Hello Moms. My son will be 3 1/2 years old in about 5 weeks. He has done a great job with keeping his Pull-Ups dry all day and is even staying dry through the night. It all changes when it comes to pooping! He has yet to poop in the toilet or potty chair. He simply will not go. When I see that he is being sneaky and gets in his pooping position, I will take him to the toilet with no luck. He will hold it in until he can be back in his Pull-Up. There has also been times when he will go all day without pooping and wait until the next day when he can find a chance to sneak and poop in his Pull-Up. After he poops, he immediately comes to me and wants to be changed. Is this common and are there any tips to help him ease into this transition? Or, do I play the waiting game?
Thank you for any commments or advice.
Thanks so much for the responses. I have been reading other materials & doing some good research on the psychology behind toilet training. It seems as if us adults assume that it needs to go like clock-work because going to the bathroom is second nature to us. But, I have learned that some children, although they appear to be ready, just aren't physically and psychology ready. I have also gotten pediatric advice that in some cases, their muscles aren't mature enough to push out poop while on a toilet (that's why some need to be lower on a potty chair so their feet can touch the floor). I am choosing not to go the route of making my son clean his own poop or blast him with cold water only because like someone else said, I KNOW he will make a bigger mess than what it originally was. I would feel horrible if I went to drastic measures (I've already regretfully allowed this to ruin a good day) only to find out that there is a true, deeper issue behind him not going poop on the toilet. For now, we have taken away the little candies that we give him for peeing. We have told him that since he is a big boy and does a great job with peeing, that now candies are only for pooping. We will see what happens later! Again, thanks for the tips.
Okay, I read somewhere that children that age may see their poop as an appendage and it upsets them to see it flushed away......
You might try the child's potty for awhile and then let him watch you pick it up and flush it away.
Or try taking him in the bathroom with you. After you poop let him watch it go away and know that you are okay.......Then give it time. He won't want to stay in those diapers forever.
It is ok. a lot of kids get poop shy. This may sound weird, but let him see you or his father or sibbling if he has one do it. also consider getting a book, like "everybody poops" or something of the like. Be calm, don't push, it will happen. Set up a reward system. Use a potty chart...use regular stickers for pee, and exciting sparkly stickers for poop or whatever floats his boat.
You could do marble stones in a jar too. yellow for pee, and blue for poop...if he gets 5 poop stones, then maybe he gets a prize or he gets to choose dinner, or a trip to the library or bookstore or whatever works in your house.
Just know that this is perfectly normal. You know your child best. Some children react well to transitions, others just need a little more time to process them...Pooping in the potty is a huge transition.
I think it's normal to master peeing in the toilet first--especially for boys. The peeing (for boys) is all just so, OUT THERE. They can see/understand exactly what is happening....poop, not so much. My son liked the book Once Upon a Potty (boy version) b/c it actually shows where the poop comes out of (and--yes--he had to check his out in the mirror--just another thing no O. ever told me about! LOL)
Also, O. time, he had pooped in his pullup and I rushed him to the toilet and the poop was stuck to his bum and I--uh--kind of "knocked" the poop off of him and into the toilet and then went wild with praise! Kind of tricked him into thinking he did it once, so he was more confident about doing it in the future.
Good luck!
The exact same thing happened when my son was that age. He did fine peeing in the potty but refused to poop. He would wear underwear and when he had to poop I would put a pull up on him and he would then hide and do his business. I would then put back on his underwear. One day-out of the blue-it stopped and he went in the potty with no problem. I want to say it was closer to 4 years old. So don't worry, he will be fine. Potty training ALWAYS works itself out sooner or later.
dont change him right away and make him sit and wait for you.... let him know you are busy and will change him in a bit and when he protests remind him had he gone in the potty he wouldnt be sitting in his poop. he will not like to sit in it and that may make him decide that in order to be comfy hes going to have to sit on the potty...
Oh I feel your pain! We are dealing with that right now with our son that is turning 3 in a couple weeks. We let him run around pantsless at home to encourage peeing (which has worked), diapers when he sleeps and have him in underwear most of the time when we leave the house. He's pooped in the potty before but decided one day that he just wouldn't do it anymore and now waits until nap/bed time when we put a diaper on to poop even if he sits on the potty for awhile first. Or he'll poop in his underwear. He cries when he does that but no matter what encouraging we do he keeps doing it. My oldest was the opposite.
I'm going to get some Matchbox/Hot Wheels cars for him for when he poops since candy bribes aren't working. If that doesn't work he's going to start cleaning himself, that worked for pee accidents (gave him a towel and made him stand on it to soak it up from the carpet and put the wet clothes in the laundry)
He is playing you and you're letting him! Get rid of the pullups, NOW. Just tell him that there are no more pullups, and from now on, he is responsible for cleaning himself AND his pants when he poops. (Why would he stop when you're doing all the work?) He has control, so let him be responsible. It's no different than picking up his toys-----"you made the mess, you can clean it up". Then just supervise the process without showing any emotion, except to praise him for doing a good job. "Oh, you pooped. Now you can wash, change your clothes, and clean your pants in the sink." I guarantee he won't do it for more than a few days, but even if he does, you are out of the equation.
this worked for my stubborn daughter... its a power struggle, put him in underwear and tell him that if he poops in them he has to clean the mess..then when he poops..take him to the bathroom, make him take his underwear off and dump the poo into the toilet, then put him in the bathtub(not filled with water) turn the water on cold, squirt some soap into his undies, make him wash his poo out of his undies, then make him wash his bum off...a few times of this and he will want to go in the potty...do not make it fun, be firm in his instructions and good luck!
my daughter did the same thing-i think you have to let him take his pace otherwise he will regress. My daughter after awhile was fully potty trained right before she turned 3 years old. She eventually went to the toilet.
I read that they are afraid because the "poop" is part of their body and when it disappears in the toilet, they feel they have lost part of themselves. I know it sounds silly, but we had this problem and followed the advice. If he pooped in his pants, we took it and flushed it down the toilet but only after saying: "bye bye poopy". When we got him to actually do it in the toilet we followed the same ritual. It took a little while but it became a game and he was less threatened by loosing "part of himself".
This sounds a bit crazy but I told my son that the poop and pee are freinds and that they go to the "ocean" when they are flushed down the toilet ( like Nemo). He fall for it and was excited to go both poop and pee in the toilet and waves by-by to them. Weird I know but I had to think outside the box b/c he was afraid or confused about going poop. The white lie worked b/c he was happy everytime he had to go.
My son did this too. He was 2. I would put him on the potty and he wouldn't go and wouldn't for days after, but if I put the diaper/pull up on him then he would go hide and do his business, so I did that. One day we were in public and he had underwear on and got the runs so we ran to the bathroom and I set him on it and at that point he didn't have a choice and went and was fine from that point on.
If he's staying dry then I would get rid of the pull ups, at least during the day. If he has stayed dry at night for at least a week straight then he probably doesn't need them then either. Sometimes they get "lazy" to the pull ups.
I'm just going to copy an answer I gave in another similar question yesterday...since your son is a little older (and around the age my son was when we had this problem) maybe it's more apropos.
I had problems getting my son to poop on the toilet...he just wouldn't (period). We had the same pull-up problem you do. No amount of cajoling or heckling would make him poop anywhere but in a pull-up. He was stubborn! And I was so at my wits end (this went on until he was a little over 4...yes, it took forever! Finally I resorted to the big bribe...I bought a toy ( at the time it was a large Lightning McQueen that he reeeeeaaallly wanted.) I put it in sight but out of reach on top of the refrigerator. I told him if he goes poop in the potty he gets it. It worked. The next time it was w/ a smaller toy but still something he wanted...the next time it was just a matchbox car,after that stickers. We worked our way down until going on the potty wasn't the big deal it had been and became habit. I know a lot of people don't like the idea of bribing but it worked for us and we were desperate for a solution. So give it a try...what toy does he really really want? Is it worth it to him to get the toy that he's willing to give up pooping in the pull-ups? To me it was (at that point) just about changing his mind-set and his habits.
My son is 3-1/2 today and I am having the exact same issues. Everyone puts in their 2 cents, but I started worrying about it so much, and my hubby was really yelling at our little guy, and guess what...he wouldn't go poop at all.....7 days later, we had to give him a glycerine suppository because he was under so much pressure... and got really sick and had a stomach ace so bad. Every child is different. It has only been a couple weeks, but when he poops, I clean it up, and call it a day. (It is just not worth it to me for him to get it on my time table - it needs to be on his own)...
(Although my little guy used to go poop on the toilet, don't know what the heck happenend, cuz' now he just doesn't. He did go pee yesterday, and accidentally went poop, so I made a big deal of it! Who knows. aarrggghhh, rough times!)
We have tried the matchbox, so when he does go, we do give him one, and he does love it though!
My little guy won't wear his underpants anymore either - just his diaper, but he never has pee accidents (for about 4 months or so), and he is dry about 50% of the time in the morning...we just put the same one back on (as long as it is clean).
And Diapers are the same things as pull ups in my opinion! Just when they go poop, it is easier to take a diaper off then a pull up, and when they go pee, a diaper is alittle harder to put on, but I mastered that one!!!
And just in my opinion, I don't get into that having your kid clean up the poop mess... they are not a dog that you could rub their nose in it...plus mine would probably have it all over their hands, and then if it doesn't get clean all the way, yuck...yeah, I don't like that one! ha! (At least for me).
Again, the matchbox cars were working "alittle". Keep trying, something will work.....
So weird, especially because my daughter was potty (and poop) trained by 2 by day, and 3 by night.... Everyone's different!!!!
Good luck to all!!!
