Has anyone stopped movicol /medication altogether?

[Ztoorawa]

Has anyone stopped their childs medication altogether.. My daughter had been on movicol for 9 months, her constipation problem is coming upto a year. No medicine seems to be working for her now as it did previously. We have tried disempaction this time round and under instruction of the peadiatrian done 21 days on 12 sachets with just type 4 poos. No loose or watery stools at all. Changed her laxatives and tried them all. Lactulose, senna, sodium picosulphate, biscodyl, and docusate. They all work initially and then they just stop and she can't poo for a week or longer. It's as if her bowels have gone to sleep.

When she has a bowel movement it would trigger pain all over her body, especially her thighs and down the back of her legs, it's as if the pushing is pressing something on her spine.

Then she's in this pain a good part of the night, only sleeping at 3 -4 o clock, then getting up at 7 to go to school.

I've made a decision to stop all medication. Don't know if I should have but I'm going to let nature take its course. She's had 2 bowels movements on her own type 5 in a week. I've also started her on some food supplements that has high doses of your everyday fruits and pro and prebiotics. All natural. Sometimes I think we just need to take a step back... each case is different and in most cases movicol works when you get the dose right according to the comments on here but for my daughter even 12 isn't working. Still on the waiting list to see gastro at Manchester till then it's just trail and error. My daughter is like many on here being affected psychologically too. Says she doesn't want to live. That she can't do this any more.

Please can anyone comment of they stopped medication. I'm scared if I'm doing the wrong thing?

Thanks in advance.

Wish everyone the very best and hope our kids get past this and go onto lead happy normal lives.

[SallyandPaul]

As you say everyone is different but we had a bad experience when we stopped. Our daughter is nearly ten and has been on medication for six years. We were told to stop for a week whilst she had X-rays at the hospital for bowel tracking. This resulted in her being doubly incontinent for six weeks until her bowel regained some muscle tone, it was absolutely horrendous!!But I don't blame you for trying .

[Ztoorawa in reply to SallyandPaul]

Hi. Thanks for taking the time to reply . My daughter luckly doesn't have any incontinence as i have read on here may of the children do.

She's passing medium amounts of stool every day for the last 4 days, although hard type 3's and has started feeling the need to go rather then being reliant on the stimulants.

The pain throughout her body has subsided significantly, although she has some back and chest discomfort still.

I just feel that even the highest doses of movicol were not giving her any results. More recently she was on 4/5 satchets plus docusate in high doses but wasn't going for a poo for nearly 10 days... plus all the pain and discomfort. It's just not sitting right in my mind. Call it motherly instinct and I hope I'm right because I'd hate to put her through anything more.

I am still really unsure if I'm doing the right thing but I feel like we're going down a spiral that will only get worse as she slowly becomes unresponsive to all the medication and it becomes a life long problem.

Wishing you all the best with your little one. 6 years is a very long time. Pray that she has full recovery and good health always.

[SallyandPaul in reply to Ztoorawa]

That all sounds really positive well done,I really pray it continues because movicol certainly doesn't solve it. At last things are starting to improve for us,she is still on medication but the accidents are far fewer.Good luck x

[Frustratedmum1]

Hi ya. I can sympathise with how you are feeling. My son has been up at 12 sachets of movicol and has had sodium Piculate and it is horrible to watch. People don't realise how much of a strain it is on the child.

My advice to you would be you know your child best and i have found if something is not sitting right there is usually a reason. Believe in yourself and do what you think is right. Sometimes you need to go down a road to help you on your journey.

I have found water consumption can help but this is hard when they are on 12 sachets.

I have put my son on prune juice. We have also looked at diet and we try to make it more varied. To the stage I buy veg I haven't cooked before and wonder what I do next. I was told to increase seeds ie flax seeds. We also use a chiropractor. Cant say it is a cure but it does seem to help.

I wish you all the luck in the world

[Allyem1976]

The trouble is with stopping or reducing is blockage or impaction. I have recently reduced my daughter from 4 a day to 2 1/2 A day and since Tuesday she's done nothing but vomit cause she can't poo. I have tried disimpaction at home but she's still vomiting so time to visit A&E today to get an x ray to see what is STILL in there.

Getting Movicol right isn't easy. We boarder on either can't go or runny poos and that results in accidents. It's now affecting my daughter emotionally because her father ( my ex) cannot cope with the accidents. Telling her off isn't helping or necessary. And now she gets fearful when he tells her off that she's choosing to not tell him she's had an accident. It's now resulted in him subjecting me to verbal.abuse and choosing to walk away and not see our daughter rather than change his behaviour.

The main thing here is getting a happy medium so our daughter does not feel like it's her fault and fewer accidents mean he doesn't tell her off. But this is proving very difficult. I don't know what the answer is. The pedatrian isn't very helpful.

[Ztoorawa]

Hi. I'm sorry at how ur daughter is struggling... I know it gets very stressful but it's wrong that ur ex can't control his anger. Poor baby, they're going through enough as it is.

I have come to the conclusion and im really sorry I didn't take this step sooner. Each case is individual but stopping my daughters medicine is the best thing I've done. All off it has stopped working on her. We went to the highest doses and initially they would work but eventually they would stop working. The movicol was the same and then even on 12 sachets she stopped going. The side effects , bloating, wind, chest and back pain were not worth the odd poo she managed. This super food supplement and an occasional herbal laxative is all she's on now. Pain free and much happier. Still very fussy and i constantly nag her to eat fruit and drink water but she's doing alot better.

I was and I'm still ready worried if I've done the wrong thing but it's been 10 days and she's the best she's been in months

[Missdemeanor87]

I decided to stop my little ones movicol as we could never get the right dosage. I'd even come to just one sachet was making her poos runny and making her bottoms extremely sore like her poo was burning her. But she is currently on on nothing, and still holds her poos partially. She sort of let's them out. But not entirely. What else can u use to help her 'let go'. She is 3 and 7 months and is partly potty trained. She, for some reason, is fine going to the loo at nursery, doing most wees and some poos there but doing nothing at home. She does also complain her back hurts but I put that down to how she sometimes contorts herself to keep her poo in 😏. What super food suppliment do you use? And people have been saying about senekot as well? I'm so pleased to be able to talk to other mums and dads about this problem, which is obviously more common than I first realised. I put my little girls one down to having a particularly hard poo when she was a baby and the experience is logged in her memory but she doesn't particularly remember now she just seems to believe it's gonna hurt to do a poo. Woohoo soz for the essay. Xx

[Ztoorawa]

It's a difficult age but by what you describe she's playing you up, as they do to their mums. If she goes at nursery I don't see why not at home. Maybe try rewards . When my kids were little I used to have a lucky dip with small wrapped prizes for good behaviour.

The super foods i use i must say have absolutly brilliant reviews. My daughter is medication free except for giving her one herbal tablet this week as her poos were quiet hard initially when I stopped medication. Today she hard her first proper poo, soft type 4, on her own and felt the urge to go without any stimulants or stool softners. The supplement,

newgendirect.com/index.php?...

I'm not sure how to share the exact product with you but if you copy the link above it should take you to the product.

It's not cheap but still worth it and it's got so much needed nutrition that we can't possibly manage to consume in our diets.

If you need any help please ask I don't mind xx