4 year old resistance to toilet scheduling after disimpaction! Help!

[Bambie83]

My 4 year old daughter has just come out of the second disimpaction since Christmas and now on a maintenance dose of Laxido which seems to be doing the trick.

However, we’re finding it frustratingly difficult to get her to poo on the toilet. We’re trying to schedule her toilet trips and most of the time she poos when we get her on it. A few times she’s told us she needs it but other times she does it her pants again.

Obviously I’m aware her colon etc will be stretched and it will take time for things to go back to normal where she can feel the urge to go - hence the scheduling. But she’s resistant (doesn’t like being told what to do if it’s not her idea) and it’s causing a lot of stress (on both sides).

So far we tried -

Setting an alarm and asking her to choose the music

Reward charts

Chocolate buttons

Bubbles

Songs and rhymes

I’m at the end of my tether - any advice?

[Health365]

Hi, I can totally understand how frustrating this is for you, I was in a similar situation with my 4 year old girl, disimpaction and Movicol, refusing to go to the toilet when I asked her, and then she would wee or poo in knickers shortly after. I talked to a family friend who worked with children for many years and she said that it sounded like an issue with control, my daughter is very stubborn and doesn’t like being told what to do. Sigh. Her advice was to give my little girl more responsibility, so I sat her down one morning and told her that she’s a big girl of 4 now and is old enough to decide when she needs to go to the toilet herself. And then I completely stepped back and never mentioned anything toilet related to her again. It was like a weight was lifted, even my husband noticed the tension was gone when he got home. Now we have 1 or 2 accidents a day max, significantly down from the usual number of 6 or 7 daily accidents, on bad days we would have 10+. I’m putting the 1 or 2 accidents down to her colon probably being stretched and we’re still fine tuning the Movicol dose. Some days she’s completely dry which gives me hope we’re going in the right direction. It’s kind of like she’s learning all the toileting again but on her own terms now. I’m still available to help if she needs it and we all give a big cheer and plenty of praise if she tells us she’s done poos in the toilet. Overall we’re a much happier house now. Not sure if this would work for you but maybe worth a try. Best of luck, you’ll get there eventually!

[Bambie83 in reply to Health365]

Thank you that’s very helpful - she too works better when she makes the decision to do something.

[Robinia in reply to Bambie83]

My son is a lot older (11) but incontinent of bowel with some recent success- I am now paying him to go to the toilet unprompted if he does poo in it! Or he gets an hour extra playing on his ps4.

(His choice).

We also do scheduled tries on the loo but the big rewards are for using it unprompted. He’s also on very high meds which help prevent him withholding.

I know at that age it’s very different but just wanted to let you know it’s very common 😬

[Bambie83 in reply to Robinia]

Thanks it’s good to know I’m not on my own!

[Robinia in reply to Bambie83]

Definitely not 🤗

[Hidden in reply to Health365]

Put her back in nappies 24/7 like I do

[Hidden]

Hi my kid is 5 and in nappies 24/7 so no worries

[Bambie83 in reply to Hidden]

Thanks for the reply - we briefly put her back in pull ups during the last stages of disimpaction and it made her really lazy so she wasn’t even weeing in the toilet anymore (which ages be doing for a year). She’s a stubborn little thing!

[Hidden in reply to Bambie83]

Yes I her in pull ups and make sure u put her on the toilet at very hour ko but I think u put in nappy 24/7