Poo on the potty

We potty trained over the summer. Our boy took really well to it but not poos. Most have issues with that. We just let him poo in a nappy. He would ask for a nappy poo and we would take it away. This week he has cracked the pooing on the loo. I got a sticker chart and said at the end we will go peppa pig world. So far so good.

I am having the same issue with my 3 year old. It's been 4 months of this, I feel like crying most days. Sometimes he does decide to go on the toilet, usually I have to use laxatives or prune juice which isn't ideal. He also seems more perceptive when we read books about poo and watch YouTube poo cartoons. Good luck x

My little one initially held it until his nap nappy went on, at the time I figured I’d tackle wees first and then deal with poops but I did do a bit of a Google search and found it’s totally normal for poos to take longer and for kids to have a bit of fear around it. Apparently there are books that can help (Poo Goes to Pooland?) It can help if he sees you/your partner pooping too. My husband and I started to announce when we were going to poop. He’d often follow us to the toilet (as they do). I think for my little one there was the fear element around it but as soon as he did the first one we had a massive celebration, sang a song (a poo poo on the potty song 😂) and we gave him a sticker. He was over the fear after that (that’s not to say we didn’t have any accidents afterwards but he was no longer scared to use the potty). So we didn’t need books in the end.

Thanks everyone! It’s good to know it’s a common issue! We don’t seem to have many issues getting him to sit and try but he will eventually get up and do it in his pants. He likes to go and hide to poo so we are going to try and give him some more privacy and see if that works! I’m so over cleaning up poo pants already 😂 I feel like as soon as they turn three there is so much expectation that they should be potty trained - like we aren’t trying our best!

I’ve just seen this and I have the same issue. My son waits until bedtime because that’s when I put a nappy on him. But I can tell when he needs one. I thought we’d cracked it when he randomly took himself for a poo. Twice! And then yesterday he did one in his pants! I’m debating taking the nappies away completely even at night. And just hoping by some miracle it works out 🙈🙈

@Katie you could definitely try it. Once my son decided he was gonna poop on the potty I took away the nappies at nap time, and a couple weeks later he started to refuse them at night. He wasn’t dry overnight at that point, but we had a chat with him and said if you need a wee in the night you will have to use the potty and so we figured we’d give it a go (the alternative was sneaking nappies on him when he was asleep which just felt wrong). Of course he had accidents. But not as many as I was expecting - they soon work out a wet bed isn’t nice and is something to avoid! We bought some washable bed pads and also he has the standard waterproof mattress protector. We have 3 of each (1 on the bed, 1 for the wash, 1 spare). Didn’t need to get more as actually accidents weren’t overnight and he had cracked it within a couple weeks.

Our little boy seems to have got the hang of the poos the last 3 or 4 days! Yey! Fingers crossed we have turned a bit of a corner. Exactly this happened tonight where he has refused to wear a nappy to go to bed as he’s a big boy not a baby …. We will have to see how it goes 🤣

Oh wow! Go with it. He will likely have some accidents but I would say just stay strong and ride it out! It really wasn’t as bad as I anticipated, but we did have some middle of the night bed changes which wasn’t ideal haha. Haven’t had a wet bed in easily 6 months now though. Probably more.