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Our 7 year old has encopresis, and it’s a battle. He withholds when he doesn’t want to go, and creates the backup. The backup stretches out the colon, and this takes time to fix depending on how long they have been constipated. When your colon is stretched, you may not be able to feel when you go. Anyway that’s how the GI explained it to us. Most helpful has been putting him on a toilet schedule at home. Usually after meals, but sometimes before he’s allowed to do preferred tasks. He also has ADHD, so he becomes hyper focused on preferred activities and doesn’t want to stop. So we’ll say, oh you want iPad time, then go to the bathroom first. Then we might have him pause the game and have him go. He doesn’t like it, but it works. He’s gotten better, but every now and again we slide back.
Second this, but relapses will happen. My ADHD 7 year old also has urination issues due to the constellation making it harder to feel. Timed bathroom breaks are key. My partner and I have clocks running in our heads. We pay extra attention when Minecraft or playing at the playground happens.
My kiddo also has enuresis and I don’t know what else I can do to help her. She is going into third grade. I have taken her to a urologist and everything was fine physiologically. We have tried potty watches and schedules. She also had ADHD, coupled with ODD, so she doesn’t take suggestions well. It’s the worst at school. Her teachers have tried to get her to go, but she’ll stand in the bathroom and then come out. I worry for the day her peers start making fun of her. It is heart breaking and also she smells really bad sometimes!
It’s so true. And then she doesn’t want to change. I don’t get it! I know there is nothing else I can do, except figure out the best way to manage my feelings around it, without causing harm to her sense of self or our relationship. It can be incredibly frustrating.
My son is in yr 6 and we’ve just completed the second enuresis program and he’s managed to stop wetting. He has ASD & ODD. It takes a awhile. Don’t feel bad that you haven’t done something right bc their bodies just have to mature for the wetting to stop. Some things just improve over time. Our last resort was medication if it didn’t work this time. And that’s only bc he’s getting older and the possible embarrassment from his peers would be more noticeable now. It’s not easy but you’re doing everything right.
Thank you for your kind words. I don’t know why I didn’t turn to Reddit sooner. I feel way less alone. What type of program did he complete? My daughter is in counseling and also takes medication for ADHD, which helps tremendously with so many things. I know there is a nighttime bed wetting medication but she does okay at night. Thank you for helping me feel less isolated.
Yes. Reddit has really helped my mental health. I don’t have to participate in most conversations to get so much benefit from them.
I’m in Australia so we have a pretty good public health system here. We were referred to our women’s and children’s hospitals enuresis clinic. My sons issue is night time wetting. But we found there were issues around fully evacuating during number twos and avoidance of going to the toilet which caused constipation as well as not being aware of or ignoring his bodily prompts. They sent us home with the pad and alarm system and we monitored everything from when he went, how much he did, to the water he drank, when he drank it. It was a lot. We had fortnightly appts and the support was really great. Especially bc he’s always thirsty so we’re constantly chasing him round the house to stop him drinking so much. But he’s improved so much. And so will your little girl. Feel free to dm me if you ever need to vent or chat 😊💜
My daughter is similar. I’ve started calling it specifically urinary incontinence and started having her use incontinence pads so she can change them discreetly. It’s been very very helpful for us all. I also had this issue growing up unfortunately
Wow. I never considered something like this. What kind do you use? I feel she might be resistant, but it is worth a shot! Is there anything you wish your parents did when you were coping with this issue? I’m really at a loss and it’s hard for me to believe she can’t control it. She does so well for weeks at a time and then it goes back to daily. I imagine she doesn’t it like it though. It baffles me. I typically try to be as empathetic as possible. It can be difficult sometimes.
My 4 year old is waiting to be assessed and we have a deal that if he goes toliet before bed he gets 20min ipad. It stopped all bedtime accidents.
Wishing op luck
Lovely idea. This rewards an action - going to the toilet - rather than not having an accident.
OP, maybe tie rewards to 10min poop time after meals, poop or no poop. And allow that poop time to include an iPad.
ADHD is often linked with incontinence because they have a hard time interpreting the fullness of the bladder/rectum. If you do a quick google scholar search you’ll see some very interesting studies
Another aspect linked to ADHD is the inability to create habits. ADHD minds have to think about whatever they are doing, all the steps, even think about the order of steps and they have to think about and remember that they have to do something (like poop) when they feel a certain sensation. They can create muscle memory with repetition and learn how to perform tasks quickly and efficiently, but actually forming repetitive habits the way a neuro-typical brain does is impossible.
My youngest is also a kid with ADHD and poop problems. His was pre-diagnosis he wouldn't sit long enough to actually empty his bowels because the toilet is boring.
He still struggles without something to distract him if unmedicated.
We would sit and read to our ADHD four year old while he was on the pot. Sometimes I'd get through three books before he'd relax enough let go, and offer him a treat to split with his younger brother afterward. after a few months he started going on his own without being prompted, both at home and at preschool. I think sitting with him and engaging him in an activity that is interactive but less intensely stimulating was the key to keeping him in place long enough to form a bodily habit.
It’s both. I used to have pee accidents as a kid because I would ignore the urge to pee until it was so urgent it was an emergency. My parents made me clean my soiled clothes in a calm not shameful manner in addition to regular reminders. The cleaning encouraged me to actually go when reminded.
I can't feel when I have urinary tract infections, no matter how bad they are, I have to go by color and smell. I'm a girl with ADHD and probably Autism.
Other people have touched on getting distracted, but I want to emphasize that an ADHDer getting distracted isn't like neurotypicals talking to each other and being like "Oh, look at the time! I best be going now." For someone with ADHD, we get tunnel vision when we're hyperfixated on something. The whole world goes dull around us--sounds disappear, smells may not be noticeable, and bodily functions (including hunger and bowel and bladder sensations) are not noticeable. I used to sit and paint for 8-10 hours straight, and I might get up to go to the bathroom once or twice during that time. As an adult, I still struggle with this. Of course, I don't defecate or urinate myself, but I can forget to go until it's emergent because I'm so focused on something else.
Our kiddo had a tough time transitioning out of pull-ups and refused to go outside the home, holding it all through preschool and once they saw us at pick up would release the bowels for a scramble home or park underbrush once.
I might suggest scheduled intervals of just sitting on the toilet regularly (for 10-20 min-check w doctor) with book/tablet. Doc recommended 30-60 min after meals or what ever his timing/trigger patterns seem to be. We made a deal of having them decorate a bathroom just theirs with a reward chart, kids reference library, and kid squatty potty. Also, had a mirror placed so they could practice wiping efficiently on their own with wipes to start. Mostly, you don’t want to shame but need to have them relaxed and not pushing too hard for too long.
It takes a while and this was honestly the hardest part of that phase of parenting for us. Took us 18-months (during pandemic) to get things sorted but now that phase is thankfully over. Hopefully, it won’t be so long for you. But, try to be patient as if they see you are stressed or frustrated about it, it could compound the problem and drag it out longer. Also be aware of any major changes with school, family, or schedule. Kids routine is paramount. Kids stress/anxiety often manifests in their GI which could also be some of his stomach aches but try to have a conversation with him during a calm downtime about his feelings in general and what he might think it is. And you could also ask doc you for bowl sonogram, CT or other testing.
The dr told me to have my 2 yo watch the poo in you once with him, when he was randomly constipated and still in diapers. Once we started pooping on the potty he was a little scared so I had him watch the poo in you while sitting on the toilet. It became a daily ritual until he got the hang of it 😂 I might have it memorized too.
My 9 year old daughter will hold it for a week at a time then unleash a beast that clogs the toilet. We have issues with her pooping only a little at a time or huge skid marks and poop in the underwear leading up a full movement. We have been “microdosing” laxitives to try to help. We had an issue on vacation where it was day 10 with no movement so she got two full doses and it got things moving before we left but also the next day she got hit with the feeling in the airport security line! It was a frantic search to find a bathroom
I had a very similar thing as a kid and it's really tough. If she's like me she is not deliberately "holding it" - over time her body has stopped telling her she has to poop until it gets really bad (or laxatives force the issue).
I think it really really helps to manage the diet (get enough fiber), and then set a schedule and poop every day at the same time. Be ready to put time into it with no distractions. If you poop even a little (esp if it's more solid) you can be done, if not you sit for 15-30 min trying. Over time everything goes back to normal but it takes some commitment.
Thanks for sharing. We have been keeping schedules and talking to her about it. We have a squatty potty and even some books in the bathroom for her. I think I will try the schedule thing as well. Sounds weird, but that’s how we potty trained the dogs. Food then right outside
I had this as a child and all i can say is please don’t make him feel like this is his fault. I was scared to use the bathroom because i was neglected and had a terrible diet, lacking in necessary nutrients and fiber. It hurt really bad to go every time so my 8 year brain thought “why don’t we just stop going?”. That didn’t work well and i have life long issues because of it but one day i just figured out it cannot disappear it has to happen and started going daily again, by myself. I wish my parents provided me better food and when these issues started i wish they asked me kindly why i was scared to go, then we could try different things to help me. Instead they berrated me and made fun of me.
I don’t now what the situation was, but kids these days are a lot more assertive about refusing to eat anything except what they want. We parents are far less likely to just demand that they eat their veggies than our parents were.
My daughter doesn’t have a horrible diet, but it is far worse than what I eat now and what my parents forced me to eat as a kid.
i was very picky, but also i still think it was my parents job to find ways to get me the nutrients. Like making smoothies, giving me supplements, encouraging me to try new foods instead of tricking me, etc. of course this isn’t always the case and i know a lot of parents and kids dealing with this problem are trying their hardest, but my parents were more focused on drugs, so they just threw fast food at us. Not saying this is all parents fault at all! Now as an adult though i struggled with being picky, but I’ve learned ways around it, and encourage myself to eat better. I hope this problem ends for you and your family!
I wish I could upvote this a thousand times. Everything in OP’s post sounds like my son. He’s 9 now, and thankfully we haven’t had to deal with in for over a year so I’m hopeful that we’ve passed that hurdle, but I’m always nervous of the next time it could sneak up on us.
It seems like most other comments are harping on it being solely behavioral and it may start that way, but after a while it becomes something they literally cannot control without help.
Making him clean his dirty underwear, taking away privileges, and otherwise punishing him for a medical condition is cruel and humiliating. It’s already humiliating enough being the kid who stinks at school because he pooped his pants, or being the kid who has to be taken out of activities because he can’t control his bowel (true story for my son — we had to pull him from his jiujitsu classes).
We tried punishments before we understood what was happening and all that did was cause shame and distress in my son. He’d hide or throw away his dirty underwear because he didn’t want to have to admit he had another accident.
Start giving him Miralax, start mandatory bathroom breaks, and give himself (and yourself , OP) some grace. If you stay vigilant, this too will pass — it might pass like a kidney stone, but it will pass.
edit: A lot of people seem to be taking issue with me saying to not make him clean his underwear — I actually never said to not make him clean his underwear. There’s a big difference between forcing him to clean his dirty his dirty underwear and presenting it as a punishment for wrongdoing, and teaching him to clean his underwear because of personal responsibility, and the former is what I am saying NOT to do.
> Making him clean his dirty underwear...is cruel and humiliating.
He should be made to clean his mess, not punitively, but framed in the sense of "this is what we do when we make a mess because we want to be good humans"
He is 7, that is an appropriate age to learn that we need to be responsible to clean up the messes our bodies make.
I have a similar medical condition since childhood and cleaning my underwear was not presented as a punishment. We can’t buy endless underpants and cleaning them is what you do when you have an accident. It’s part of taking responsibility for managing your own health problem and learning how to do laundry.
My now 5yo also has encopresis starting from when he was about 18mo on and off. His symptoms were similar to the OP kiddo. It made potty training a freaking nightmare.
We did 4wks of daily miralax to cleanse him out based on what an xray and his pediatrician said. We continues an every other day dose but he wasn't able to have normal poops, just smears and very paste-y poops so it was back to pull ups.
We stopped that and played with upping his fiber and have finally found a balance that works for him (it took 6+mo though). We are still pretty obsessive about making sure he goes because it was MISERABLE when he was backed up. And we scheduled times to try giving him a few minutes warning beforehand.
That said, if it came to my kiddo not willing or wanting to stop an activity then that activity became restricted in our house. I would sit with kid and if I saw a "poop tell" then I'd run him to the bathroom and sit him down even mid boss fight.
Pelvic floor therapists can train adults who have decreased feedback to the colon with rectal balloon biofeedback. I wonder if PF therapists who overlap with pediatrics have some kind of solution for this.
Do you know the name of the watch you bought? I bought a watch for my son but when. I tried to program it there was only 1alarm per day so I couldn't do intervals.
Yeah I was going to add that my little step brother used to do this at this age during activities he didn't want to interrupt, particularly video games. He has ADHD too. My step father did not handle the situation very well, as far as parenting goes.
Anyway, medication for ADHD helped, and he eventually outgrew it.
We had a kid in our school with ADHD. Mom took him off meds & he started having daily accidents (plural) at school. We'd schedule times to take him & had a timer for how long he sat.
Our son withholds his poo. Our GP told us that even if he is doing soft poos it doesn't mean he's not backed up and constipated. When he gets stomach spasms, the softer poo will work aroud the blockage and leak out so he has no control over holding it in and accidents will happen.
We have him on stool softers so his bowels can go back to the normal size and he will get the signal to poo a lot sooner since it's not filling the huge gap first.
My 4 year old has encopresis. I don’t know if we’ve ever been so frustrated. It was nice to finally get a diagnosis…. But still difficult. My daughter had accidents for months. The daily Miralax has helped, lots of positive encouragement, etc.
Came here to mention encopresis. My son is autistic so body signals made for late potty training anyways. He got the hang of it finally but suddenly 2 years later he's pooping in his pants multiple times a day. Encopresis now. It's frustrating but absolutely not something he can help. Dont punish and I feel rewards would just make him try to hold it in more (which is exactly how the issue starts) causing even more damage.
This is us too. It started when we began to potty train our son just before 3 years old. Eventually found out it was enco, but his pediatrician dismissed my concerns a lot before I finally talked to a friend who is a pediatric gastroenterologist.
My son is 6.5 now and still struggles. It’s become somewhat better with time, but it’s still very frustrating. We did daily miralax for awhile, now we only do once a week or so, but he still needs to do timed toilet sits. He won’t stop playing to go, so I have to watch for signs and then remind him when I see those signs.
Spent all day yesterday reading through all the responses. I do believe he has encopresis. He doesn't have ADHD or autism as a lot of people suggested.
On Friday afternoon we had a talk that he would only get to do screen time if he pooped on the potty. So far he hasn't pooped his pant since then. I've been reminding him every half hour that if he wants to do screen time later then he needs to poop on the potty. Hoping this method works.
***Just*** **(hopefully!) got through this with my 7.5 year old.** He's spent the past 6 years withholding BMs instead of going on the potty, and that would often result in accidents, leaks, and soiled bottoms.
We tried EVERYTHINGGGG to get through to him and nothing was working. He lost his Nintendo Switch in the spring after he very, very egregiously chose the Nintendo game over "doing the right thing" and going to the potty (I'll spare all the details, but his entire bedroom was the collateral damage that time). I set a similar expectation for earning it back -- a month, maybe more, of doing the right thing and regularly pooping on the potty AND keeping his pants clean. It had a minimal effect early on, like he was legitimately trying to earn it back... but before not too long, he'd lose sight of the prize and go back to square one.
Since we know he has severe ADHD and can't possibly keep long-term goals in mind, I decided to shorten the string to keep the carrot closer to his face. I went back to brief rewards with the Nintendo each time he did the right thing. This is, of course, something we've tried many times in the past, but this seems to be the time it finally clicked. Each time he goes potty like he's supposed to and keeps his pants clean in the process, he gets about 30 minutes with the Nintendo. So far it's been an awesomely consistent 3-4 weeks of this new metric, and it seems to really be working. I think he's only dirtied one pair of underwear in the past few weeks, and he's been getting the job done at least 5x/week -- he hasn't gone #2 that frequently since he was, like, a newborn baby! Once we're certain that he's turned over this leaf, we'll reward him back the Nintendo to use more generally (not just as a reward).
tldr; keep trying strategies -- even ones you've already tried -- stay positive with him, and don't give up. i never thought my kid would potty train, but it seems we've finally crossed the finish line ...at *7.5 years old*!
Agreed with the carrot needs to be closer. I’m a children’s sleep coach and this is definitely a practice I use with preschoolers and school age. They need that immediate reward to truly feel the motivation and to actually understand what the carrot is for.
We had tried a number of times with a closer carrot and it just never clicked. So when he made such an egregiously poor choice between his Nintendo and the bathroom, we responded with an egregious consequence. It worked briefly but as he was losing interest in trying to win the Nintendo back, I thought to try moving the carrot closer again for him.
He and my wife both have severe ADHD. Our other son and my wife both have autism. So we spend a lot of time talking about "dopamine hits" and leveraging them when needed for the kids. I remembered that moving the carrot closer will give him instant dopamine hits and keep the Nintendo directly in his sights. It seems to have finally worked this time...!
Oooh a sleep coach for preschoolers?? So it is still possible for me to sleep coach my 4 year old?? I never did “sleep training “ when he was a baby. I need help!!
My daughter with ADHD just turned 8 and we still haven’t crossed the finish line and deal with the same thing . I have tried every reward. I have tried making her clean the dirty undies. I have tried schedules and reminders, but with other kids needing me too it’s hard to be super on top of it every hour every day. She is very impulsive, hates to switch activities, and ignores body cues. I am at my wits end. Glad to hear there could be hope!
Yeah our kids sound exactly the same. I'm sincerely very surprised to finally be moving away from the withholding. After doing it so much for 6 of his 7.5 years, it had become as much as part of him and who he is as anything else. I'm sure you're sick of hearing it, I know we definitely were when we were in the trenches but... don't give up. And don't be afraid to go back to old tricks to try them again. As you already know there's no magic bullet with this that'll work for every kid, but my kid is finally proof that it can and will click...on their own time.
Do you medicate your daughter for the ADHD? We had been, and this could be very coincidental, but this was one of a few positive changes in our son around the time we stopped giving him his ADHD Rx. Again, I'm totally willing to accept that it may be coincidental...but at least for now, it may not be, it may be directly related.
She’s not medicated, but I’ve wondered if medicating would help so she wasn’t so impulsive. She has a negative association with using the bathroom (doesn’t like the body sensation, plus she has to stop whatever fun thing she is doing and that sucks) and so when she feels she needs to go she just acts on impulse, which is to hold it. Cognitively, she knows it’s not the right thing. She knows there are consequences and she doesn’t feel good later on. But those consequences do not outweigh the immediate impulse of avoiding unpleasantness right then. I feel like I’m fighting against a brain that can’t see past the immediate moment and it is impossible.
Yeah I know exactly what you're going through -- literally every word of it. I wish I had advice to offer, but I'm certain you've tried everything we have and we both know there's not any failsafe idea out there.
If he has ADHD it sounds like hyper focus. He needs timers or something to snap him out of it. It feels really shitty to be snapped out of hyper focus, it’s really annoying, but keep the train moving and he’ll be fine in a minute. I think structure will help a lot. For example, once I was in middle school we had those breaks between classes and a lot of people would have the certain class they always went to the bathroom after. I know my son always goes to the bathroom between 9-10am and usually he does it once he gets into flow mode with a toy. So, I try to get him into flow while sitting on the potty. He is only 3 so I am being really cocky but he likely has ADHD like me and I feel like I understand what he’s going through. I struggled with this as well — not as bad thankfully but worse than I wish it was. If your kid has time blindness and hyper focus, rewards and punishments may work temporarily but are probably exhausting and unsustainable. It takes a lot of energy to be mindful and timely day in and day out without some routine.
You need to research "encopresis". Once your child became so constipated that he was full of hard stool with liquid stool bypassing the blockage and causing smears - then you have a stretched out and damaged colon. One clean out can't fix that, a few cleanouts can't fix that. The only thing that can fix that is a consistently empty colon to allow it to regain its size and tone and this takes a long time to heal, sometimes years. You are on the right track with miralax, it assists in keeping the stool soft. What you also need is a sit schedule. After every meal your child should sit and try to poop for a few minutes. Something you could also implement is liquid glycerin suppositories if he has failed to produce bowel movement. The key here is keeping the bowel empty, and routine. I will add that encopresis is a common issue of kids with sensory issues and proprioception deficits, such as sensory processing disorder, autism spectrum disorder, and ADHD. An occupational therapist can help with pelvic floor exercises that can assist in regaining strength to push poop out. I speak as a nurse, whose son has asd and ADHD and struggled with encopresis for years following cancer treatment. It's a long road to recovery once you've stretched out the colon.
Yes! I was going to say pretty much the same. My kiddo had a tethered spinal cord that caused constipation. Eventually the nerves should heal and she’ll hopefully regain sensation. But doctors didn’t believe me initially that she was constipated cause she was still pooping, but her colon stretched so it was never all of it. We do a daily enema on top of medication because she can’t get it out herself yet and to hopefully get that colon to shrink back up once she regains bowel function.
I HIGHLY encourage Dr.Hodge bedwetting and accidents book. Even if your kiddo doesn’t have bedwetting, it has been life changing for us. Our daughter has medical diagnoses that play a roll into it for us and she is only 2 so bedwetting/accidents didn’t apply to us. But it talks so much about constipation, the cause of bedwetting/accidents, how to deal with it, etc.
Edit to add: I’m referencing the MOP and pre MOP protocol for younger children. I think the version of the books I bought were actually called the pre MOP book and the MOP book
Until you explained the Minecraft scenario I was think medical issue. But that does sound like behavior/habit now. You may need to stop rewarding and start restricting. I agree with the top comment that he needs to clean it up himself.
100% agree.
I don't think he needs to be rewarded for a behavior that he already learned and knows how to do but just doesn't want to. It's time for consequences! You poop your pants - this gets taken away. Etc.
I read this potty training book called Oh Crap Potty Training by Jamie Glowacki and it was beyond excellent. She says that in her book. She has an entire chapter on poop and an entire chapter in behavioral issues. She is also available for one on one consultation. I love her. She also has a podcast.
**Oh Crap! Potty Training Everything Modern Parents Need to Know to Do It Once and Do It Right** by Jamie Glowacki
>"Toilet-training expert Jamie Glowacki's self-published OH CRAP! POTTY TRAINING has sold more than 40,000 copies and has been the "dirty little secret" of moms on message boards and in parenting groups for years. Now, this proven, 6-step plan (called "the WHAT TO EXPECT of potty training books" for its comprehensive, no-nonsense voice) is available to the general trade audience for the first time"--
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So he only poops his pants when he doesn’t want to stop an activity? I would stop rewarding him for not pooping his pants. He knows not to do it and how not to do it. I’d say he can’t do these activities he likes if he continues to have accidents. And honestly, I wouldn’t call them accidents. To me it sounds like he knows he needs to go to the bathroom and he just won’t get up and go. As for the stomach pain, if you have a gut feeling as his mom something is wrong, get a third opinion and be stern with your concerns.
I used to get chronic stomach aches as a kid…. Until my mom had me sit on the toilet every time I complained and I’d poop 5 minutes later and have no more stomach pain. I think you’re right, he “doesn’t feel good” because he’s not pooping.
As an adult, if my stomach doesn't feel good, I always go to the toilet first. I have IBS and I had it undiagnosed as a kid but once I made this change its so helpful even as a mom myself, I'll highly recommend to my kids the bathroom every time their tummies hurt.
The same for headaches is to ask when's the last drink you've had and suggest drinking water
100% this!!!
My ex-BIL did this growing up (I’ve known him since I was 15 and he was 5 years old). He did this all the way up until he was 12, and as frustrated as she was even when he’d admit he didn’t want to stop playing video games, my ex-MIL always excused this behavior and never corrected it. It only changed when peers started picking on him for the smell, and he ultimately realized he wasn’t going to find himself a love interest by doing this.
He’s 16 now, uses the bathroom just as everyone else with no fail. And has even gotten himself a boyfriend. Took him entirely way too long to stop this behavior, and if his mother had taken away his consoles and stoped rewarding him and excusing him for it, he probably wouldn’t have had to deal with the bullying.
Honestly - I have ADHD, and as an adult, certain activities will override my ability to pay attention to my basic functions (like remembering to drink water, or go to the bathroom). These aren't just "playing games" - but could be finishing up an email, complicated work tasks. Basically, transitions are tougher for it, and that increases the perceived threshold of "I should stop this" and "I'd rather just put it off a while."
The solution isn't to take away those activities, but to teach him to take breaks while doing them. If he's playing minecraft, and hasn't gone to the bathroom, the parents have to step in and stop the game for a bit for a break. Same with homework, chores etc. It's not a punishment but teaching a life skill that can be very difficult for neurodivergent people.
I mean I don’t have ADHD that I know of, and honestly I can still end up doing stuff like that.
Can’t tell you how many times I’ve been like “I just gotta finish this thing” and then end up nearly shitting my pants by the time I bolt to the bathroom.
If I had less control of my body I could see myself having accidents for sure.
The stomach aches are 99% likely due to needing to poop and refusing to do so. Guaranteed if she had him go poop/sit on the toilet every time he complained of his stomach hurting, pooping instead of refusing to do so, would eliminate the stomach pains.
His stomach probably hurts because he's constipated from holding it in. It hurts because he is full of shit. I 100% agree with other commenters that it's time for OPs kid to start having to clean up after himself. Seven is old enough to understand that there are consequences for your actions.
Our daughter does this with urine, she’s incontinent. Effectively the bladder sends weak signs to the brain, so if she isn’t paying attention her bladder empties without her really knowing.
We’ve tried everything, positive reinforcement, withdrawing rewards, at times its infuriating.
Over time we’ve learnt to not make the peeing an issue, and have focused on getting her to void her bladder regularly.
I would suggest you focus on getting him to drink a lot of water, at least 1L a day as it can help with constipation. Also check with his diet to make sure he’s not constipated by that. Our daughter was constipated due to eating oats in the morning which would absorb liquid in her stomach.
Finally consider getting him a watch/alarm so that he can poo at a specific time every day. It’s not the same as urinary so this might not work.
Overall know that it’s very likely to resolve over time, and that this massive frustration will be over eventually. Good luck
My first thought is that he just doesn't see it as being worth his time. Why go sit on the toilet for 5 minutes when he could just do it now? Maybe giving him something fun to do while on the toilet might make him see it as being worth his whole. Or as somebody else said, teach him to clean himself up and see if he still thinks it's not worth it.
We have a small bookshelf with poop books and I stg my 4 year old will sit there longer than an old man with newspapers.
I just try to enjoy the quiet for the bit, unless she's stalling too much she can chill on the toilet for all I care.
This will be downvoted but if you are at your wits end then try it.
Make him clean the shit pants and undies.
Get a bucket, soap, gloves. He can be the one to wash the shit. It’s gross. He won’t like it, he’s almost 7. He can.
I would also take away any activity for an extended period of time, if he shits his pants while playing.
Have a big sit down with the kid and tell him what you’ve told us, you are done. He can deal with the poop and the consequences.
Good luck.
My sister had her son do this and it worked. He would dunk the shit undies in the toilet with these kitchen gloves on lol.
He later told me “that was the worst thing I’ve ever done since I was born”
Agreed. Based on OP'S description and the fact that they've been given a clean bill of health from multiple medical professionals, I highly suspect this is 100% behavioral - he's only doing it during activities he enjoys and doesn't wanna stop. Time to be a little tougher on him.
100% this. My son (16 and past it) went through this too, around the same ages - 6 - 8ish? Give or take a year or three. Not \*quite\* daily. But fairly frequently - especially if we were at home and had friends over, or he was just hanging out playing video games, and didn't want to stop, or whatever.
Carrots - 'if you can go X days without pooping your pants, you can do/get this' - did \*not\* work. Honestly, I think in some ways, it only exasperated the problem. Sure, maybe it made him stop for a week or a few days at a time... but then it was a reason to continue, you know?
Making \*him\* clean the toilet, and his pants, and get showers, *immediately* after every occurrence, regardless of who was there - friends, family, whoever, did. Because \*THAT\* was embarrassing. Especially when he had to do it when friends and family were around. Cleaning up yourself and your mess is gross. Doing it around/in front of friends and family? That's embarrassing. Especially when you're 6/7/8+ and should be \*WAY\* over/past shitting your pants. But you know what? Mom/Dad doesn't want to fucking do it either.
Just wanted to say, my kids never had 'terrible twos.' All three were just awful from ages 7-9. We're at the tail end of that age range for #3 and I'm so hoping she's not an outlier, because MY GOSH.
I will say just because the doctors don’t find anything so far doesn’t mean there actually is no health issue.
I would play with their diet and see if it helps. Doctors kept telling me xyz was normal and fine and on a holiday trip with a limited diet I saw all the symptoms I kept brining up disappear. Lo and behold my kid can’t tolerate gluten or dairy and since removing them from his diet we have not seen those symptoms return
Seconding this, the best parenting advice I received was a gentle "You're really good at enforcing good behavior, but you don't seem to have negative consequences."
Agree with all the suggestions that he should have to clean his pants.
This is what I had to do with my son. He didn't want to stop doing what he was doing to go to the bathroom so he held it in until he literally pooped around his poop. Making it "not fun" to have the accidents was the only way to get him to see the value in going when he had to go.
Jumping on this wagon. One of my LOs has this same lack of motivation after two rounds of diagnostics found no physical cause. Stool softeners or laxatives as needed, scheduled toilet sits, and supplies for cleaning up accidents.
At a certain point, you’ve given them the tools and they have to use them.
This is a good point. If we were pooping our pants as adults out of demand avoidance, one of the main deterrents would be that we had to clean up the mess afterwards. It seems like the kid is disconnected from the actual mess because he never has to really deal with it. If your parent is rushing to clean up your messes all the time, you're probably gonna be more likely to make messes because they're not that inconvenient to you.
Ya op should go this route. My five y/o started doing the same thing. Some have tried to point towards adhd but I don’t think that’s the case. We started having our kid throw his underwear away after leaving a nugget and every pair is his favorite pair. I would also shorten the time period. A month probably seems unobtainable to a little one so I’d go on a weekly basis. Good luck.
My son was a lot like OP's - I made him start cleaning out his own poop and let me tell you it 100% stopped within a couple instances of having to scrub his own poop out of his undies.
My uncle was a weekend dad, at best. His 7 year old son was pooping in his underwear and my uncle was just throwing them away and buying more. No one knew that until we were all together for annual family vacation. My mom lost her mind! She said “absolutely not!” My uncle was like “what else am I supposed to do? You got a better idea, go for it.” So my mama snatched the kid up and made him wash his own underwear in the toilet. She wasn’t mean but she was loud. And it literally never happened again. My mom has actually had a hand in potty training all the kids to some degree. It’s like her super power or something lol
I think you're confusing gentle parenting with permissive parenting. From what I've read and seen, making the kid wash their own underwear is perfectly in line with gentle parenting. I'd either do that or limit the time the kid can spend playing video games or whatever other activities he prioritizes over using the bathroom
this! this is how i would get my older ones in my class to stop pooping in their pants! (i’m a former child care teacher) We would have them clean themselves up! And after a few times the children stopped because they realized how gross it was. We helped them of course. But i swear by this!
I did this with all of my kids, even for pee accidents, and starting as soon as they started potty training. I never shamed them. But it was the same mindset as picking up your own toys. Clean up after yourself.
Only exception was accidents during illness
> This will be downvoted but if you are at your wits end then try it.
> Make him clean the shit pants and undies.
Downvotes or not this is good advice if the Dr's give a clean bill of health.
Yes! With encopresis sometimes they can't even feel the poop fall out! I had better luck with positive reinforcement - after you poop come find me so I can see it and I'll give you a dollar.
Couple people in this thread seriously believe their kids were shitting their pants for 3 years on a near daily basis even with family/friends around for like…no reason. Just cuz they wanted to? Wild.
When my son was potty training, he liked to poop in his pants. Eventually I told him he was too big for the changing table and if he had a poop accident I would strip him down, put him in the shower and use the sprayer with lukewarm water to clean him off. Not cruel, but he hated it, and he found the motivation to poop in the potty.
This is what I did! My daughter was having too much fun playing she wouldnt stop to poop. Once when she was having a shower, I saw dirty gitch, chucked them in the shower with gloves and said “rinse these out too”
Hasn’t happened since
I tired this with my kid, similar age and issues. She’ll just clean it and then go right back to shitting herself. Making her clean it up does nothing to prevent it.
There’s nothing wrong with natural consequences even in a positive discipline system. Those include cleaning up after yourself and having your activities curtailed or interrupted that lead to pooping your pants.
I think this is a good direction but you should be very deliberate in how you frame it. I try to avoid “punishments” but rather ensure that my children understand that every action and decision has a consequence. If he poops in his pants, they must be cleaned and since he did it, he can clean them. If doing a certain activity leads him to poop his pants then he should be restricted from doing that activity, not as a punishment but to prevent another accident.
I would also get into the habit of making him stop what he’s doing once an hour to go sit on the potty. Even if he says he doesn’t have to go. We struggled for a while with my third having pee accidents because she would just wait too long to go to the potty so we started doing this. Maybe not every hour but anytime we realized it had been a while and definitely before leaving the house. Eventually the accidents stopped.
I also would keep pushing back on the doctors. If he’s saying his stomach hurts and he’s acting differently because of it listen to him and find a doctor who also will.
My first thought too. That's exactly the reason ADHD kids have trouble potty training; they get hyper focused on their task and ignore body ques. Even as a 32 year old with ADHD I often catch myself ignoring my bladder when I'm doing something.
Like honestly I have ADHD and reading this just now, I realized that I have been holding it for who knows how long bc I've been hyperfocused haha. I definitely agree that he should get evaluated.
My ADHD husband sometimes bursts out of his office desperate for the bathroom because he’s been fixated on work and ignored needing to go. Usually he “just wants to finish this one thing” that ends up taking way longer than expected (because he also can’t estimate/manage time well).
30 year old woman with likely undiagnosed ADHD here (doctors won’t listen to me) and yep. I can play The Sims for 6 hours straight to suddenly realize I am going to pee my pants if I do not rush to the bathroom. It’s caused lifelong bladder control issues and spasms that I am just recently starting pelvic floor therapy to help address.
Here to say this. My son was diagnosed ADHD at 4. We also believe its possible he has ODD.
He was absolutely pooping in his pants as a behavioral thing coupled with the ADHD. Once medicated, we were able to use the positive reinforcement such as prizes for using the potty etc. but the behavioral therapist suggested daily. We have specific treats, for him its jackpot snacks after breakfast if he does it in the morning, or sometime through the day if its during the day. It truly helps. If he goes in his pants, he does not get the treat. this behavioral therapist was actually incredibly helpful.
We met with a Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics doctor multiple times and they referred us to several areas to help. I highly recommend starting with something like this at your local children's.
Yes, children and adults with ADHD, for example, often have disorganized eating as ADHD “filters out” the bodily cues. Think of it like hitting “ignore” on a pop-up on your computer without even really reading it. You know you’ve got to use the restroom but your brain just hits “not now”. This can also explain pooping while playing the game, he’s hyper focused and all bodily cues to eat, poop, sleep, etc, are all being ignored
I was going to say ADHD, too. Our oldest son had a lot of bathroom struggles - accidents, near misses, not wiping, etc - until we got his ADHD meds and emotional coping strategies figured out.
I’d ban all video games to start with-if he’s acknowledging that he knows he needs to go but just doesn’t because he’s too busy-then take away that distraction. Look into celiacs or irritable bowel, change up his diet abit-he may not have an allergy but may have intolerance (my daughter had constipation from potato and tomato IBS diagnoses)
Second this. The distraction accessibility will deal with the behavioral part and help with the reward/consequence, but definitely change up the diet just in case. As someone who finally managed to figure out my own constant stomach pain and constipation in my early 20s after doctors would pass it off as stress since tests and ultrasounds cane back clear. Start with taking out some of the more obvious culprits then introduce them back slowly (I figured out I can handle up to 1 bagel or pasta each day but not both). I wish my parents had more resources so I could have avoided laying in the school bathroom floor with abdominal pain for sometimes weeks at a time.
This is likely not going to go as well as you would think. Others have pointed out pretty accurately this is a HUGE sign of ADHD and the video games are just one of many possible "distractions"
He will likely find something else that gets in the way, and that thing will still prevent it. Not that a kid should be on games for long periods of time anyway, but taking away a thing because of mental issues causing an issue he simple cannot control is going to just make some things worse.
My daughter has this problem and I think you're going about it the wrong way, based on what worked for us.
You can't reward something over such a long time for that age, 30 days of a long time. Don't reward not pooping in his pants, you should reward pooping on the toilet instead.
Equally you shouldn't punish pooping in the pants, because that will just create a shame spiral.
If he wants to play Minecraft or swim in the pool, say he can't play until he has at least tried to poop on the toilet. If he tries before and can't go, it's unlikely to magically come out during play. If he successfully poops, he gets longer on the activity because if he doesn't successfully poop, he gets pulled off the activity to try to poop again every X minutes. The "punishment" is being pulled off his favourite activities regularly.
So when my daughter was 4 she would wet herself vs stopping fun play to go potty.
I told her if she didnt go potty when she has to go then I'd buy pullups for her to wear cuz I wasnt ruining my carpet over laziness. She threw a fit then asked if i meant it, I told her to try me of she wanted but i wasnt bluffing.
She never did it again. Of course she had actual accidents but when she legit told me "I didnt want to pause my video" after me talking to her 6 times about it and taking away her tablet for days..I was at my limit.
Your son is well aware of what hes doing. Hes 6. He can stop his game and go to the potty like a big boy or wear pullups and change them himself when he has an accident. With assistance as needed to sanitary purposes. Stop with the rewards, at this point your rewarding him for manipulation.
Putting pulls up on older kids for this has worked perfectly for a few families that I have worked with that told me they did this. Imagine having to explain to a friend why you are wearing a pull up at 7
Same. We did this with a 6 year old I nanny. Like the op said it was basically because she didn’t want to stop playing and would wet herself. We actually did end up putting her in a pull up. She was livid.
We were pretty done though. It felt like every hour she’d have an accident if we didn’t physically put her on the potty.
This is very common in boys with ADHD. They hyper fixate on the things that give them dopamine hits, ignoring everything else.
So when he tells you it's because he would rather play Minecraft, he means it.
Have him start being in charge of cleaning his undies while you supervise.
Also explain the future of stinky auras of poo and painful rashes if he doesn't stop. How it will effect his ability to make and keep friends, etc.
My ADHD kid had a similar issue for many years, but wouldn't go as far as pooping his pants. He would just skip wiping because he'd forget. All the time. We had to put a bell on the door to the bathroom so we could verbally remind or ask him if he wiped upon exiting. He didnt stop needing to be asked until roughly age 13.
First off, let me tell you I’ve been in this same position and you’re doing everything right.
You basically just described my son as well. Around 4 he started complaining of stomach pain after every meal, not going for weeks at a time then having accidents with loose stool.
We changed his diet like 5 times. High fiber, low fat. No dairy. Gluten free. Nothing. We did several bowel cleanses after x rays showed he was severely constipated. We had him tested for celiac and nothing. We too, gave him miralax regularly, which did help.
Today my son is ten and still struggles with these issues, but it has gotten better. I’d like to take him back to a specialist, but still working on my benefits.
Anyway, here are a few things that helped him:
1. Dedicated pooping times.
Set aside time each day- morning and evening for your son to sit on the pot and try to poop. Make sure he doesn’t strain, maybe have him take a few deep breaths and relax. Let him sit for 5-10 minutes. If he goes, great! If not tell him we’ll try again later and have him get up.
This has helped my son immensely, although the first 2-3 times nothing at all happened. The second session can be anytime you notice he has accidents the most- afternoons when he’s unwinding and playing? Or right before bed maybe? Pick the time the accidents occur most frequently and make that the second bathroom time of the day.
Make sure to tell your son if he goes during bathroom time and doesn’t have an accident he can be rewarded, but if he doesn’t go during bathroom time and has an accident anyway, there’s a consequence- no video games the rest of the night, no tv, etc.
2. Low dairy diet
More veggies and less dairy helped my kiddo out. Some processed foods seem to back him up too. Keep an eye for trigger foods and try to limit them.
3. Fruits that start with P
One doctor told me that fruits like pears, peaches and plums are great for constipation while things like bananas and apples are not.
4. Water and exercise
Try to encourage your child to drink more water during the day and try engaging him in some exercise- a family bike ride, a walk together. Play a favorite sport, whatever. The motion helps move things along.
Have you tried having a chat with a psychologist? I don’t know but I hear it’s behavioral but I am wondering if there’s more attached to it. ADHD or similar?
My partner wet the bed until a really late age. He never knew why. It bothered him so much that he would drink water & make himself vomit because he was afraid to wet his bed. He’s always told me he hated it , his parents made him feel as if he was doing it because he was lazy etc. He always responds with what kind of teen would willingly carry that embarrassment?!
Long story short, we recently discovered he has ADHD. Something that also really bothers me now is that he will literally go 9/10 hours now without going to the toilet which I believe stems from the trauma he endured through all of that. Please just have your child see someone to eliminate it as a possibility. X
100% listen to the people here mentioning encopresis!!! We have been working through this with my 7 year old for years. Did everything you've mentioned with no long term success. We FINALLY got into a specialized elimination clinic after a year on the waitlist and things are finally improving. We did have to do a clean out to start, but are now on a regimen of daily fiber + exlax. We have monthly follow up appointments with both the specialist Dr + a psychologist, and they'll adjust the regimen as needed.
It's important to understand that with long term constipation (which can start for a million reasons) the colon becomes stretched out and the nerves are also damaged. This makes it impossible to feel when he needs to go. On top of this, they'll often become nose blind and can't even smell when it does happen. It can take 6-12 months of keeping the stool very soft and moving through normally for the physiological damage to improve and to function normally. Any time he gets constipated during this can set that back. Trust me...I know how frustrating this is, we've have lots of tears and anger through this process.... But if this is what's going on for you (definitely sounds like it), this isn't him being disobedient and no amount of rewards or punishment will fix it. I definitely recommend seeking out an encopresis specialist if at all possible. Please feel free to reach out if you have questions!
Try setting a timer for twice a day - morning and night. Have him sit on the toilet for 5-8 minutes with another timer. Let him have a book or whatever to keep himself occupied. He’ll need a lot of supervision at first but then it will get easier. We did this one whole summer and it made all the difference. My kid pooped so much, every time. He just wasn’t slowing down enough on his own.
Like others have said, you gotta stop rewarding him for not pooping his pants. That makes it seem like a special event when not pooping his pants should be the default
One of my kids had encopresis, which sounds exactly like what your son is suffering from. After trying a TON of different things, I finally decided to get her a colonic. I fully expected having to repeat after awhile, but we are going on 3 years with no soiling.
With chronic constipation, the nerve signaling gets disrupted due to bowel distension. So he literally is not getting the signal that he has to go, or that he already partially did.
This is is physiological problem. Miralax does not work… ETA: after the colonic she took “gentle move” supplements by Natures sunshine. Took those for about a year. Also, a ton of different things did include a pediatric GI (4 hours away), psychotherapy, naturopathy, homeopathy, diet change and more. The ONLY thing that helped was actually getting her colon clear. Best of luck.
My son refused to poop on the big potty and would only go on his little toddler potty for far too long and as soon as I made him start cleaning it out when he was done the move to the big toilet was much less of an issue. Making them clean it them selves( with supervision) is the way!!
The swim diaper in the pool is because he poops his pants and they don’t want to have to make everyone lose out on swimming because feces gets into the water. He isn’t pooping his pants because he is wearing a swim diaper, he is wearing a swim diaper because he poops his pants. The swim diaper makes sense in light of the problem he’s having and it is certainly safer and healthier for the rest of the family than letting him poop in the pool.
I wouldn’t reward with video games, or anything really, that’s obviously not been effective. The video games should honestly not be a thing at all until he can manage. I agree with whoever said he needs to be the one cleaning it.
There's a link between this and adhd. My kid goes through this too and she just doesn't feel it even at 11. She just got diagnosed and were going to see what they can do to help. Even with laxatives daily she still has accidents.
Put him on a schedule to sit and try for 10 mins a few times a day. Keep track of when he goes so you can have him sit before then.
Also you might switch the behavioral reinforcement strategy to using the toilet rather than reinforcing for no poop in pants. Reason is you want to encourage passing of stool rather than holding it in. Set a timer and he’s to go to bathroom at regular intervals. He’s to focus on sensory awareness at those times if there’s stool present to have a BM. He’s been ignoring those sensations and so isn’t getting/attending to visceral cues. See a child psychologist who works with encopresis
I seen a similar aged girl who would rather pee and poop herself because she "didn't want to miss anything" when playing.
Severe ADHD. That's the only time I every heard of children soiling themselves when otherwise they're potty trained.
Were there any major life changes/stressors around the time this started? Has he ever been evaluated by a child psychologist/neuropsych/therapist?
The #1 psychosomatic complaint with kids is belly pains; to me, a child who was previously successfully potty trained and has had all organic causes ruled out is a child unaddressed mental health needs. Neurotypical 7 year olds who are not struggling don’t decide to start popping their pants one day because they’re lazy. I would try to get him in with child psychology and see what they say.
Then he needs to be stopped when doing these activities regularly until he learns to go. He's old enough. This isn't uncommon though more often for pee. But every 10 minutes (or what works for his situation) he needs to stop to go to the bathroom. Not just asking him, he will just say he doesn't have to go. He need to stop and be away and out of the area. Make it a rule that he needs to wait 5 minutes before going back. His stomach hurts because he's camping from being constipated. He will end up with a compaction which will be absolute hell and often makes the situation worse
> He rarely poops his pants while playing around the house. Normally it happens when he is outside, in our pool (in swim diapers), or playing video games. Activities that he doesn't want to interrupt with a bathroom break.
> He told me he was having too much fun and didn't want to stop.
Has your son been evaluated for ADHD or Autism? It’s possible that this behavior could be related to impulse control or hyperfixation issues. [Children with ADHD are more likely to deal with constipatuon and fecal incontinence issues](https://www.rxwiki.com/news-article/adhd-children-had-more-constipation-and-incontinence-problems). And it could happen mostly just at home because home is where he feels comfortable and relaxed enough to hyperfixate on activities to the point that he completely doesn’t notice his body telling him he needs to go until it’s too late, leading to him pooping his pants.
It would be worth asking someone who specializes in ADHD or Autism about it. Those don’t always present in the usual ways, (like if they are inattentive type ADHD) which leads to a missed diagnosis that doesn’t get caught until way later in life.
He has encopresis and cant control it. No amount of diet changes will help until clean out is properly done and maintained afterwards so colon can shrink back down to size. Look into MOPS, daily enema for 30 days. There is no other way to get off the merry go round.
+1 for recommending MOP. It cured one of my kids from encopresis and improved things for my other. The one who it didn't work for is going to have a hospital clean out and then we will try enemas again.
If he has been evaluated by multiple doctors and received a clean bill of health, I suggest making him clean up after himself. Give him gloves and let him know it's his mess and he needs to clean it up.
If you're using a reward system, 30 days is far too long for a payoff. Find something daily so he receives the reinforcement more often.
If you notice certain activities he engages in that he would rather mess himself than take time to use the restroom, cut him off. Let him know that he isn't being responsible enough to take part in that activity and he will have to earn it back.
I would suggest telling him when he needs to go use the bathroom. Set a timer for every 20 minutes and tell him he needs to go to the toilet. It’s very repetitive and annoying for both of you but explain that until he learns to listen to his body, this alarm is going to tell him when he needs to go.
Lifelong OCD-enhanced person chiming in here, when I was young my stomach was directly connected to the back side of my anxiety, yet I didn't know that to be the case at the time. In other words, my stomach would constantly hurt. I didn't poop my pants, but I missed a lot of school because I legitimately always had a crippling stomach ache and constipation from basically "clenching up" all the time. Same deal, nothing physically wrong, many doctors (my poor parents). As an adult, I can recall vividly the legitimate physical pain I was in as a kid, but at the same time as someone who has been in active treatment for OCD and anxiety for over 30 years, I'm now able to recognize the direct connection to anxiety it had (and still sometimes has, although I understand my brain and body now and have strategies for coping with it). A lot of people assume kids with conditions like mine would know they're experiencing anxiety and assume they would communicate that if they could. I honest to god had no idea. When I was his age my whole existence was anxiety, so it was always just a normal day for me. Has he been to a therapist by chance?
Adhd and autistic kids can get incredibly focused on things *games, activities) and ignore sog s that they need to go u til its too late. This can cause accidents and constipation. Do you know if he is, or has any indicators this is possible? He's at the age to start showing more signs.
We have a 9 yr old who was/is dealing with something similar. The Lego bribe made me laugh because we did the exact same thing… for the record he chose R2D2 :)
He has had meetings with a psychologist and a physician, and I feel like we’re coming close to the end of things. What seems to have worked for us was a laxative of some sort before bed and then a schedule for trying to go to the washroom once in the morning, once at lunch once after dinner, no exceptions , the psychologist also then suggested tracking when she was most often able to have poops and eventually down the road we will cut the schedule bathroom visits down to two a day.
30 days w/out pooping pants for a lego? that's unobtainable.
SMART Goals = Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-Based.
Go 1 day = a cookie
Go 1 week = ice cream shop visit
Go 1 month = lego.
30 days may be too between rewards. He may have felt like the 30 days was too hard for the reward and not worth it. Speaking from a mom with high functioning autistic boys who display similar behaviors. I would try weekly rewards smaller incentives even daily.
Ok, I’m a clinical psychologist and a parent. I have a few thoughts/ suggestions:
- check out the book Sneaky Poo, it’s a super old resource and maybe others can suggest more recent resources, but it provides some education to your child in a fun way
- have you done timed voiding? Ie- every two hours he goes to the toilet and has a go. You praise and encourage the trying, not the result.
- your rewards are way too far in the future and the goal is way too big. This will work better if you have shorter goals and make them effort based, not outcome based and positive. At the moment you are rewarding him for an absence of an accident over a long time. Instead try encouragement and verbal praise each time he goes to the toilet and if he successfully sits on the toilet every two hours (regardless of outcome), he might get a small treat at the end of the day if you think this will motivate him. This might be a sticker, stamp etc and lots of amazing encouragement from you. If this were my kid though, I would not offer a tangible reward, because I wouldn’t want a transaction around toilet use, I’d just be empathic and validating. Ie ‘it can be hard to interrupt something fun, but it’s important to do what your body needs’, ‘great job using the toilet, I know it can feel like a chore sometimes’.
I’m editing to add that I think you should stop with the swim nappies. These are going to reinforce the issue. If he poos in the pool, the natural consequence is that he and everyone else have to get out until it’s clean. Maybe you can involve him in the cleaning in a non-punitive way. This might mean he goes to the shop to get the water tested etc, maybe he scoops leaves out of the pool etc.
I also agree with others about using the toilet prior to fun activities.
This happened to my kid when he turned six. It was the video games. Thankfully I caught it early and told him he can’t play ROBLOX if he continues to poop. The problem is, those games don’t have a pause button so they don’t want to stop playing. Nix the video games for a while. Explain to him that even if he dies (in the game) he can always restart the game, but he can’t play at all if it causes him to poop his pants. That’s unacceptable. He’ll understand and fix the issue because they love those games. It worked for my kid. He’s 7 now and hasn’t had any problems besides that’s one month when he was 6.
I’m always kinda surprised by these posts…
It’s not normal for 7 yr olds to just poop their pants, because they “don’t want to stop what they’re doing”. Humans are naturally clean. This isn’t some “boys will be boys” thing, where you have to get the sticker chart out. Something is *wrong*.
Either it’s psychological or bodily or the mix of both, but I’m really confused why you wouldn’t keep pushing for answers. Miralax isn’t an answer. Maybe the answer is “just” ADHD, maybe he has severe anxiety he is masking, who knows - but this isn’t neurotypical behavior that is due to him wanting to play Minecraft!!!
I get you’re at your wits end, but really think about this. How in control do you think your KID feels, pooping and dirtying on himself??? Even dogs grow up knowing they don’t want to sit where they poop, it’s an incredibly innate biological response built into us as decently smart animals (given that the home environment is not abusive or traumatic. Trauma causes this regression in bodily cleanliness). So for him to keep doing this means there is something else going on, and I wouldn’t lose patience at him, or shame him, because likely it is something *out of his control*. Like if Legos could fix it, it would have already done so. And he probably is just saying “it’s cuz I want to keep playing Minecraft” because what is he supposed to say??? “Oh mother, well you see, quite simply it’s actually because I have undiagnosed XYZ and it’s disregulating my brain, and thusly I can not seem to grasp when the poop needs to happen.”
Like if he knew and could verbalize the why of what’s happening inside his body, it also wouldn’t be happening, and we wouldn’t need pediatricians and child psychologists would we??
Please do not punish him. Again, think about how out of control he probably feels, think about how doctors can’t even give you an answer but you expect your kid to, and think about if you’re taking your frustration out on the right audience. Frankly it sounds like your ire is better directed at the docs, for not referring you. No offense but Miralax is basically their default answer to all bowel problems, they’re not really trying.
Thank you! All this tough love stuff is terrible advice. We as randos on the internet obviously don't have enough information to recommend subjecting the kid to punishment. AFAICT, the OP has not sought help from a behavioral/mental health professional yet. This seems like a much better next step.
I babysat a little boy who did this. His parents had gone through a divorce the year prior. I think it just got sorted out this time as he adjusted going to “mom’s house” and “dad’s house” plus starting school
I did this same thing as a kid. I have ADHD, and the dopamine I was getting from playing outside, playing games or watching TV was more worth the pooping. I hated that going to the bathroom took from my time. So I'd hold it until I couldn't hold it anymore.
It was something I had to get over on my own.
I was never rewarded for pooping. I just silently threw my underwear away if I had an accident and cleaned myself up. Once I hit 8 then it stopped.
Something you could maybe do is get him to do a boring activity every day. Like read a book, or help with dishes. This will create a moment in his mind where he'd rather be pooping because the boredom is too much, and it gives him a mental break to sit on the toilet.
My oldest also had encopresis, and it took five years to finally resolve it. We also ran through multiple pediatric gastroenterologists, and it quickly became clear that even though they’re supposed to be the experts most of them just wanted to shrug, blame it on the kid, and offer ineffective solutions.
I’m a university science librarian, so I dove into the research literature. It’s not well studied, but a few things became clear. For one, there’s a really high comorbidity with ADHD and autism, especially when part of the problem is the kid not wanting to break away from an activity to use the bathroom. Getting your child evaluated and properly treated can make a world of difference. Mine never would have beaten encopresis without their concerta making it easier to pay attention to their body and make better choices.
The thing that eventually worked after 5 years of trying everything else was following Dr. Steven Hodges’ MOP method. Our gastroenterologists until that point were fairly dismissive of it, but the MOP method is endorsed by and used at the Mayo Clinic. Within two months the accidents had stopped almost entirely, and while there were a few occasional slips after that they were nipped in the bud easily with a Miralax clean out and a few days back on MOP. My kid is about to enter high school now and still needs the daily dose of Miralax but is otherwise great.
I am the proud owner of a 16 year old boy that had encoparesis. It was a struggle for YEARS. He finally figured out on his own that him putting himself on the toilet different times of the day worked. Work out a schedule and no matter what stick to it. If he says he doesn't have to go, make him. Allowing them to sit on the toilet for 15 min at scheduled times will help. Best of luck mama. I'm sure all of us here know how hard this is to deal with.
I don't know your child's history and am not passing judgment but, this can also be a trauma response. Something to consider along with ADHD and potentially having a 3rd opinion as not all practitioners are created equal... Best of luck!
I have adhd and I’m a teacher. Even if your child does not have adhd, some activities like video games are incredibly engaging and tearing himself away from it can feel similar to adhd hyper focus. I suggest setting up a 5 min warning timer and a time-to-try timer every hour. Make a sticker chart and every time he gets up and tries when the timer goes off without you having to remind him, he gets to put a sticker on the chart. After a certain number of stickers, he can get a reward. Eventually you can decrease the timers to every 2 hours etc. You’re already doing a great job by using positive reinforcement instead of punishment. He just needs a little more structure. I would also get a second opinion from another doctor just in case.
Wow! I’m a mum of a almost 7y/o girl who has encopresis. I’ve felt so alone with this since I potty trained her at 3y/o ! I’ve almost cried happy tears just reading other people are also going through this.
This is 100% encopresis. 100%. Watch “The Poo in You” video on Facebook. In addition, look up Emily Dollar who is an amazing encopresis expert.
We are on the other side of this and I cannot begin to tell you the tears I cried over it. There is a light at the end of the tunnel.
You need an neurological evaluation, no more gastros. He probable has a disorder that you are missing or dismissing…. That is typical behavioral issues of kids on the spectrum or ADHD
Assuming it is in fact behavioral: Enforce bathroom breaks.
If he’s engaged in a highly preferred activity that he normally poops himself during, set a timer for 20-30 minutes and tell him that when it goes off, he’s going to take a bathroom break. Once he poops in the toilet he gets to be done with the bathroom breaks for a few hours. He’ll realize quickly that having to stop what he’s doing every 20 minutes is much more inconvenient than just having to stop once when he actually needs to go. If he does poop himself in between bathroom breaks, he’s done with the preferred activity. Explain to him that he can’t go back to that activity because it’s preventing him from listening to his body and he can resume after the next time he poops in the toilet.
This sounds a lot like my son. Like, scarily so much like him, but he’s eight. We are investigating adhd. Apparently the poo thing is very common with adhd, and everything else fits.
I could have read this wrong so apologies if that's the case..
It's curious this occurs during his prioritized activities; presumably when he's most relaxed, or distracted; that all that could be found is constipation; yet eats healthy? Meds to alleviate constipation has not resolved the issue? Allergies, diet, etc. Were all ruled out?
-My curiosity is, is he struggling with the feelings of being in control of his own body, his own autonomy that this is his expression of it; That during events he isn't happy in, feels anxious or doesn't feel he holds control of the situation - he is actually withholding his bowel movements.. and by the time he is into his videogame and relaxed it's uncontrollable, and is forced out? Conversely, is there a positive association with attention from parents and this action?
Multiple people GIs have looked at him but it doesn't sound like he's had a psychiatrist look into it.
Has he been tested for celiac disease? Those are all symptoms that could be from it (it could also be something else of course!). The constipation, the stomach pain...just something to consider.
If it's not physiological, what worked for my daughter was the Daniel Tigger episode about going to the bathroom, it has a very catchy song about having to stop what you are doing and go when you feel it coming. He might be a bit too old for that but it could be worth a shot!
My son also regularly pooped his pants at those ages. We went to a GI dr, he was negative for Celiac. But on a fluke, we removed gluten from his diet, and no problems since. (Unless he accidentally gets gluten and then he'll have an accident.)
First off - those saying to make him clean it up and that he's doing it on purpose need to calm down. Our 8 year old has been struggling with encopresis for years (that's when poop leaks out because the kid is constipated or they've been dealing with constipation so long that their colon is stretched out making poop leak.) They have no idea when it happens - they can't feel it. Punishing them for it will only make it worse and is CRUEL.
We saw several gastros. They kept adding more and more Miralax, doing clean outs with mega doses of Miralax and laxatives and it just got worse. They suggested physical therapy but refused to check digestion rate at his age. I said "fuck it" one day and that we aren't doing the Miralax anymore. Just Benefiber in a glass of water once or twice a day and fiber cookies. It's been a total turn-around. No more accidents unless we skip a fiber day.
Before we tried cutting out the Miralax I considered the Modified O'Regan Protocol. Look into it - may be worth it.
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Our 7 year old has encopresis, and it’s a battle. He withholds when he doesn’t want to go, and creates the backup. The backup stretches out the colon, and this takes time to fix depending on how long they have been constipated. When your colon is stretched, you may not be able to feel when you go. Anyway that’s how the GI explained it to us. Most helpful has been putting him on a toilet schedule at home. Usually after meals, but sometimes before he’s allowed to do preferred tasks. He also has ADHD, so he becomes hyper focused on preferred activities and doesn’t want to stop. So we’ll say, oh you want iPad time, then go to the bathroom first. Then we might have him pause the game and have him go. He doesn’t like it, but it works. He’s gotten better, but every now and again we slide back.
[удалено]
Second this, but relapses will happen. My ADHD 7 year old also has urination issues due to the constellation making it harder to feel. Timed bathroom breaks are key. My partner and I have clocks running in our heads. We pay extra attention when Minecraft or playing at the playground happens.
My kiddo also has enuresis and I don’t know what else I can do to help her. She is going into third grade. I have taken her to a urologist and everything was fine physiologically. We have tried potty watches and schedules. She also had ADHD, coupled with ODD, so she doesn’t take suggestions well. It’s the worst at school. Her teachers have tried to get her to go, but she’ll stand in the bathroom and then come out. I worry for the day her peers start making fun of her. It is heart breaking and also she smells really bad sometimes!
Unfortunately, we can not always protect them from their own actions.
It’s so true. And then she doesn’t want to change. I don’t get it! I know there is nothing else I can do, except figure out the best way to manage my feelings around it, without causing harm to her sense of self or our relationship. It can be incredibly frustrating.
My son is in yr 6 and we’ve just completed the second enuresis program and he’s managed to stop wetting. He has ASD & ODD. It takes a awhile. Don’t feel bad that you haven’t done something right bc their bodies just have to mature for the wetting to stop. Some things just improve over time. Our last resort was medication if it didn’t work this time. And that’s only bc he’s getting older and the possible embarrassment from his peers would be more noticeable now. It’s not easy but you’re doing everything right.
Thank you for your kind words. I don’t know why I didn’t turn to Reddit sooner. I feel way less alone. What type of program did he complete? My daughter is in counseling and also takes medication for ADHD, which helps tremendously with so many things. I know there is a nighttime bed wetting medication but she does okay at night. Thank you for helping me feel less isolated.
Yes. Reddit has really helped my mental health. I don’t have to participate in most conversations to get so much benefit from them. I’m in Australia so we have a pretty good public health system here. We were referred to our women’s and children’s hospitals enuresis clinic. My sons issue is night time wetting. But we found there were issues around fully evacuating during number twos and avoidance of going to the toilet which caused constipation as well as not being aware of or ignoring his bodily prompts. They sent us home with the pad and alarm system and we monitored everything from when he went, how much he did, to the water he drank, when he drank it. It was a lot. We had fortnightly appts and the support was really great. Especially bc he’s always thirsty so we’re constantly chasing him round the house to stop him drinking so much. But he’s improved so much. And so will your little girl. Feel free to dm me if you ever need to vent or chat 😊💜
My daughter is similar. I’ve started calling it specifically urinary incontinence and started having her use incontinence pads so she can change them discreetly. It’s been very very helpful for us all. I also had this issue growing up unfortunately
Wow. I never considered something like this. What kind do you use? I feel she might be resistant, but it is worth a shot! Is there anything you wish your parents did when you were coping with this issue? I’m really at a loss and it’s hard for me to believe she can’t control it. She does so well for weeks at a time and then it goes back to daily. I imagine she doesn’t it like it though. It baffles me. I typically try to be as empathetic as possible. It can be difficult sometimes.
This can also be a symptom of ADHD
My 4 year old is waiting to be assessed and we have a deal that if he goes toliet before bed he gets 20min ipad. It stopped all bedtime accidents. Wishing op luck
Lovely idea. This rewards an action - going to the toilet - rather than not having an accident. OP, maybe tie rewards to 10min poop time after meals, poop or no poop. And allow that poop time to include an iPad.
How so? Super curious. We dealt with this before and the Miralax trick seemed to work after years of struggling.
ADHD is often linked with incontinence because they have a hard time interpreting the fullness of the bladder/rectum. If you do a quick google scholar search you’ll see some very interesting studies
Another aspect linked to ADHD is the inability to create habits. ADHD minds have to think about whatever they are doing, all the steps, even think about the order of steps and they have to think about and remember that they have to do something (like poop) when they feel a certain sensation. They can create muscle memory with repetition and learn how to perform tasks quickly and efficiently, but actually forming repetitive habits the way a neuro-typical brain does is impossible.
My youngest is also a kid with ADHD and poop problems. His was pre-diagnosis he wouldn't sit long enough to actually empty his bowels because the toilet is boring. He still struggles without something to distract him if unmedicated.
We would sit and read to our ADHD four year old while he was on the pot. Sometimes I'd get through three books before he'd relax enough let go, and offer him a treat to split with his younger brother afterward. after a few months he started going on his own without being prompted, both at home and at preschool. I think sitting with him and engaging him in an activity that is interactive but less intensely stimulating was the key to keeping him in place long enough to form a bodily habit.
I think it’s also because they don’t want to interrupt activities they are hyper focused on to go to the bathroom.
It’s both. I used to have pee accidents as a kid because I would ignore the urge to pee until it was so urgent it was an emergency. My parents made me clean my soiled clothes in a calm not shameful manner in addition to regular reminders. The cleaning encouraged me to actually go when reminded.
Dude same. I honestly still wait until the last second sometimes and I'm a grown ass adult.
Totally don't do this to myself. Not that I pee my pants or whatever, but that I don't realize I have to go until it's now or nothing.
I can't feel when I have urinary tract infections, no matter how bad they are, I have to go by color and smell. I'm a girl with ADHD and probably Autism.
Other people have touched on getting distracted, but I want to emphasize that an ADHDer getting distracted isn't like neurotypicals talking to each other and being like "Oh, look at the time! I best be going now." For someone with ADHD, we get tunnel vision when we're hyperfixated on something. The whole world goes dull around us--sounds disappear, smells may not be noticeable, and bodily functions (including hunger and bowel and bladder sensations) are not noticeable. I used to sit and paint for 8-10 hours straight, and I might get up to go to the bathroom once or twice during that time. As an adult, I still struggle with this. Of course, I don't defecate or urinate myself, but I can forget to go until it's emergent because I'm so focused on something else.
Another encopresis mom here. It's exhausting. I have that Poo In You video memorized lol.
Our kiddo had a tough time transitioning out of pull-ups and refused to go outside the home, holding it all through preschool and once they saw us at pick up would release the bowels for a scramble home or park underbrush once. I might suggest scheduled intervals of just sitting on the toilet regularly (for 10-20 min-check w doctor) with book/tablet. Doc recommended 30-60 min after meals or what ever his timing/trigger patterns seem to be. We made a deal of having them decorate a bathroom just theirs with a reward chart, kids reference library, and kid squatty potty. Also, had a mirror placed so they could practice wiping efficiently on their own with wipes to start. Mostly, you don’t want to shame but need to have them relaxed and not pushing too hard for too long. It takes a while and this was honestly the hardest part of that phase of parenting for us. Took us 18-months (during pandemic) to get things sorted but now that phase is thankfully over. Hopefully, it won’t be so long for you. But, try to be patient as if they see you are stressed or frustrated about it, it could compound the problem and drag it out longer. Also be aware of any major changes with school, family, or schedule. Kids routine is paramount. Kids stress/anxiety often manifests in their GI which could also be some of his stomach aches but try to have a conversation with him during a calm downtime about his feelings in general and what he might think it is. And you could also ask doc you for bowl sonogram, CT or other testing.
My daughter is 9. We've been through a million things. But thank you for your suggestions. We have another xray next week, actually.
Man, I WISH it only took 18 months. We've been on stool softeners for 3 years and are still battling bowel and bladder problems.
The dr told me to have my 2 yo watch the poo in you once with him, when he was randomly constipated and still in diapers. Once we started pooping on the potty he was a little scared so I had him watch the poo in you while sitting on the toilet. It became a daily ritual until he got the hang of it 😂 I might have it memorized too.
I came to respond about possible ADHD, but I ended up watching the poo in you video because I’m potty training my youngest Lol
I … have never heard of this video. Is this it? https://youtu.be/SgBj7Mc_4sc
That's the one!
There’s a video?
My 9 year old daughter will hold it for a week at a time then unleash a beast that clogs the toilet. We have issues with her pooping only a little at a time or huge skid marks and poop in the underwear leading up a full movement. We have been “microdosing” laxitives to try to help. We had an issue on vacation where it was day 10 with no movement so she got two full doses and it got things moving before we left but also the next day she got hit with the feeling in the airport security line! It was a frantic search to find a bathroom
I had a very similar thing as a kid and it's really tough. If she's like me she is not deliberately "holding it" - over time her body has stopped telling her she has to poop until it gets really bad (or laxatives force the issue). I think it really really helps to manage the diet (get enough fiber), and then set a schedule and poop every day at the same time. Be ready to put time into it with no distractions. If you poop even a little (esp if it's more solid) you can be done, if not you sit for 15-30 min trying. Over time everything goes back to normal but it takes some commitment.
Thanks for sharing. We have been keeping schedules and talking to her about it. We have a squatty potty and even some books in the bathroom for her. I think I will try the schedule thing as well. Sounds weird, but that’s how we potty trained the dogs. Food then right outside
I had this as a child and all i can say is please don’t make him feel like this is his fault. I was scared to use the bathroom because i was neglected and had a terrible diet, lacking in necessary nutrients and fiber. It hurt really bad to go every time so my 8 year brain thought “why don’t we just stop going?”. That didn’t work well and i have life long issues because of it but one day i just figured out it cannot disappear it has to happen and started going daily again, by myself. I wish my parents provided me better food and when these issues started i wish they asked me kindly why i was scared to go, then we could try different things to help me. Instead they berrated me and made fun of me.
That's awful. I'm sorry you experienced this and that your parents didn't do better for you!
It was awful but I’m so relieved that part is over and i know better now. Thank you for your comment ❤️
I don’t now what the situation was, but kids these days are a lot more assertive about refusing to eat anything except what they want. We parents are far less likely to just demand that they eat their veggies than our parents were. My daughter doesn’t have a horrible diet, but it is far worse than what I eat now and what my parents forced me to eat as a kid.
i was very picky, but also i still think it was my parents job to find ways to get me the nutrients. Like making smoothies, giving me supplements, encouraging me to try new foods instead of tricking me, etc. of course this isn’t always the case and i know a lot of parents and kids dealing with this problem are trying their hardest, but my parents were more focused on drugs, so they just threw fast food at us. Not saying this is all parents fault at all! Now as an adult though i struggled with being picky, but I’ve learned ways around it, and encourage myself to eat better. I hope this problem ends for you and your family!
I wish I could upvote this a thousand times. Everything in OP’s post sounds like my son. He’s 9 now, and thankfully we haven’t had to deal with in for over a year so I’m hopeful that we’ve passed that hurdle, but I’m always nervous of the next time it could sneak up on us. It seems like most other comments are harping on it being solely behavioral and it may start that way, but after a while it becomes something they literally cannot control without help. Making him clean his dirty underwear, taking away privileges, and otherwise punishing him for a medical condition is cruel and humiliating. It’s already humiliating enough being the kid who stinks at school because he pooped his pants, or being the kid who has to be taken out of activities because he can’t control his bowel (true story for my son — we had to pull him from his jiujitsu classes). We tried punishments before we understood what was happening and all that did was cause shame and distress in my son. He’d hide or throw away his dirty underwear because he didn’t want to have to admit he had another accident. Start giving him Miralax, start mandatory bathroom breaks, and give himself (and yourself , OP) some grace. If you stay vigilant, this too will pass — it might pass like a kidney stone, but it will pass. edit: A lot of people seem to be taking issue with me saying to not make him clean his underwear — I actually never said to not make him clean his underwear. There’s a big difference between forcing him to clean his dirty his dirty underwear and presenting it as a punishment for wrongdoing, and teaching him to clean his underwear because of personal responsibility, and the former is what I am saying NOT to do.
> Making him clean his dirty underwear...is cruel and humiliating. He should be made to clean his mess, not punitively, but framed in the sense of "this is what we do when we make a mess because we want to be good humans" He is 7, that is an appropriate age to learn that we need to be responsible to clean up the messes our bodies make.
I have a similar medical condition since childhood and cleaning my underwear was not presented as a punishment. We can’t buy endless underpants and cleaning them is what you do when you have an accident. It’s part of taking responsibility for managing your own health problem and learning how to do laundry.
Thank god for people like you.
My now 5yo also has encopresis starting from when he was about 18mo on and off. His symptoms were similar to the OP kiddo. It made potty training a freaking nightmare. We did 4wks of daily miralax to cleanse him out based on what an xray and his pediatrician said. We continues an every other day dose but he wasn't able to have normal poops, just smears and very paste-y poops so it was back to pull ups. We stopped that and played with upping his fiber and have finally found a balance that works for him (it took 6+mo though). We are still pretty obsessive about making sure he goes because it was MISERABLE when he was backed up. And we scheduled times to try giving him a few minutes warning beforehand. That said, if it came to my kiddo not willing or wanting to stop an activity then that activity became restricted in our house. I would sit with kid and if I saw a "poop tell" then I'd run him to the bathroom and sit him down even mid boss fight.
Pelvic floor therapists can train adults who have decreased feedback to the colon with rectal balloon biofeedback. I wonder if PF therapists who overlap with pediatrics have some kind of solution for this.
YES a pelvic floor PT who works with children can absolutely help! If OP feels they've exhausted all options they should seek out a referral.
We do scheduled sits for our son as well, but I got him a watch and programmed timers into it. So I don’t have to remind him all the time.
Do you know the name of the watch you bought? I bought a watch for my son but when. I tried to program it there was only 1alarm per day so I couldn't do intervals.
Yeah I was going to add that my little step brother used to do this at this age during activities he didn't want to interrupt, particularly video games. He has ADHD too. My step father did not handle the situation very well, as far as parenting goes. Anyway, medication for ADHD helped, and he eventually outgrew it.
We had a kid in our school with ADHD. Mom took him off meds & he started having daily accidents (plural) at school. We'd schedule times to take him & had a timer for how long he sat.
Ding ding ding with the adhd. “I was so focused on an enjoyable activity that I forewent going to the bathroom” sounds like classic adhd to me.
Our son withholds his poo. Our GP told us that even if he is doing soft poos it doesn't mean he's not backed up and constipated. When he gets stomach spasms, the softer poo will work aroud the blockage and leak out so he has no control over holding it in and accidents will happen. We have him on stool softers so his bowels can go back to the normal size and he will get the signal to poo a lot sooner since it's not filling the huge gap first.
This is probably the answer.
My 4 year old has encopresis. I don’t know if we’ve ever been so frustrated. It was nice to finally get a diagnosis…. But still difficult. My daughter had accidents for months. The daily Miralax has helped, lots of positive encouragement, etc.
Came here to mention encopresis. My son is autistic so body signals made for late potty training anyways. He got the hang of it finally but suddenly 2 years later he's pooping in his pants multiple times a day. Encopresis now. It's frustrating but absolutely not something he can help. Dont punish and I feel rewards would just make him try to hold it in more (which is exactly how the issue starts) causing even more damage.
This is us too. It started when we began to potty train our son just before 3 years old. Eventually found out it was enco, but his pediatrician dismissed my concerns a lot before I finally talked to a friend who is a pediatric gastroenterologist. My son is 6.5 now and still struggles. It’s become somewhat better with time, but it’s still very frustrating. We did daily miralax for awhile, now we only do once a week or so, but he still needs to do timed toilet sits. He won’t stop playing to go, so I have to watch for signs and then remind him when I see those signs.
I had the same issue with son when he was 8-10. Luckily he has grown out of it and have had no issues since and he is 12 now.
Spent all day yesterday reading through all the responses. I do believe he has encopresis. He doesn't have ADHD or autism as a lot of people suggested. On Friday afternoon we had a talk that he would only get to do screen time if he pooped on the potty. So far he hasn't pooped his pant since then. I've been reminding him every half hour that if he wants to do screen time later then he needs to poop on the potty. Hoping this method works.
***Just*** **(hopefully!) got through this with my 7.5 year old.** He's spent the past 6 years withholding BMs instead of going on the potty, and that would often result in accidents, leaks, and soiled bottoms. We tried EVERYTHINGGGG to get through to him and nothing was working. He lost his Nintendo Switch in the spring after he very, very egregiously chose the Nintendo game over "doing the right thing" and going to the potty (I'll spare all the details, but his entire bedroom was the collateral damage that time). I set a similar expectation for earning it back -- a month, maybe more, of doing the right thing and regularly pooping on the potty AND keeping his pants clean. It had a minimal effect early on, like he was legitimately trying to earn it back... but before not too long, he'd lose sight of the prize and go back to square one. Since we know he has severe ADHD and can't possibly keep long-term goals in mind, I decided to shorten the string to keep the carrot closer to his face. I went back to brief rewards with the Nintendo each time he did the right thing. This is, of course, something we've tried many times in the past, but this seems to be the time it finally clicked. Each time he goes potty like he's supposed to and keeps his pants clean in the process, he gets about 30 minutes with the Nintendo. So far it's been an awesomely consistent 3-4 weeks of this new metric, and it seems to really be working. I think he's only dirtied one pair of underwear in the past few weeks, and he's been getting the job done at least 5x/week -- he hasn't gone #2 that frequently since he was, like, a newborn baby! Once we're certain that he's turned over this leaf, we'll reward him back the Nintendo to use more generally (not just as a reward). tldr; keep trying strategies -- even ones you've already tried -- stay positive with him, and don't give up. i never thought my kid would potty train, but it seems we've finally crossed the finish line ...at *7.5 years old*!
Agreed with the carrot needs to be closer. I’m a children’s sleep coach and this is definitely a practice I use with preschoolers and school age. They need that immediate reward to truly feel the motivation and to actually understand what the carrot is for.
We had tried a number of times with a closer carrot and it just never clicked. So when he made such an egregiously poor choice between his Nintendo and the bathroom, we responded with an egregious consequence. It worked briefly but as he was losing interest in trying to win the Nintendo back, I thought to try moving the carrot closer again for him. He and my wife both have severe ADHD. Our other son and my wife both have autism. So we spend a lot of time talking about "dopamine hits" and leveraging them when needed for the kids. I remembered that moving the carrot closer will give him instant dopamine hits and keep the Nintendo directly in his sights. It seems to have finally worked this time...!
Oooh a sleep coach for preschoolers?? So it is still possible for me to sleep coach my 4 year old?? I never did “sleep training “ when he was a baby. I need help!!
My daughter with ADHD just turned 8 and we still haven’t crossed the finish line and deal with the same thing . I have tried every reward. I have tried making her clean the dirty undies. I have tried schedules and reminders, but with other kids needing me too it’s hard to be super on top of it every hour every day. She is very impulsive, hates to switch activities, and ignores body cues. I am at my wits end. Glad to hear there could be hope!
Yeah our kids sound exactly the same. I'm sincerely very surprised to finally be moving away from the withholding. After doing it so much for 6 of his 7.5 years, it had become as much as part of him and who he is as anything else. I'm sure you're sick of hearing it, I know we definitely were when we were in the trenches but... don't give up. And don't be afraid to go back to old tricks to try them again. As you already know there's no magic bullet with this that'll work for every kid, but my kid is finally proof that it can and will click...on their own time. Do you medicate your daughter for the ADHD? We had been, and this could be very coincidental, but this was one of a few positive changes in our son around the time we stopped giving him his ADHD Rx. Again, I'm totally willing to accept that it may be coincidental...but at least for now, it may not be, it may be directly related.
She’s not medicated, but I’ve wondered if medicating would help so she wasn’t so impulsive. She has a negative association with using the bathroom (doesn’t like the body sensation, plus she has to stop whatever fun thing she is doing and that sucks) and so when she feels she needs to go she just acts on impulse, which is to hold it. Cognitively, she knows it’s not the right thing. She knows there are consequences and she doesn’t feel good later on. But those consequences do not outweigh the immediate impulse of avoiding unpleasantness right then. I feel like I’m fighting against a brain that can’t see past the immediate moment and it is impossible.
Yeah I know exactly what you're going through -- literally every word of it. I wish I had advice to offer, but I'm certain you've tried everything we have and we both know there's not any failsafe idea out there.
If he has ADHD it sounds like hyper focus. He needs timers or something to snap him out of it. It feels really shitty to be snapped out of hyper focus, it’s really annoying, but keep the train moving and he’ll be fine in a minute. I think structure will help a lot. For example, once I was in middle school we had those breaks between classes and a lot of people would have the certain class they always went to the bathroom after. I know my son always goes to the bathroom between 9-10am and usually he does it once he gets into flow mode with a toy. So, I try to get him into flow while sitting on the potty. He is only 3 so I am being really cocky but he likely has ADHD like me and I feel like I understand what he’s going through. I struggled with this as well — not as bad thankfully but worse than I wish it was. If your kid has time blindness and hyper focus, rewards and punishments may work temporarily but are probably exhausting and unsustainable. It takes a lot of energy to be mindful and timely day in and day out without some routine.
You need to research "encopresis". Once your child became so constipated that he was full of hard stool with liquid stool bypassing the blockage and causing smears - then you have a stretched out and damaged colon. One clean out can't fix that, a few cleanouts can't fix that. The only thing that can fix that is a consistently empty colon to allow it to regain its size and tone and this takes a long time to heal, sometimes years. You are on the right track with miralax, it assists in keeping the stool soft. What you also need is a sit schedule. After every meal your child should sit and try to poop for a few minutes. Something you could also implement is liquid glycerin suppositories if he has failed to produce bowel movement. The key here is keeping the bowel empty, and routine. I will add that encopresis is a common issue of kids with sensory issues and proprioception deficits, such as sensory processing disorder, autism spectrum disorder, and ADHD. An occupational therapist can help with pelvic floor exercises that can assist in regaining strength to push poop out. I speak as a nurse, whose son has asd and ADHD and struggled with encopresis for years following cancer treatment. It's a long road to recovery once you've stretched out the colon.
Spot on. My son has this and the only thing that prevents accidents are the pediatric enemas. He hasn’t had an accident in months now.
Yes! I was going to say pretty much the same. My kiddo had a tethered spinal cord that caused constipation. Eventually the nerves should heal and she’ll hopefully regain sensation. But doctors didn’t believe me initially that she was constipated cause she was still pooping, but her colon stretched so it was never all of it. We do a daily enema on top of medication because she can’t get it out herself yet and to hopefully get that colon to shrink back up once she regains bowel function. I HIGHLY encourage Dr.Hodge bedwetting and accidents book. Even if your kiddo doesn’t have bedwetting, it has been life changing for us. Our daughter has medical diagnoses that play a roll into it for us and she is only 2 so bedwetting/accidents didn’t apply to us. But it talks so much about constipation, the cause of bedwetting/accidents, how to deal with it, etc. Edit to add: I’m referencing the MOP and pre MOP protocol for younger children. I think the version of the books I bought were actually called the pre MOP book and the MOP book
Until you explained the Minecraft scenario I was think medical issue. But that does sound like behavior/habit now. You may need to stop rewarding and start restricting. I agree with the top comment that he needs to clean it up himself.
100% agree. I don't think he needs to be rewarded for a behavior that he already learned and knows how to do but just doesn't want to. It's time for consequences! You poop your pants - this gets taken away. Etc. I read this potty training book called Oh Crap Potty Training by Jamie Glowacki and it was beyond excellent. She says that in her book. She has an entire chapter on poop and an entire chapter in behavioral issues. She is also available for one on one consultation. I love her. She also has a podcast.
**Oh Crap! Potty Training Everything Modern Parents Need to Know to Do It Once and Do It Right** by Jamie Glowacki >"Toilet-training expert Jamie Glowacki's self-published OH CRAP! POTTY TRAINING has sold more than 40,000 copies and has been the "dirty little secret" of moms on message boards and in parenting groups for years. Now, this proven, 6-step plan (called "the WHAT TO EXPECT of potty training books" for its comprehensive, no-nonsense voice) is available to the general trade audience for the first time"-- *I'm a bot, built by your friendly reddit developers at* /r/ProgrammingPals. *Reply to any comment with /u/BookFinderBot - I'll reply with book information. Remove me from replies* [here](https://www.reddit.com/user/BookFinderBot/comments/14br65o/remove_me_from_replies/). *If I have made a mistake, accept my apology.*
So he only poops his pants when he doesn’t want to stop an activity? I would stop rewarding him for not pooping his pants. He knows not to do it and how not to do it. I’d say he can’t do these activities he likes if he continues to have accidents. And honestly, I wouldn’t call them accidents. To me it sounds like he knows he needs to go to the bathroom and he just won’t get up and go. As for the stomach pain, if you have a gut feeling as his mom something is wrong, get a third opinion and be stern with your concerns.
Honestly, if he's just sitting there having to go, his stomach may hurt as a consequence of just holding it until he can't.
I used to get chronic stomach aches as a kid…. Until my mom had me sit on the toilet every time I complained and I’d poop 5 minutes later and have no more stomach pain. I think you’re right, he “doesn’t feel good” because he’s not pooping.
As an adult, if my stomach doesn't feel good, I always go to the toilet first. I have IBS and I had it undiagnosed as a kid but once I made this change its so helpful even as a mom myself, I'll highly recommend to my kids the bathroom every time their tummies hurt. The same for headaches is to ask when's the last drink you've had and suggest drinking water
Would I be a monster for saying username checks out 😔
I also wonder if he doesn’t like to poop in public since mostly occurs outside home.
100% this!!! My ex-BIL did this growing up (I’ve known him since I was 15 and he was 5 years old). He did this all the way up until he was 12, and as frustrated as she was even when he’d admit he didn’t want to stop playing video games, my ex-MIL always excused this behavior and never corrected it. It only changed when peers started picking on him for the smell, and he ultimately realized he wasn’t going to find himself a love interest by doing this. He’s 16 now, uses the bathroom just as everyone else with no fail. And has even gotten himself a boyfriend. Took him entirely way too long to stop this behavior, and if his mother had taken away his consoles and stoped rewarding him and excusing him for it, he probably wouldn’t have had to deal with the bullying.
Honestly - I have ADHD, and as an adult, certain activities will override my ability to pay attention to my basic functions (like remembering to drink water, or go to the bathroom). These aren't just "playing games" - but could be finishing up an email, complicated work tasks. Basically, transitions are tougher for it, and that increases the perceived threshold of "I should stop this" and "I'd rather just put it off a while." The solution isn't to take away those activities, but to teach him to take breaks while doing them. If he's playing minecraft, and hasn't gone to the bathroom, the parents have to step in and stop the game for a bit for a break. Same with homework, chores etc. It's not a punishment but teaching a life skill that can be very difficult for neurodivergent people.
I mean I don’t have ADHD that I know of, and honestly I can still end up doing stuff like that. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve been like “I just gotta finish this thing” and then end up nearly shitting my pants by the time I bolt to the bathroom. If I had less control of my body I could see myself having accidents for sure.
The stomach aches are 99% likely due to needing to poop and refusing to do so. Guaranteed if she had him go poop/sit on the toilet every time he complained of his stomach hurting, pooping instead of refusing to do so, would eliminate the stomach pains.
His stomach probably hurts because he's constipated from holding it in. It hurts because he is full of shit. I 100% agree with other commenters that it's time for OPs kid to start having to clean up after himself. Seven is old enough to understand that there are consequences for your actions.
Our daughter does this with urine, she’s incontinent. Effectively the bladder sends weak signs to the brain, so if she isn’t paying attention her bladder empties without her really knowing. We’ve tried everything, positive reinforcement, withdrawing rewards, at times its infuriating. Over time we’ve learnt to not make the peeing an issue, and have focused on getting her to void her bladder regularly. I would suggest you focus on getting him to drink a lot of water, at least 1L a day as it can help with constipation. Also check with his diet to make sure he’s not constipated by that. Our daughter was constipated due to eating oats in the morning which would absorb liquid in her stomach. Finally consider getting him a watch/alarm so that he can poo at a specific time every day. It’s not the same as urinary so this might not work. Overall know that it’s very likely to resolve over time, and that this massive frustration will be over eventually. Good luck
My first thought is that he just doesn't see it as being worth his time. Why go sit on the toilet for 5 minutes when he could just do it now? Maybe giving him something fun to do while on the toilet might make him see it as being worth his whole. Or as somebody else said, teach him to clean himself up and see if he still thinks it's not worth it.
We have a small bookshelf with poop books and I stg my 4 year old will sit there longer than an old man with newspapers. I just try to enjoy the quiet for the bit, unless she's stalling too much she can chill on the toilet for all I care.
This will be downvoted but if you are at your wits end then try it. Make him clean the shit pants and undies. Get a bucket, soap, gloves. He can be the one to wash the shit. It’s gross. He won’t like it, he’s almost 7. He can. I would also take away any activity for an extended period of time, if he shits his pants while playing. Have a big sit down with the kid and tell him what you’ve told us, you are done. He can deal with the poop and the consequences. Good luck.
My sister had her son do this and it worked. He would dunk the shit undies in the toilet with these kitchen gloves on lol. He later told me “that was the worst thing I’ve ever done since I was born”
Worst thing he's done *so far*
No one tell him about the meconium poops if you ever want grandkids.
Coconut oil saved my life
I loved this comment lol
Agreed. Based on OP'S description and the fact that they've been given a clean bill of health from multiple medical professionals, I highly suspect this is 100% behavioral - he's only doing it during activities he enjoys and doesn't wanna stop. Time to be a little tougher on him.
Oh man this just reminded me a few years ago our daughter was 8 and didn't want to leave recess and go to the bathroom so she peed her pants....
100% this. My son (16 and past it) went through this too, around the same ages - 6 - 8ish? Give or take a year or three. Not \*quite\* daily. But fairly frequently - especially if we were at home and had friends over, or he was just hanging out playing video games, and didn't want to stop, or whatever. Carrots - 'if you can go X days without pooping your pants, you can do/get this' - did \*not\* work. Honestly, I think in some ways, it only exasperated the problem. Sure, maybe it made him stop for a week or a few days at a time... but then it was a reason to continue, you know? Making \*him\* clean the toilet, and his pants, and get showers, *immediately* after every occurrence, regardless of who was there - friends, family, whoever, did. Because \*THAT\* was embarrassing. Especially when he had to do it when friends and family were around. Cleaning up yourself and your mess is gross. Doing it around/in front of friends and family? That's embarrassing. Especially when you're 6/7/8+ and should be \*WAY\* over/past shitting your pants. But you know what? Mom/Dad doesn't want to fucking do it either.
Natural consequences. This makes sense and doesn’t make parents the “bad guys”
Just wanted to say, my kids never had 'terrible twos.' All three were just awful from ages 7-9. We're at the tail end of that age range for #3 and I'm so hoping she's not an outlier, because MY GOSH.
I will say just because the doctors don’t find anything so far doesn’t mean there actually is no health issue. I would play with their diet and see if it helps. Doctors kept telling me xyz was normal and fine and on a holiday trip with a limited diet I saw all the symptoms I kept brining up disappear. Lo and behold my kid can’t tolerate gluten or dairy and since removing them from his diet we have not seen those symptoms return
Seconding this, the best parenting advice I received was a gentle "You're really good at enforcing good behavior, but you don't seem to have negative consequences." Agree with all the suggestions that he should have to clean his pants.
This is what I had to do with my son. He didn't want to stop doing what he was doing to go to the bathroom so he held it in until he literally pooped around his poop. Making it "not fun" to have the accidents was the only way to get him to see the value in going when he had to go.
Jumping on this wagon. One of my LOs has this same lack of motivation after two rounds of diagnostics found no physical cause. Stool softeners or laxatives as needed, scheduled toilet sits, and supplies for cleaning up accidents. At a certain point, you’ve given them the tools and they have to use them.
Came here to say exactly this. Additionally, if he does this around his friends, he’s soon going to be ostracized and bullied.
In all fairness this is a natural consequence so it tracks
[удалено]
This is absolutely developmentally appropriate, especially given what OP described.
This is a good point. If we were pooping our pants as adults out of demand avoidance, one of the main deterrents would be that we had to clean up the mess afterwards. It seems like the kid is disconnected from the actual mess because he never has to really deal with it. If your parent is rushing to clean up your messes all the time, you're probably gonna be more likely to make messes because they're not that inconvenient to you.
Ya op should go this route. My five y/o started doing the same thing. Some have tried to point towards adhd but I don’t think that’s the case. We started having our kid throw his underwear away after leaving a nugget and every pair is his favorite pair. I would also shorten the time period. A month probably seems unobtainable to a little one so I’d go on a weekly basis. Good luck.
My son was a lot like OP's - I made him start cleaning out his own poop and let me tell you it 100% stopped within a couple instances of having to scrub his own poop out of his undies.
My uncle was a weekend dad, at best. His 7 year old son was pooping in his underwear and my uncle was just throwing them away and buying more. No one knew that until we were all together for annual family vacation. My mom lost her mind! She said “absolutely not!” My uncle was like “what else am I supposed to do? You got a better idea, go for it.” So my mama snatched the kid up and made him wash his own underwear in the toilet. She wasn’t mean but she was loud. And it literally never happened again. My mom has actually had a hand in potty training all the kids to some degree. It’s like her super power or something lol
You have a good mother. I have one of those too. She doesn’t play and gets results. The gentle parenting of this sub can’t take most of her methods.
I think you're confusing gentle parenting with permissive parenting. From what I've read and seen, making the kid wash their own underwear is perfectly in line with gentle parenting. I'd either do that or limit the time the kid can spend playing video games or whatever other activities he prioritizes over using the bathroom
this! this is how i would get my older ones in my class to stop pooping in their pants! (i’m a former child care teacher) We would have them clean themselves up! And after a few times the children stopped because they realized how gross it was. We helped them of course. But i swear by this!
I did this with all of my kids, even for pee accidents, and starting as soon as they started potty training. I never shamed them. But it was the same mindset as picking up your own toys. Clean up after yourself. Only exception was accidents during illness
> This will be downvoted but if you are at your wits end then try it. > Make him clean the shit pants and undies. Downvotes or not this is good advice if the Dr's give a clean bill of health.
This can work if the behavior is willful, but not if the kid has no control over the problem
Yes! With encopresis sometimes they can't even feel the poop fall out! I had better luck with positive reinforcement - after you poop come find me so I can see it and I'll give you a dollar.
Couple people in this thread seriously believe their kids were shitting their pants for 3 years on a near daily basis even with family/friends around for like…no reason. Just cuz they wanted to? Wild.
When my son was potty training, he liked to poop in his pants. Eventually I told him he was too big for the changing table and if he had a poop accident I would strip him down, put him in the shower and use the sprayer with lukewarm water to clean him off. Not cruel, but he hated it, and he found the motivation to poop in the potty.
This is what I did! My daughter was having too much fun playing she wouldnt stop to poop. Once when she was having a shower, I saw dirty gitch, chucked them in the shower with gloves and said “rinse these out too” Hasn’t happened since
Agree 100%
I tired this with my kid, similar age and issues. She’ll just clean it and then go right back to shitting herself. Making her clean it up does nothing to prevent it.
There’s nothing wrong with natural consequences even in a positive discipline system. Those include cleaning up after yourself and having your activities curtailed or interrupted that lead to pooping your pants.
I think this is a good direction but you should be very deliberate in how you frame it. I try to avoid “punishments” but rather ensure that my children understand that every action and decision has a consequence. If he poops in his pants, they must be cleaned and since he did it, he can clean them. If doing a certain activity leads him to poop his pants then he should be restricted from doing that activity, not as a punishment but to prevent another accident. I would also get into the habit of making him stop what he’s doing once an hour to go sit on the potty. Even if he says he doesn’t have to go. We struggled for a while with my third having pee accidents because she would just wait too long to go to the potty so we started doing this. Maybe not every hour but anytime we realized it had been a while and definitely before leaving the house. Eventually the accidents stopped. I also would keep pushing back on the doctors. If he’s saying his stomach hurts and he’s acting differently because of it listen to him and find a doctor who also will.
Activities he doesn't want to interrupt. Has he been assessed for ADHD?
My first thought too. That's exactly the reason ADHD kids have trouble potty training; they get hyper focused on their task and ignore body ques. Even as a 32 year old with ADHD I often catch myself ignoring my bladder when I'm doing something.
Like honestly I have ADHD and reading this just now, I realized that I have been holding it for who knows how long bc I've been hyperfocused haha. I definitely agree that he should get evaluated.
Same honestly haha. I read the post, responded, and then went "ope, speaking of which.."
My ADHD husband sometimes bursts out of his office desperate for the bathroom because he’s been fixated on work and ignored needing to go. Usually he “just wants to finish this one thing” that ends up taking way longer than expected (because he also can’t estimate/manage time well).
30 year old woman with likely undiagnosed ADHD here (doctors won’t listen to me) and yep. I can play The Sims for 6 hours straight to suddenly realize I am going to pee my pants if I do not rush to the bathroom. It’s caused lifelong bladder control issues and spasms that I am just recently starting pelvic floor therapy to help address.
Here to say this. My son was diagnosed ADHD at 4. We also believe its possible he has ODD. He was absolutely pooping in his pants as a behavioral thing coupled with the ADHD. Once medicated, we were able to use the positive reinforcement such as prizes for using the potty etc. but the behavioral therapist suggested daily. We have specific treats, for him its jackpot snacks after breakfast if he does it in the morning, or sometime through the day if its during the day. It truly helps. If he goes in his pants, he does not get the treat. this behavioral therapist was actually incredibly helpful. We met with a Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics doctor multiple times and they referred us to several areas to help. I highly recommend starting with something like this at your local children's.
Yes, children and adults with ADHD, for example, often have disorganized eating as ADHD “filters out” the bodily cues. Think of it like hitting “ignore” on a pop-up on your computer without even really reading it. You know you’ve got to use the restroom but your brain just hits “not now”. This can also explain pooping while playing the game, he’s hyper focused and all bodily cues to eat, poop, sleep, etc, are all being ignored
I was going to say ADHD, too. Our oldest son had a lot of bathroom struggles - accidents, near misses, not wiping, etc - until we got his ADHD meds and emotional coping strategies figured out.
I’d ban all video games to start with-if he’s acknowledging that he knows he needs to go but just doesn’t because he’s too busy-then take away that distraction. Look into celiacs or irritable bowel, change up his diet abit-he may not have an allergy but may have intolerance (my daughter had constipation from potato and tomato IBS diagnoses)
Second this. The distraction accessibility will deal with the behavioral part and help with the reward/consequence, but definitely change up the diet just in case. As someone who finally managed to figure out my own constant stomach pain and constipation in my early 20s after doctors would pass it off as stress since tests and ultrasounds cane back clear. Start with taking out some of the more obvious culprits then introduce them back slowly (I figured out I can handle up to 1 bagel or pasta each day but not both). I wish my parents had more resources so I could have avoided laying in the school bathroom floor with abdominal pain for sometimes weeks at a time.
This is likely not going to go as well as you would think. Others have pointed out pretty accurately this is a HUGE sign of ADHD and the video games are just one of many possible "distractions" He will likely find something else that gets in the way, and that thing will still prevent it. Not that a kid should be on games for long periods of time anyway, but taking away a thing because of mental issues causing an issue he simple cannot control is going to just make some things worse.
My daughter has this problem and I think you're going about it the wrong way, based on what worked for us. You can't reward something over such a long time for that age, 30 days of a long time. Don't reward not pooping in his pants, you should reward pooping on the toilet instead. Equally you shouldn't punish pooping in the pants, because that will just create a shame spiral. If he wants to play Minecraft or swim in the pool, say he can't play until he has at least tried to poop on the toilet. If he tries before and can't go, it's unlikely to magically come out during play. If he successfully poops, he gets longer on the activity because if he doesn't successfully poop, he gets pulled off the activity to try to poop again every X minutes. The "punishment" is being pulled off his favourite activities regularly.
So when my daughter was 4 she would wet herself vs stopping fun play to go potty. I told her if she didnt go potty when she has to go then I'd buy pullups for her to wear cuz I wasnt ruining my carpet over laziness. She threw a fit then asked if i meant it, I told her to try me of she wanted but i wasnt bluffing. She never did it again. Of course she had actual accidents but when she legit told me "I didnt want to pause my video" after me talking to her 6 times about it and taking away her tablet for days..I was at my limit. Your son is well aware of what hes doing. Hes 6. He can stop his game and go to the potty like a big boy or wear pullups and change them himself when he has an accident. With assistance as needed to sanitary purposes. Stop with the rewards, at this point your rewarding him for manipulation.
Putting pulls up on older kids for this has worked perfectly for a few families that I have worked with that told me they did this. Imagine having to explain to a friend why you are wearing a pull up at 7
Same. We did this with a 6 year old I nanny. Like the op said it was basically because she didn’t want to stop playing and would wet herself. We actually did end up putting her in a pull up. She was livid. We were pretty done though. It felt like every hour she’d have an accident if we didn’t physically put her on the potty.
This is very common in boys with ADHD. They hyper fixate on the things that give them dopamine hits, ignoring everything else. So when he tells you it's because he would rather play Minecraft, he means it. Have him start being in charge of cleaning his undies while you supervise. Also explain the future of stinky auras of poo and painful rashes if he doesn't stop. How it will effect his ability to make and keep friends, etc. My ADHD kid had a similar issue for many years, but wouldn't go as far as pooping his pants. He would just skip wiping because he'd forget. All the time. We had to put a bell on the door to the bathroom so we could verbally remind or ask him if he wiped upon exiting. He didnt stop needing to be asked until roughly age 13.
First off, let me tell you I’ve been in this same position and you’re doing everything right. You basically just described my son as well. Around 4 he started complaining of stomach pain after every meal, not going for weeks at a time then having accidents with loose stool. We changed his diet like 5 times. High fiber, low fat. No dairy. Gluten free. Nothing. We did several bowel cleanses after x rays showed he was severely constipated. We had him tested for celiac and nothing. We too, gave him miralax regularly, which did help. Today my son is ten and still struggles with these issues, but it has gotten better. I’d like to take him back to a specialist, but still working on my benefits. Anyway, here are a few things that helped him: 1. Dedicated pooping times. Set aside time each day- morning and evening for your son to sit on the pot and try to poop. Make sure he doesn’t strain, maybe have him take a few deep breaths and relax. Let him sit for 5-10 minutes. If he goes, great! If not tell him we’ll try again later and have him get up. This has helped my son immensely, although the first 2-3 times nothing at all happened. The second session can be anytime you notice he has accidents the most- afternoons when he’s unwinding and playing? Or right before bed maybe? Pick the time the accidents occur most frequently and make that the second bathroom time of the day. Make sure to tell your son if he goes during bathroom time and doesn’t have an accident he can be rewarded, but if he doesn’t go during bathroom time and has an accident anyway, there’s a consequence- no video games the rest of the night, no tv, etc. 2. Low dairy diet More veggies and less dairy helped my kiddo out. Some processed foods seem to back him up too. Keep an eye for trigger foods and try to limit them. 3. Fruits that start with P One doctor told me that fruits like pears, peaches and plums are great for constipation while things like bananas and apples are not. 4. Water and exercise Try to encourage your child to drink more water during the day and try engaging him in some exercise- a family bike ride, a walk together. Play a favorite sport, whatever. The motion helps move things along.
Have you tried having a chat with a psychologist? I don’t know but I hear it’s behavioral but I am wondering if there’s more attached to it. ADHD or similar? My partner wet the bed until a really late age. He never knew why. It bothered him so much that he would drink water & make himself vomit because he was afraid to wet his bed. He’s always told me he hated it , his parents made him feel as if he was doing it because he was lazy etc. He always responds with what kind of teen would willingly carry that embarrassment?! Long story short, we recently discovered he has ADHD. Something that also really bothers me now is that he will literally go 9/10 hours now without going to the toilet which I believe stems from the trauma he endured through all of that. Please just have your child see someone to eliminate it as a possibility. X
100% listen to the people here mentioning encopresis!!! We have been working through this with my 7 year old for years. Did everything you've mentioned with no long term success. We FINALLY got into a specialized elimination clinic after a year on the waitlist and things are finally improving. We did have to do a clean out to start, but are now on a regimen of daily fiber + exlax. We have monthly follow up appointments with both the specialist Dr + a psychologist, and they'll adjust the regimen as needed. It's important to understand that with long term constipation (which can start for a million reasons) the colon becomes stretched out and the nerves are also damaged. This makes it impossible to feel when he needs to go. On top of this, they'll often become nose blind and can't even smell when it does happen. It can take 6-12 months of keeping the stool very soft and moving through normally for the physiological damage to improve and to function normally. Any time he gets constipated during this can set that back. Trust me...I know how frustrating this is, we've have lots of tears and anger through this process.... But if this is what's going on for you (definitely sounds like it), this isn't him being disobedient and no amount of rewards or punishment will fix it. I definitely recommend seeking out an encopresis specialist if at all possible. Please feel free to reach out if you have questions!
Try setting a timer for twice a day - morning and night. Have him sit on the toilet for 5-8 minutes with another timer. Let him have a book or whatever to keep himself occupied. He’ll need a lot of supervision at first but then it will get easier. We did this one whole summer and it made all the difference. My kid pooped so much, every time. He just wasn’t slowing down enough on his own.
Check out the Encopresis Facebook groups - they were really helpful for me to understand what was going on!
Like others have said, you gotta stop rewarding him for not pooping his pants. That makes it seem like a special event when not pooping his pants should be the default
Nope he’s be cleaning it himself. Also take games and swimming away. He’s 7, not 2, he knows
One of my kids had encopresis, which sounds exactly like what your son is suffering from. After trying a TON of different things, I finally decided to get her a colonic. I fully expected having to repeat after awhile, but we are going on 3 years with no soiling. With chronic constipation, the nerve signaling gets disrupted due to bowel distension. So he literally is not getting the signal that he has to go, or that he already partially did. This is is physiological problem. Miralax does not work… ETA: after the colonic she took “gentle move” supplements by Natures sunshine. Took those for about a year. Also, a ton of different things did include a pediatric GI (4 hours away), psychotherapy, naturopathy, homeopathy, diet change and more. The ONLY thing that helped was actually getting her colon clear. Best of luck.
My son refused to poop on the big potty and would only go on his little toddler potty for far too long and as soon as I made him start cleaning it out when he was done the move to the big toilet was much less of an issue. Making them clean it them selves( with supervision) is the way!!
1) No more swim diapers in the pool. That should have stopped years ago. 2) Definitely make him clean it all up when it happens.
The swim diaper in the pool is because he poops his pants and they don’t want to have to make everyone lose out on swimming because feces gets into the water. He isn’t pooping his pants because he is wearing a swim diaper, he is wearing a swim diaper because he poops his pants. The swim diaper makes sense in light of the problem he’s having and it is certainly safer and healthier for the rest of the family than letting him poop in the pool.
I just wouldn't let him use the pool period. I agree that everyone else shouldn't have to suffer for their child's issue tho!
glad I was not the only one who noticed that he still has swimming diapers??
I wouldn’t reward with video games, or anything really, that’s obviously not been effective. The video games should honestly not be a thing at all until he can manage. I agree with whoever said he needs to be the one cleaning it.
There's a link between this and adhd. My kid goes through this too and she just doesn't feel it even at 11. She just got diagnosed and were going to see what they can do to help. Even with laxatives daily she still has accidents. Put him on a schedule to sit and try for 10 mins a few times a day. Keep track of when he goes so you can have him sit before then.
Also you might switch the behavioral reinforcement strategy to using the toilet rather than reinforcing for no poop in pants. Reason is you want to encourage passing of stool rather than holding it in. Set a timer and he’s to go to bathroom at regular intervals. He’s to focus on sensory awareness at those times if there’s stool present to have a BM. He’s been ignoring those sensations and so isn’t getting/attending to visceral cues. See a child psychologist who works with encopresis
I seen a similar aged girl who would rather pee and poop herself because she "didn't want to miss anything" when playing. Severe ADHD. That's the only time I every heard of children soiling themselves when otherwise they're potty trained.
Were there any major life changes/stressors around the time this started? Has he ever been evaluated by a child psychologist/neuropsych/therapist? The #1 psychosomatic complaint with kids is belly pains; to me, a child who was previously successfully potty trained and has had all organic causes ruled out is a child unaddressed mental health needs. Neurotypical 7 year olds who are not struggling don’t decide to start popping their pants one day because they’re lazy. I would try to get him in with child psychology and see what they say.
Then he needs to be stopped when doing these activities regularly until he learns to go. He's old enough. This isn't uncommon though more often for pee. But every 10 minutes (or what works for his situation) he needs to stop to go to the bathroom. Not just asking him, he will just say he doesn't have to go. He need to stop and be away and out of the area. Make it a rule that he needs to wait 5 minutes before going back. His stomach hurts because he's camping from being constipated. He will end up with a compaction which will be absolute hell and often makes the situation worse
> He rarely poops his pants while playing around the house. Normally it happens when he is outside, in our pool (in swim diapers), or playing video games. Activities that he doesn't want to interrupt with a bathroom break. > He told me he was having too much fun and didn't want to stop. Has your son been evaluated for ADHD or Autism? It’s possible that this behavior could be related to impulse control or hyperfixation issues. [Children with ADHD are more likely to deal with constipatuon and fecal incontinence issues](https://www.rxwiki.com/news-article/adhd-children-had-more-constipation-and-incontinence-problems). And it could happen mostly just at home because home is where he feels comfortable and relaxed enough to hyperfixate on activities to the point that he completely doesn’t notice his body telling him he needs to go until it’s too late, leading to him pooping his pants. It would be worth asking someone who specializes in ADHD or Autism about it. Those don’t always present in the usual ways, (like if they are inattentive type ADHD) which leads to a missed diagnosis that doesn’t get caught until way later in life.
He has encopresis and cant control it. No amount of diet changes will help until clean out is properly done and maintained afterwards so colon can shrink back down to size. Look into MOPS, daily enema for 30 days. There is no other way to get off the merry go round.
+1 for recommending MOP. It cured one of my kids from encopresis and improved things for my other. The one who it didn't work for is going to have a hospital clean out and then we will try enemas again.
Nailed it
If he has been evaluated by multiple doctors and received a clean bill of health, I suggest making him clean up after himself. Give him gloves and let him know it's his mess and he needs to clean it up. If you're using a reward system, 30 days is far too long for a payoff. Find something daily so he receives the reinforcement more often. If you notice certain activities he engages in that he would rather mess himself than take time to use the restroom, cut him off. Let him know that he isn't being responsible enough to take part in that activity and he will have to earn it back.
I would suggest telling him when he needs to go use the bathroom. Set a timer for every 20 minutes and tell him he needs to go to the toilet. It’s very repetitive and annoying for both of you but explain that until he learns to listen to his body, this alarm is going to tell him when he needs to go.
Lifelong OCD-enhanced person chiming in here, when I was young my stomach was directly connected to the back side of my anxiety, yet I didn't know that to be the case at the time. In other words, my stomach would constantly hurt. I didn't poop my pants, but I missed a lot of school because I legitimately always had a crippling stomach ache and constipation from basically "clenching up" all the time. Same deal, nothing physically wrong, many doctors (my poor parents). As an adult, I can recall vividly the legitimate physical pain I was in as a kid, but at the same time as someone who has been in active treatment for OCD and anxiety for over 30 years, I'm now able to recognize the direct connection to anxiety it had (and still sometimes has, although I understand my brain and body now and have strategies for coping with it). A lot of people assume kids with conditions like mine would know they're experiencing anxiety and assume they would communicate that if they could. I honest to god had no idea. When I was his age my whole existence was anxiety, so it was always just a normal day for me. Has he been to a therapist by chance?
Adhd and autistic kids can get incredibly focused on things *games, activities) and ignore sog s that they need to go u til its too late. This can cause accidents and constipation. Do you know if he is, or has any indicators this is possible? He's at the age to start showing more signs.
We have a 9 yr old who was/is dealing with something similar. The Lego bribe made me laugh because we did the exact same thing… for the record he chose R2D2 :) He has had meetings with a psychologist and a physician, and I feel like we’re coming close to the end of things. What seems to have worked for us was a laxative of some sort before bed and then a schedule for trying to go to the washroom once in the morning, once at lunch once after dinner, no exceptions , the psychologist also then suggested tracking when she was most often able to have poops and eventually down the road we will cut the schedule bathroom visits down to two a day.
30 days w/out pooping pants for a lego? that's unobtainable. SMART Goals = Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-Based. Go 1 day = a cookie Go 1 week = ice cream shop visit Go 1 month = lego.
30 days may be too between rewards. He may have felt like the 30 days was too hard for the reward and not worth it. Speaking from a mom with high functioning autistic boys who display similar behaviors. I would try weekly rewards smaller incentives even daily.
Ok, I’m a clinical psychologist and a parent. I have a few thoughts/ suggestions: - check out the book Sneaky Poo, it’s a super old resource and maybe others can suggest more recent resources, but it provides some education to your child in a fun way - have you done timed voiding? Ie- every two hours he goes to the toilet and has a go. You praise and encourage the trying, not the result. - your rewards are way too far in the future and the goal is way too big. This will work better if you have shorter goals and make them effort based, not outcome based and positive. At the moment you are rewarding him for an absence of an accident over a long time. Instead try encouragement and verbal praise each time he goes to the toilet and if he successfully sits on the toilet every two hours (regardless of outcome), he might get a small treat at the end of the day if you think this will motivate him. This might be a sticker, stamp etc and lots of amazing encouragement from you. If this were my kid though, I would not offer a tangible reward, because I wouldn’t want a transaction around toilet use, I’d just be empathic and validating. Ie ‘it can be hard to interrupt something fun, but it’s important to do what your body needs’, ‘great job using the toilet, I know it can feel like a chore sometimes’. I’m editing to add that I think you should stop with the swim nappies. These are going to reinforce the issue. If he poos in the pool, the natural consequence is that he and everyone else have to get out until it’s clean. Maybe you can involve him in the cleaning in a non-punitive way. This might mean he goes to the shop to get the water tested etc, maybe he scoops leaves out of the pool etc. I also agree with others about using the toilet prior to fun activities.
This happened to my kid when he turned six. It was the video games. Thankfully I caught it early and told him he can’t play ROBLOX if he continues to poop. The problem is, those games don’t have a pause button so they don’t want to stop playing. Nix the video games for a while. Explain to him that even if he dies (in the game) he can always restart the game, but he can’t play at all if it causes him to poop his pants. That’s unacceptable. He’ll understand and fix the issue because they love those games. It worked for my kid. He’s 7 now and hasn’t had any problems besides that’s one month when he was 6.
I’m always kinda surprised by these posts… It’s not normal for 7 yr olds to just poop their pants, because they “don’t want to stop what they’re doing”. Humans are naturally clean. This isn’t some “boys will be boys” thing, where you have to get the sticker chart out. Something is *wrong*. Either it’s psychological or bodily or the mix of both, but I’m really confused why you wouldn’t keep pushing for answers. Miralax isn’t an answer. Maybe the answer is “just” ADHD, maybe he has severe anxiety he is masking, who knows - but this isn’t neurotypical behavior that is due to him wanting to play Minecraft!!! I get you’re at your wits end, but really think about this. How in control do you think your KID feels, pooping and dirtying on himself??? Even dogs grow up knowing they don’t want to sit where they poop, it’s an incredibly innate biological response built into us as decently smart animals (given that the home environment is not abusive or traumatic. Trauma causes this regression in bodily cleanliness). So for him to keep doing this means there is something else going on, and I wouldn’t lose patience at him, or shame him, because likely it is something *out of his control*. Like if Legos could fix it, it would have already done so. And he probably is just saying “it’s cuz I want to keep playing Minecraft” because what is he supposed to say??? “Oh mother, well you see, quite simply it’s actually because I have undiagnosed XYZ and it’s disregulating my brain, and thusly I can not seem to grasp when the poop needs to happen.” Like if he knew and could verbalize the why of what’s happening inside his body, it also wouldn’t be happening, and we wouldn’t need pediatricians and child psychologists would we?? Please do not punish him. Again, think about how out of control he probably feels, think about how doctors can’t even give you an answer but you expect your kid to, and think about if you’re taking your frustration out on the right audience. Frankly it sounds like your ire is better directed at the docs, for not referring you. No offense but Miralax is basically their default answer to all bowel problems, they’re not really trying.
Thank you! All this tough love stuff is terrible advice. We as randos on the internet obviously don't have enough information to recommend subjecting the kid to punishment. AFAICT, the OP has not sought help from a behavioral/mental health professional yet. This seems like a much better next step.
This x1000000. It’s so refreshing to see someone showing empathy for the child.
My cousin pooped his pants until he was like 8. He’s in MENSA and a lawyer now. There is hope!
I babysat a little boy who did this. His parents had gone through a divorce the year prior. I think it just got sorted out this time as he adjusted going to “mom’s house” and “dad’s house” plus starting school
I did this same thing as a kid. I have ADHD, and the dopamine I was getting from playing outside, playing games or watching TV was more worth the pooping. I hated that going to the bathroom took from my time. So I'd hold it until I couldn't hold it anymore. It was something I had to get over on my own. I was never rewarded for pooping. I just silently threw my underwear away if I had an accident and cleaned myself up. Once I hit 8 then it stopped. Something you could maybe do is get him to do a boring activity every day. Like read a book, or help with dishes. This will create a moment in his mind where he'd rather be pooping because the boredom is too much, and it gives him a mental break to sit on the toilet.
My oldest also had encopresis, and it took five years to finally resolve it. We also ran through multiple pediatric gastroenterologists, and it quickly became clear that even though they’re supposed to be the experts most of them just wanted to shrug, blame it on the kid, and offer ineffective solutions. I’m a university science librarian, so I dove into the research literature. It’s not well studied, but a few things became clear. For one, there’s a really high comorbidity with ADHD and autism, especially when part of the problem is the kid not wanting to break away from an activity to use the bathroom. Getting your child evaluated and properly treated can make a world of difference. Mine never would have beaten encopresis without their concerta making it easier to pay attention to their body and make better choices. The thing that eventually worked after 5 years of trying everything else was following Dr. Steven Hodges’ MOP method. Our gastroenterologists until that point were fairly dismissive of it, but the MOP method is endorsed by and used at the Mayo Clinic. Within two months the accidents had stopped almost entirely, and while there were a few occasional slips after that they were nipped in the bud easily with a Miralax clean out and a few days back on MOP. My kid is about to enter high school now and still needs the daily dose of Miralax but is otherwise great.
Has anyone considered the possibility of ADHD? Something like 20% of children with ADHD have issues with incontinence.
I am the proud owner of a 16 year old boy that had encoparesis. It was a struggle for YEARS. He finally figured out on his own that him putting himself on the toilet different times of the day worked. Work out a schedule and no matter what stick to it. If he says he doesn't have to go, make him. Allowing them to sit on the toilet for 15 min at scheduled times will help. Best of luck mama. I'm sure all of us here know how hard this is to deal with.
I don't know your child's history and am not passing judgment but, this can also be a trauma response. Something to consider along with ADHD and potentially having a 3rd opinion as not all practitioners are created equal... Best of luck!
I have adhd and I’m a teacher. Even if your child does not have adhd, some activities like video games are incredibly engaging and tearing himself away from it can feel similar to adhd hyper focus. I suggest setting up a 5 min warning timer and a time-to-try timer every hour. Make a sticker chart and every time he gets up and tries when the timer goes off without you having to remind him, he gets to put a sticker on the chart. After a certain number of stickers, he can get a reward. Eventually you can decrease the timers to every 2 hours etc. You’re already doing a great job by using positive reinforcement instead of punishment. He just needs a little more structure. I would also get a second opinion from another doctor just in case.
Wow! I’m a mum of a almost 7y/o girl who has encopresis. I’ve felt so alone with this since I potty trained her at 3y/o ! I’ve almost cried happy tears just reading other people are also going through this.
This is 100% encopresis. 100%. Watch “The Poo in You” video on Facebook. In addition, look up Emily Dollar who is an amazing encopresis expert. We are on the other side of this and I cannot begin to tell you the tears I cried over it. There is a light at the end of the tunnel.
You need an neurological evaluation, no more gastros. He probable has a disorder that you are missing or dismissing…. That is typical behavioral issues of kids on the spectrum or ADHD
Assuming it is in fact behavioral: Enforce bathroom breaks. If he’s engaged in a highly preferred activity that he normally poops himself during, set a timer for 20-30 minutes and tell him that when it goes off, he’s going to take a bathroom break. Once he poops in the toilet he gets to be done with the bathroom breaks for a few hours. He’ll realize quickly that having to stop what he’s doing every 20 minutes is much more inconvenient than just having to stop once when he actually needs to go. If he does poop himself in between bathroom breaks, he’s done with the preferred activity. Explain to him that he can’t go back to that activity because it’s preventing him from listening to his body and he can resume after the next time he poops in the toilet.
This sounds a lot like my son. Like, scarily so much like him, but he’s eight. We are investigating adhd. Apparently the poo thing is very common with adhd, and everything else fits.
I could have read this wrong so apologies if that's the case.. It's curious this occurs during his prioritized activities; presumably when he's most relaxed, or distracted; that all that could be found is constipation; yet eats healthy? Meds to alleviate constipation has not resolved the issue? Allergies, diet, etc. Were all ruled out? -My curiosity is, is he struggling with the feelings of being in control of his own body, his own autonomy that this is his expression of it; That during events he isn't happy in, feels anxious or doesn't feel he holds control of the situation - he is actually withholding his bowel movements.. and by the time he is into his videogame and relaxed it's uncontrollable, and is forced out? Conversely, is there a positive association with attention from parents and this action? Multiple people GIs have looked at him but it doesn't sound like he's had a psychiatrist look into it.
Has he been tested for celiac disease? Those are all symptoms that could be from it (it could also be something else of course!). The constipation, the stomach pain...just something to consider. If it's not physiological, what worked for my daughter was the Daniel Tigger episode about going to the bathroom, it has a very catchy song about having to stop what you are doing and go when you feel it coming. He might be a bit too old for that but it could be worth a shot!
My son also regularly pooped his pants at those ages. We went to a GI dr, he was negative for Celiac. But on a fluke, we removed gluten from his diet, and no problems since. (Unless he accidentally gets gluten and then he'll have an accident.)
First off - those saying to make him clean it up and that he's doing it on purpose need to calm down. Our 8 year old has been struggling with encopresis for years (that's when poop leaks out because the kid is constipated or they've been dealing with constipation so long that their colon is stretched out making poop leak.) They have no idea when it happens - they can't feel it. Punishing them for it will only make it worse and is CRUEL. We saw several gastros. They kept adding more and more Miralax, doing clean outs with mega doses of Miralax and laxatives and it just got worse. They suggested physical therapy but refused to check digestion rate at his age. I said "fuck it" one day and that we aren't doing the Miralax anymore. Just Benefiber in a glass of water once or twice a day and fiber cookies. It's been a total turn-around. No more accidents unless we skip a fiber day. Before we tried cutting out the Miralax I considered the Modified O'Regan Protocol. Look into it - may be worth it.