chronic constipation, so tiring.... (long)

[mamamoogs]

my 3 year old has had this problem since she was a year old, she only pooed once every weeek or so when EBF , and it got worse with solids...

I have been to three doctors and a homeopathy practioner... So sad for my kiddo...
So far have been told to keep her on miralax, which giver her the runs( cant potty train) take her off miralax and then told by a GI doctor to keep her on miralax and add fiber and mineral oil, ( is mineral oil even healthy to drink)?

third doctor, agrees keep on miralax but add mineral oil , told to try wheat whole grains fresh fruit fresh vegastable.. more milk less otmeal less juice more water.... so on and so forth,,,, I am tired! she is three i dont even know alot of toddlers that eat those kinds of things.... not that yours dont but i know of none that do.

Homeopathy practioner had her on sulfur didnt work and was getting expensive...

This last bout was 10 days and three on miralax and she finally went big and hard and very clay colored took my DD to another ped she said she wasnt concerned with the color of the bm DD looked good but needed to poop more DAH!!! so now we are off for a xray ultrasound and blood work to check for a obstruction/blockage and celieac disease.


I am so confuse on what to do,, she is three she doesn not eat fresh vegtables, only cooked green beans as far fruit loves bananas but we cant give them to her, she eats prunes everyday not working doesnt like any other fruit.... So now what I cant force her to eat those things that is impossible. she loves activia yogurt and loves ho ho's she has a horrible diet but what can i do I offer everything good she just dont want to eat it.

Now this new ped recommends food therapy yeah this is gonna work another waste of my time and money.... She is a picky eater, as I was at that age.
I need help any advice for us?

Please dont tell me to change her diet or try to elimate things we have done that. I am afraid to give her mineral oil and flax seed i odnt have much knowledge of those things, if you do please send me your wisdom.....

[MountainMamaGC]

I feel for your situation. I have been going through this for a year now.

My current regime is 1 teaspoon of psyllium fiber in her "cuppee". Its roasted barley coffee (its not actually coffee, its a hot beverage) with half a cup of milk. Its her favourite drink and its the only way I can get her to drink a lot of fluids with the psyllium fiber. She has this every morning. Its tricky to get them to drink enough fluids. I would give whatever fluid you can get them to drink a lot of.

In the evening i put 2 teaspoons of flax oil in her yogurt.

This will usually get her to poop every 2 days. If she goes longer than 2 days I give her milk of magnesia with lots of fluids once in the morning and once at night. That will usually help her poop. If that doesnt work I use a suppository.

I also offer her prunes. She only likes the sunsweet brand. Somedays she will eat like 5 prunes and other days she wont touch them at all. She also eats raisin bran for breakfast. She loves oranges. Inspite of that, she still gets constipated.

A child wont starve themselves. I would not give my toddler ho hos. A ho ho is empty calories, she may as well not eat it. JMO.

My kid eats what I offer or she doesnt eat at all. I dont force her to eat anything but I will not cater to her want for unhealthy food. The choice is hers. Food is offered every couple hours here so its not long before she can eat something else. I guess I run a tight ship.

Again I sympathize because its so frustrating when they cant poop.

[Neera]

hi

my dd is is 3 and i wouldn't say is constipated but, she has constantly been struggling with her poop since she was around the same age as your dd - 1. starting on last friday and ending on sunday we went thru one of those major painful poop episodes she gets from time to time. She was so constipated that she could neither take it out nor keep it in. i gave her 1/2 a cap of miralax twice a day on day 1 not knowing how much should be given to a child. (looked it up on the net ) and 1/2 a cap the next day. but, if it does work it took forever to work. she definetly reqd. an enema by then but, she is terrified of it. we totally forgot about prune juice, prunes and raisins. finally, when I remembered i gave her small amts. of all three so as to not react with the miralax. today she had 3 humongous poops. i am not sure if the miralax finally worked. i am planning on giving her 1 ounce of prune juice daily. and she readily drank it after all that pain she had to endure. when she was a baby prune juice was a life saver then at some point she started rejecting it and today she had it without a complaint. also, since she was a baby her grandma pureed fruits (strawberries, blue berries, apples, pears) and she loves to eat that with every meal. it was an incentive for her to eat her food and she still eats it with every meal. although the fruit is cooked the fiber is intact so, i am sure it is helping a little but, unfortunately she doesn't eat vegetables other than carrots so, her diet is primarily made up of beef, eggs, chicken and rice which slows things up and then totally jams it. the other thing is dh has ordered dr. shculz's all-natural poop medication. dd will takes it with some maple syrup. but, serioulsy, i will just be sticking with the prune juice because that works for us. sorry, i can't be of more help.

[angelandmisha]

My 2.5yo ds has been having problems with this as well. As your dc, his diet is not great, but I try. Here's what I have done and it's been working: lots of exercise- we started going to the playground everyday for about an hour or so; talking to him about not holding the poo-poo in- explaining briefly how it needs to come out and the longer it stays in the more it hurts to come out; giving more fluids- water, apple juice, pear juice; eating more fiber- I found some double fiber bread that gives 6g for one slice- he loves it spread with Nutella in the morning; I have also been offering pears at breakfast, he likes them and supposedly they're helpful; when it looks like he needs to poop, we go to the bathroom and I have been popping in a glycerin suppository- not so nice of me, but it seems like it keeps him from being able to hold it in if it's trying to come out; and finally, I found this recipe on another thread here somewhere for banana flax muffins and it seems to work with the added bonus that he loves them! I make them in mini muffins and he calls them cakes. Here's a copy of the recipe, sorry I don't know who originally posted this.

Banana Flax Muffins- (pooping muffins)

Ingredients

-1/2 cup butter

-1/2 cup sugar

-1 cup mashed bananas

-1 cup dried fruit such as raisins or chopped prunes

-1 tbsp vanilla

-1 egg

-1 cup flour (whole wheat is fine as is white)

-1/2 cup ground flax meal (again, this is available at grocery stores, but usually cheaper on Amazon.com.)

-1/4 tsp. salt

-1 tbsp Cinnamon

-1 tsp. baking soda

Instructions

1.Cream sugar and butter.

2.Add egg, mashed bananas, and vanilla.

3.Mix in dry ingredients.

4.Fill muffin tins and bake for 20-30 minutes at 350F. *Makes 12 muffins.

Since I made them in mini muffins, I only baked them about 12-15 minutes. I used a mixture of raisins, finely chopped prunes, finely chopped apricots and mini chocolate chips to make up the 1 cup
of fruit/raisins called for.

I think it's working. We went from one poop every 7-10 days to one every 2-3 days and this week have had one three days in a row. And they've gotten softer therefore less painful and easier to get out. I read in Toddler 411(which I'm not generally fond of) that this is a pretty common problem and that they get "full of stool" and you need to get them cleaned out and then on a more regular schedule. They said that toddlers will have a painful incident pooping and will begin to withhold their stool so it won't hurt again. So the idea is to get it soft enough for long enough that they don't remember it hurting anymore and then they're not likely to withhold.

So, good luck! I hope some of this helps, I have Bern very concerned about this myself recently.

[angelandmisha]

And BTW, Dr. Sears doesn't suggest using mineral oil because it doesn't have any nutrients and just causes whatever nutrients are in the intestines to slide right out- he says to use flax oil in its place because it has nutrients and better for you. That's about the extent of my knowledge of flax.

[rzberrymom]

What ALWAYS worked for my DD was a smoothie with raw kale leaves in it. The kale is pretty much tasteless and just makes the smoothie a cool green color. You can add juice, frozen berries, etc. and then just toss in a few kale leaves. I have never met a kid who wouldn't devour one of my smoothies, and it does the trick!

Before my DD would eat veggies reliably (almost age 5), we had one of those smoothies at least every other day.

[ellemenope]

Oh, your poor little girl.

We suffered from constipation right after DD's first birthday. She suffered for months. It was the worst. I don't even want to write about it And, I understand about not being able to just change her diet.

DD's problem was that she only would poo at home when she felt comfortable. So, when we went on trips, which was often, she would withhold it until she couldn't possibly anymore. It became harder and harder to recover from.

She was stretching out that last part of her large intestine. It created this pocket. She was also fearing her poops, so she wouldn't go. That pocket of poo would just dry up and become just about impossible to fit through.

So, we started mirilax. I'd say we went at least a month of runny poops before we weaned off of the mirilax. DD needed to heal her bowel and learn to love to poo again.

We now drink a kefir smoothie daily, and she goes daily, beautiful poops!

You have to let your DD heal and learn to love to poo again! Embrace the runs!

[sarahdavida]

[QUOTE=ellemenope;15352999]So, we started mirilax. I'd say we went at least a month of runny poops before we weaned off of the mirilax. DD needed to heal her bowel and learn to love to poo again.QUOTE]

we also had to go to Miralax after trying anything and everything natural and dietary...started just before DS turned 2 - he never had a problem before - but after one uncomfortable experience, he started holding and that is his problem - a year later, we are still off and on with it - it is very frustrating. He is just so attached psychologically to the idea that it will be uncomfortable, even though it hasn´t been for months and months - he is very hard to break of an idea once he gets it in his head and I am hoping that in the next few months, as he gets to understand things a little more, he will relax about it and not hold anymore...it is very exasperating...

BUT what was really important for me was to find the miralax dose that worked for him - one full dose per day was too much, so I went down and down until I found the amount that kept him regular, but didn´t overdo it (which freaked him out, too, so equally unhelpful)...we had it all the way down to a 1/2 teaspoon, just 2 or 3 times a week - now we´re up to 1 teaspoon a day and hope to get it back down again.

It´s something that really has to be weaned off gradually, the first time the pediatrician we saw while travelling (that´s when it started - after a dietary change) told me to go ahead and stop once he pooped a few times and it was a disaster. he didn´t realize (and I didn´t yet either) that the problem at that point was more psychological than physical and it needed to be much more long-term than that - just not at nearly the same dose.

[chase_mommy]

I haven't read any of the PP's responses as I am in a hurry. However, I had to post real quick. DS had the same issues that you are having. Started at about 3 months with being EBF all the way up until he was 5. He has had the blood work, x-rays, diet changes, miralax, milk of magnesia, food elimination, and we have tried tons of other things. He has always ate tons of fresh fruits and veggies and that has never made a difference for him. What I have found to work for us is watching his dairy and getting him a Hazel wood necklace. Ever since he has had his hazel wood necklace we have not had one constipation episode. They have to be replaced when they lose their effectiveness but I think they are well worth it. I hope it helps and I know how frustrating it is to see your LO in so much pain. I hope you all get this resolved soon.

[QuestionGal]

we found a product that helped DS overcome his issues (I have a thread on here about it). We used a combination of FiberMate (a natural stool softener) and Mineral Oil. He'd get them first thing in the morning. Mixed in either OJ or a protein shake. We started out using Flax Seed Oil b/c of the lack of nutrients in Mineral Oil....but after a few days he started vomiting. Apparently FSO isn't tolerated well in small children?? (at least according to our naturopath). We switched to Mineral Oil (which if used long term can inhibit vitamin K absorption) but made sure to up his intake of Vit K foods. After 3 weeks of CONSISTENT Fibermate/mineral oil we were able to wean him completely off both (and only use if we notice the constipation returning).

We prefer FiberMate as stool softener b/c:
it mixes well with juices/applesauce/protein shakes
it doesn't cause gas/bloating/explosive, uncontrollable poops
it worked better for us than Miralax, Milk of Magnesia, Aloe Vera pills, and homeopathics

You can find FiberMate at a natural foods store, it comes in pill or powder form (we used powder)

I think it's key to get her system cleaned out, then work on maintenance

[Alma Stalice]

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