Help ME! Poo fear w/ Toilet Training

Ok so the Little Dude (3) has been toilet trained for ages, like his sister he took to it like water, doesn't wear nappies to bed and is accident free. BUT... he absolutely REFUSES to poo in anything other than a nappy. He will ask for a nappy after dinner and he'll take himself into the toilet, close the door and poo then ask for his nappy to be changed, then he'll get back into jocks and sleep through accident free. So my question is HOW do we get him to poo in the toilet. We spent 6 hours one night on the toilet and he still held it in. We've tried bribary, gentle coaxing, the potty, you name it. The only thing we haven't done is prune juice and I'm trying to avoid it if possible in case it does cause an accident and it stresses him out even more. Should I be concerned or will he just do it in his own time? Its not affecting his day to day stuff, but I'm worried about him using his bowels only once a day. The last thing I want is for him to get lazy bowel or or pockets in his intestines from holding on so long...

Have you had this problem? If so how did you resolve it?

hi niliac, I dont personally have any exp with this, but my almost 4yo nephew was the same, with him it was a psychological thing as someone at daycare or kindy had made a comment about poo being smelly or something like that, so he became really self concious about it and would only go in the nappy, by himself, at night, at home.
im not sureif it has been resolved yet, will ask her and get back to you. x

Maybe you could cut a hole in the nappy then put him on the loo so he's still got the nappy sensation but can do his poo in the loo.

Yeah thats part of the psych stuff you're supposed to do in this state. But he won't actually sit on the loo to start with so we couldn't even do that method... as its a progressional thing...

Za was just like this... till we accidently found a little phamplet on poop!!!

We had Kane at WCH, for a check up, and on the big board was some phamplets asking "What poo do you do?? :lol: Its made for kiddies...

It had little pics(fake!) and names... like "gravy" poo (runny), sausage Poo(like a snag!) and Corn poo.. (like a corn on the cobb look)

Za used the potty straight up, to see what type he had. Went to the big loo no worries after about a week. He still calls out what type of poo he has done.... usually its a sausage!!! :lol::lol:

Cai, we had the exact same problem with Lindsay and he was day and night trained but could hold a poo in for days if you didn't put a nappy on out of fear he would do some damage to himself from holding it in that long. We think he was scared to do it in the loo because he didn't have control over it or something, like he was scared to do it outside his nappy because when you poo with no nappy on it makes a mess kwim? In the end we had to rely on plying him with fruit juice and loads of fruit and liquorice to make sure it was soft so he didn't have to strain (sorry, but there is no *nice* way to talk about poo LOL) but at the same time not give him that urgency like a laxative would have. When he looked like he was getting close, we sat him on the loo and I closed the door over (no way known would he do anything in the loo with you watching) and I sang and read to him and eventually he did it and he was fine after that. It was like he just needed to do it the once and when he realised it was ok, he was fine to keep doing it in the loo.

Just wanted to update on this... (thanks Liz for reminding me LOL).

He just figured it out on his own one day. He called out to me when he was in the toilet and asked for me to wipe his bottom... I can't believe I squealed in excitement over poop! This was about 4 weeks ago now (so about a week or 2 after I posted this). He was so excited and scored a Light Saber and Star Wars Projector Torch for his efforts ;) Next step is to teach him to wipe his own butt!

Yay! I love it when they just do things on their own LOL. I think it really pays to go along with things and not battle over them. I would have been the same.. handed over the nappy for him to poo in, and just hoped he'd grow out of it at some stage!

hmm... yes.. wiping his own butt.. I haven't attempted this yet.. still get the "mu-um!! I'm finished!!" LOL.

I am so relieved to hear that he worked it out on his own! DS is day TT but refuses to poo in the toilet, asks for a nappy to poo in. Now I will leave him be and hope he works itout for himself too.

I had this problem and all I did was this

they had to ask for a nappy (which your son does) then when the business was done they had to help me flush it down the toilet and wash hands ect just like they would have to do if they did it in the toilet but we also made it fun.. We made jokes about the noise it made when it plopped into the toilet and how cool would it be if they made the noise by themselves instead of out of the nappy..

It took time but eventually they started using the toilet for poos. We were just totally relaxed about it and knew they would do it in their own time. I did ask each time they asked for a nappy if they would like to try the toilet first.. Sometimes they did and sometimes they just went right for the nappy

HTH