she had soiled she needed to put the hard matter down the toilet and rinse her underwear which I would then properly wash. After any soiling incident I made her go and have a wash or even shower as invariably it wouldn't be localised & also asked that school contact me immediately if there was an incident there so she I could come and help her clean up.

And absolutely above all kindness, patience and compassion needed. It took a while but we got there

@WickedNOTevilstepmum It's so frustrating when parents don't nip behaviour for so long that it actually ends up negatively impacting the child as all of a sudden you realise that they're quite old to still be doing/not doing X,Y and Z themselves. Teaching them to wipe properly and be clean is so important and at the end of the day SD is the one who will suffer if it ever gets picked up on by people at school.

@GlitteryGreen that's my worry that people at school notice because that's the kind of thing kids NEVER forget. We've all been in the playground we all know what its like.

Pants go ina seperate bag and you make DH wash them or send them home to mums. They won't take the issue seriously if they aren't having to clean the shitty pants.

Yup. Mum or dad need to gentley tell her this.

@WickedNOTevilstepmum

If a child looks/smells uncared for, and there's a bully lurking, the next thing you know, they've mustered a crowd to join in the mocking... If DSD is with you overnights midweek, how can you just ignore it? The wider family will just act as if you caused the problem in the first place.

Have you tried putting in toilet wipes in the bathroom for her to use? DSD went through a phase of not wiping/not wiping properly and we found out she didn't like using lots of toilet paper so the wipes were better for her. In terms of flushing, she still doesn't always flush wee but this is because at mums (now 30% of time but was 50%) mum didn't flush wees to 'save water' so DSD wasn't allowed. We just nipped it by asking her every time she left the bathroom had she wiped fully, did she flush, did she wash her hands. If she said no, she was sent back to do it. DP started asking her 1 at a time and sending her back each time so eventually she was sick of going back and forth 3 times on the spin. She soon learned the expectations and not been an issue for the last 2 years.

Would a reward system work in this situation? Everytime she wipes properly she gets a star / sticker and after reaching so many she gets to choose a treat or fun activity. I know 8 is a bit older for the reward chart but it's quite an effective method for bringing about a change in behaviour. Hopefully it starts to become a habit and she does it without even realising.

Similar situation when I met my DSC who were 9 & 6 at the time.

Wouldn’t wipe their own bums and would just pull their pants up & spend the day dirty. Oh my…. I can still remember the stench….

Apparently mummy did it for them at home & they weren’t interested in doing it themselves.

In my OH’s case mum won’t co parent with dad (she’s always in the right) and she wouldn’t discuss it. It was her role apparently to do it for them.

When i pointed out that this wasn’t normal behaviour and no one did it for them in school, their dad decided to teach them.

Every single time they were with him went to the loo - he showed them how to do it themselves & they didn’t leave until they were clean. Every single time they were with him. He didn’t care what went on at mums - this is what happened in his house.

Eventually they were doing it few themselves.

Good Luck!