Stool Soiling, but NOT Constipated

I don't have anything to offer with the staining but my daughter is going through the same thing. The chronic constipation has been going on way too long. We will be bringing her to Children's to work with someone there. Her doctor referred her. It seemed like no one really took it seriously before or I didn't push hard enough.

She has been on Miralax for a few weeks. I will be talking with the specialist about my concerns with Miralax. Thanks for the info.

It still seems like she has encopresis.

Encopresis is not the same thing as constipation.... her constipation seems fixed now... but she has encopresis....

Look up Encopresis online...

What does your Doctor say?

Please take her off Miralx. It isn't the safest thing a child should be taking!!!

Miralax is polyethylene glycol, which is a cousin of ethylene glycol (antifreeze). Here is a link to the Material Data Safety Sheet. https://fscimage.fishersci.com/msds/19124.htm

If she has been on this stuff for a year (which is 50 weeks longer than recommended by the manufacture) then she could have internal irritation which is causing her to have problems.

There is also a Yahoo group for more info on it, the FDA and safer alternatives. http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/miralax/

Good luck
S.

My daughter was on Miralax and had the same thing happen. She had no control over it and didn't know she was doing it (she was four years old) I REALLY didn't want her on the Miralax, and finally just decided to quit cold turkey with it. At first I didn't give her any milk, cheese or bananas and she drinks pear juice everyday. Made sure she was getting enough fiber and drinking a lot of water, and she was doing good. Now she can have all foods...I just still watch her cheese intake and limit milk to once a day, and she has been Miralax free for about 9 months. She still drinks pear juice everyday, and I think that is what really helps her.

that sounds like an effect from the miralax

the cure for constipation issues is not medication, its proper diet. LIMIT dairy (regardless what the million dollar milk industry says) to ONLY at meals, SMALL glasses. serve LOTS of water all day long, and as seconds for drinks at meals. also limit meats, serve more fruits and veggies, the key is fiber. if you want you can get milled flax seed in the health section of any grocery store; sprinkle that on just about anything for an extra dose of fiber : HOWEVER, if you do not make sure she gets enough liquids, the fiber will only absorb all the liquid it can in the stool, and dry it up making it hard and difficult/painful to pass.

understand that fiber's job is to absorb water and keep stool soft. it doesnt get digested like other things. if theres not enough water in the body, it still does its job, but it messes with the system; as i said, it will absorb all the liquid from the stool and make it hard anyway.

dont use a lot of flax; less than a teaspoon. its just a texture, so you can literally put it on anything. works like a charm - i once gave tiny amounts in formula to a plugged up baby, and it worked within a half hour. amazing stuff.

anyway. good luck.

Not exactly...but I know my 5 year old, who has always had no problem making time to poop, is suddenly too involved in his life to remember to go--so when he needs to go, it's NOW, and sometimes that results in soiled underwear. If she is on schedule, and has been for a little while, perhaps she's paying less attention to her body's cues (as she might be glad be able to, after so much focus on it) and just getting too involved in what she's doing?

Is she doing a good job of wiping? My grandchildren, ages 6 and 9, still have soiling. They often don't wipe or don't wipe enough.

I am rarely constipated. When I was younger I had a lot of diarrhea. Now, even with a normal stool I do sometimes have a bit of leakage or sometimes just a little bit of stool remains just inside the outer sphincter. I think that with chronic constipation the sphincter enlarges or loses some of it's elasticity as it does with age. Perhaps it will just take time for it to become tighter or to push better.

Her large intestine is likely still impacted and new stool is running around the impaction into her underwear. Do you see a Ped Gastroenterologist? She probably needs a thorough "clean out". They can tell with an x-ray. Also, once completely cleaned out, it takes 1 year for the large intestine to shrink back to normal shape and regain full "sensation". So, even though she's going each day (sometimes multiple times) you probably have not really "gained control" yet. I'm sorry to tell you that. My son went every day (sometimes multiple times) and yet was fully impacted every 3-4 months. He was admitted to the hospital several times a year for nasogastric cleanout. We coudn't keep him "empty" for 12 months straight...even though he was going every day...he wasn't fully evacuating but felt like he was. Get an x-ray; it's the only way to know. She may have a motility issue...things go slowly through the large intestine and even though you are evacuating, the stool hardens because it takes so long to make it's way down. If you have any other questions, I'm happy to discuss. We dealt with this for 9.5 years. My son finally had the ACE/MACE procedure done and we wish we had done it years ago. He is a different person now, in terms of appetite and energy. Good luck.

My daughter has suffered from constipation her entire life (she's 10 this month), and I have also my entire life (I am 42). My daughter also has an overactive bladder and has seen an urology specialist and a colon specialist. My daughter had the soiling issue as well, was also on Miralax as well as additional fiber. Constipation does cause soiling, and even if your daughter goes regularly, she can still have soiling. My daughter does. AND, she can still be constipated. My daughter usually is.

As another poster stated, it all comes down to diet at this point. Cow dairy is very, very hard on the body and the intestines. My husband and I have a casein allergy, so there is no cow dairy in our house. We use raw goat cheese and raw sheep cheese, occasionally we buy raw goat milk, or we use rice milk. We both suffer from a severe soy intolerance, so there is no soy milk or soy products either. In fact, the less you can use cow milk products and drink water, the better off your body will be in the long run. Calcium can be obtained through vegetables and other foods. Our family is also gluten intolerant, so we eat other grains and fiber besides wheat, rye, and barley (we can eat oats if they're not cross-contaminated).

Making sure we don't eat foods that we are allergic to or have an intolerance for has totally influenced how our bodies work, for the BETTER, and we are getting rid of many disorders and chronic health problems we once had.

Cow dairy is one of the hardest things on the human body. Since I've quit all cow dairy and started eating lots and lots of vegetables, my constipation has pretty much disappeared. It's harder to get my daughter to eat her veges. I make sure she takes an alpha-lipolic acid supplement, and I put pure organic premium ground flaxseed into as many things as I possibly can; it's a natural laxative. We also notice that when my daughter can't pee, it usually means she needs a BM and is all blocked up. Sure enough, she goes BM, then she can pee (without dribbling or having wet spots in her underwear) and all the pain in her tummy goes away. However, getting her to eat enough fiber and laxative friendly foods isn't an easy task (she LOVES carbs). Nor is it easy getting her to drink enough liquids. THAT is another big contributor to making sure she goes BM every day and doesn't get blocked up. It's a daily struggle in our household to make sure she drinks plenty of WATER.

Basically, you need to modify your daughter's diet to ensure she's eating as organic as possible with little or no prepared or processed foods. Her body is already having a hard time digesting and doesn't need to spend it on chemicals and pesticides and food colorings and dyes and all the other additives that the food companies put into mostly "dead" foods. We have noticed a very profound effect--for the good--on our family when we switched to an organic lifestyle two years ago.

I like Ericka L.'s post. Good info, Ericka.

Good luck.