In case the title doesn’t give it away, this is a post about poop. Consider that your TMI disclaimer. I hope that in sharing this story, that I may be able to offer some encouragement to other families dealing with the same issue.
Last week I had posted on Facebook about some progress being made with the child-who-was-afraid-to-poop. My girl is 4.5 years old, and has been otherwise toilet trained for nearly 2 years. Pooping on the toilet though, has been a monumental obstacle for her. It’s partly a sensory thing and partly an anxiety thing. We have tried everything and tried it again. Nothing has worked. She is not constipated. She goes when she wants to and has no trouble holding it as long as she needs to before she feels comfortable going.
This week I think I can safely say that she is turning a real corner in overcoming her anxiety. I’ve spoken with other moms facing toileting problems in older kids “who should be toilet trained by now” and this is really not as uncommon as I had once thought. It’s quite common in kids with sensory processing disorders or on the autism spectrum, though her sensory issues are mild and she is not on the spectrum.
She would go in her pants and I would tell her “good job, I am so glad that your body is going poop.” She thought I’d gone crazy and would say, “but I pooped in my undies.” And I would tell her again that I just want her to poop, at home, even if it’s in her undies. In her mind I had truly gone off the deep end because I was congratulating her for going poop in her undies. She would hide, someone would notice and tell me, and I would say (loudly so that she could hear me), “that’s okay, she just needs to go poop by herself right now.” Our boys thought I’d gone bonkers too. The stress level associated with pooping had become so high that it was just all bad in her mind. We had to change her thinking to believe that pooping is good. Because it is.

This girl is my treasure. I would move mountains to help her overcome her poop anxiety, if I could.

So much has changed for her in the last couple of weeks. Being able to tell what the urge to poop feels like, and not be afraid of it. Being able to sit on the toilet and try to go, without freaking out. Those two things both had to happen before we were going to see success of any kind. Had I known that telling her she could poop her pants would be what helps her calm down and use the toilet, I’d have given her permission months ago.
It’s tough seeing an older child struggle with their own body. I’m not sure how long it will be before she is able to go consistently. She was in a cycle of holding it for so long that going was scary due to the volume, and then holding it more because she’s afraid to go. As she’s feeling the urge on her own and telling us so that we can take her to the washroom, she is retraining her own body to be okay with that feeling. It may take time for her to respond to “small” urges that she has been used to holding in. That’s okay. Seeing her be happy and excited just to try to use the toilet is huge progress. She IS getting it, one day at a time. That one big accident is actually the only one she’s had in a week. It wasn’t as much of a setback as it normally would have been. (Honestly if I pooped that much I’d freak out too.) Being able to go since then has boosted her confidence even more.
Her next goal is to go not one time or five times, but ten times on the toilet – and she will earn Super Girl to team up with Bat Girl and Wonder Woman. Where was the DC Super Hero Girls movie all this time anyway? Maybe all a girl needs is a hero to help her out! There won’t be rewards forever, and I’m honestly not sure why rewards are working now when they never have before, but after 2 years of struggle, it’s a small price to pay. She wants to be brave like the Super Hero Girls and I am so down with a kid who wants to be courageous in overcoming something that has been unbelievably difficult and discouraging.
I don’t know if sharing this story will help one struggling parent or many, but this is such a tough struggle to walk through with an older child that there was no way I could keep the things that have helped us, to myself. I’m praying that she doesn’t regress and that we continue to move forward on this.
I also pray for breakthrough and success for other kids and families trying to overcome toileting issues in older kids as well. I can honestly say that this is one of the toughest challenges I’ve faced with any of my kids and that is saying an awful lot. Hang in there. I’m hanging in there too.
copyright (c) 2016 Jenna Pelias // all rights reserved