Potty accidents in 6yo

[DevaMajka]

Is this normal, or indicative of something wrong (my first thought goes to food allergies, but they are on my mind recently with ds2).

Ds1 has been having minor poop accidents the last couple months. It's like he either waits until the last minute to go, or he doesn't realize he has to go until too late, so some slips out. He's been pt'ed since he was 3- once he caught on (in a couple weeks) he was totally pt'ed.

Is this developmentally normal?

He also has some small random rashes that don't bother him, that have come and gine over the last bunch of months, and rashes around his lips, but I assume those are because he constantly licks his lips. He has dark undereye circles, which I read could be allergies.

[LauraLoo]

I wouldn't say that this is normal, especially if it's come on in the last couple of months.

Why this is happening is hard to say -- but along with the rashes and the dark circles under his eyes, I'd first want to take a look at possible food allergies or intollerances.  

The "slipping out" is also a symptom of encropesis:

http://www.lpch.org/DiseaseHealthInfo/HealthLibrary/growth/encopres.html

If it were me, I'd consult my health care provider.

HTH!

[DevaMajka]

I will take him to the doc soon- I'll make an appt tomorrow. It sounds like it needs to be checked out, to be safe. Dp is convinced that ds is juast too busy to realize he has to go. I thought that in the beginning, but it's happened too many times for it to be that.

It sounds a lot like encopresis, except that he's not constipated. He poops every couple of days, and it's usually soft but formed. I read elsewhere that others had kids with encopresis, and their kids weren't (or they didn't think they were) constipated, so I haven't ruled it out. He eats a high fiber diet- lots of produce, and whole grains.

With his other symptoms, I'm going to look at food. He's pretty adamant about not ED'ing, so I'll food journal for him, and try to get an allergy test. If all else fails, je'll have to ED, but I'm going to try other stuff first.

from your link

Quote:

 Parents may feel guilt, shame, anger, or distaste by the problem. The child will often be aware of a parent's feelings and become even more emotionally affected.

 

 That made me about want to cry :( I don't get why parents would be mad about this. It's clearly not done on purpose!

[Ophelia]

 but along with the rashes and the dark circles under his eyes, I'd first want to take a look at possible food allergies or intollerances.  

I agree, you will likely need to do an ED with him and keep a food journal.  Also Dr. Doris Rapp's book Is This Your Child may help.  Could be something else too, but all point to food issues to me.

[PreggieUBA2C]

Perhaps quit grains for a month. I would highly suspect grain in your situation. Actually, my seven yr old had the same issues, which are now fully resolved since being grain and dairy-free which has been for only 22 days. He had been running to the toilet for a few months after the "slipping out" thing had gone on for a while, but now he's had no issues that way at all. His eye circles and random rashes are gone, too. It only took a few days.

I wish I had known long, long ago, what grains do to the human gut.

My whole family has experienced dramatic improvements to our health. :)

[minkajane]

We had problems with DS where he would have full-blown poops in his pants. We thought it was stress, but stress-relieving techniques didn't help. We ended up enrolling him in an experimental online program with the University of Virginia called U-Can-Poop-Too. It's helped a lot. We did videos and activities to help him understand why he was having the accidents and that we know he really can't help it.

Basically what was going on was that he was constipated (in DS's case, mainly because he was too busy to stop and sit on the potty). So his colon got all stretched out and couldn't send the right messages to his brain to tell him he needed to poop. Then the soft poop from behind the constipated hard poop would leak around the backup and leak out and he couldn't do anything about it.

He's on daily laxatives to keep things moving while his colon shrinks back down. We've also had to do a couple of enemas to get things cleaned out (he had the choice of an enema or high-dose laxatives and he chose the enema). This program has made a HUGE difference. He has only had a couple of accidents in the last few months. Another month or so and we'll start weaning him off the laxatives to see how things go.

[~cassie]

Originally Posted by minkajane 

We had problems with DS where he would have full-blown poops in his pants. We thought it was stress, but stress-relieving techniques didn't help. We ended up enrolling him in an experimental online program with the University of Virginia called U-Can-Poop-Too. It's helped a lot. We did videos and activities to help him understand why he was having the accidents and that we know he really can't help it.

Basically what was going on was that he was constipated (in DS's case, mainly because he was too busy to stop and sit on the potty). So his colon got all stretched out and couldn't send the right messages to his brain to tell him he needed to poop. Then the soft poop from behind the constipated hard poop would leak around the backup and leak out and he couldn't do anything about it.

He's on daily laxatives to keep things moving while his colon shrinks back down. We've also had to do a couple of enemas to get things cleaned out (he had the choice of an enema or high-dose laxatives and he chose the enema). This program has made a HUGE difference. He has only had a couple of accidents in the last few months. Another month or so and we'll start weaning him off the laxatives to see how things go.

We are having this exact issue with our 5 yr old.  In fact it has gone on for several months(him having slippage in the pants)

[DevaMajka]

I told him the other night that we need to know for sure if this is something he can control (and he's just too busy to go to the bathroom fast enough), or something he can't control, and we'll have him checked out and take care of it. I told him that if we go to the doc, he might get an x-ray (that's how they check for encopresis), and x-rays are fine but you don't want to get one if you don't need it. In about 10 minutes, his story went from "I never know until after it happens" to "I know sometimes before it happens" to "I've known every time but the last 2" to "I've known every time but the 2nd to last time."

And yesterday, he got to the bathroom in time and not even a skid mark in his undies. So we'll see. It's hard, because I don't want him to feel ashamed, but at the same time, 6 is totally old enough to know that pooping in your pants is not cool (if he can control it). lol I think I handled it well, hopefully.

Also, add to the list of possible allergy symptoms- red ears, just about all the time. Unfortunately, all of his other symptoms (red ears, dark under eyes, rash near mouth) are pretty constant recently.

[mom22girls]

Just wanted to let you know I went through this with my almost 7 yo daughter up until really recently (and we still have the occasional major skid mark).  She had none of the other symptoms, so I think you need to go with your gut on whether or not it is a food issue.  My dd's came in phases, she'd have no accidents for awhile, and then a couple weeks where it was terrible!  Usually, paying more attention to her helped (she is a middle child) but I don't think it was the only thing.  She has intense concentration so when she's playing a game, I truly believe nothing else comes into her "space" not even body needs.  To help her out, I used really thin pantyliners in her undies, so if it happened at school, she could take it off and toss it.  I also got some individually wrapped moist toilet wipes (we have them in Sweden, but don't know about in the US) so that she could clean herself up.  Things are better now, it could be a combination of lots of things so I just take it one day at a time now.

Hugs!

[DevaMajka]

We all had stomach flu over the holidays, and we cut ds's dairy down to just about none. He hasn't had a poop accident since the diarrhea (which doesn't count, Imo) on Christmas day. So it's either dairy or it was encopresis and the stomach flu cleared him out. Or I suppose it could just be a coincidence. We're adding dairy back today, and will watch closely.

He did say he felt better the last few days- no poop accidents, and he said the rash around his mouth didn't itch. He'd never told me before that it itched. The rash is still there, though. His ears haven't been red the whole time, just a couple times. The dark circles haven't improved at all, but I know we'd have to take out all dairy to know anything for certain.