Toddler Not Going Poopie

my daughter use to have a huge problem with constipation and it was mainly because she would hold it in and bananas! she would go sometimes 5 days with nothing and i know she had to go because i could see her holding it in, this went on for months. it was awful and incredibly stressful when she would scream trying to get it out. 2 things worked for us, the most important was miralax. our doctor suggested it and it worked wonderfully. i don't know how old your daughter is but what finally got ours wanting to sit on the potty and pooh was a hand held dora game that she could only play with when she was trying to go pooh. she was wanting to sit on the potty and pooh in just a couple of days all by herself, we haven't had problems in about 5 or 6 months. good luck!

Try to add flaz seeds to her food (it has a nice nutty flavor) and a probiotic chewable waffer. I had the EXACT same problem with my daughter. We also fed her bite sized prunes. She thought they were candy. Try to do those things for awhile and see it that helps.

Good luck! M.

She's eating all the right things but sometimes when you eat a lot of fiber it does the opposite from helping "keep your insides clean". If she eats a bunch of bananas, lay off those for awhile and give her some apple juice. For my daughter and my niece apple juice makes their stools less firm so when I notice my daughter having issues I always up the apple juice for a few days. I still dilute it with water though.

My 2 yr old will eat prunes or drink apple / prune juice. I have even put prune juice in her milk - looks nasty but she likes it. My 10 month old has big issues with this. I put prune juice in her apple juice and in her formula. Neither one complains. It really does look rather gross but it does work. hth

Does she eat a lot of bananas? That will constipate a child - so I've heard. They dont do that to my son though. Everyones body reacts differently to different foods. Maybe check with her pediatrician and see about natural fiber that can be mixed with her water like Citrucel or something.... you may have to lessen the dosage, but check on that, it's an option. Or some kind of stool softener - maybe it hurts her to go, so she's trying to keep from going. But it's going to come out at some point.

True with the apple juice.... I would certainly try that first.

Good Luck!

I have three children that have had problems with constipation first I started putting Karo syrup in their milk, if your child drinks alot of milk try taking DD of the milk , milk and other diary products may cause and you are right DD is holking it because it hurts when he or she goes potty, as my children got older they had to take citra cell(mispelled) or benefiber please check with your peditrition this is the advice I got from my peditrition my six year od is now on benefiber and drinking soy milk and taking vit. with calc. to replace the milk and it is working so far the next step will be to test for iterable bowl syndrome hoping it does not come to that did you know that IBS is heriditery they get it from my mom sorry about the spelling. hope things work out

My son was the same way. We tried everything from fruit juice to enimas, which were horrible. What finally worked for him is Miralax. It is available over the counter now, and basically just adds water to the stool, which makes it harder to hold in. We started with 1/4 of the adult dose mixed with four ounces of juice once a day. It takes a few days to kick in, and you may have to adjust the dose up or down until you get it right. If it is too high and causes loose stools, then just back off a little (a small decrease goes a long way). It will also take several days to see the change when you adjust the dose up or down. As for the withholding, that is as much mental as it is physical. However, once they realize that it does not hurt to go to the bathroom anymore, they will eventually stop trying so hard to hold it in. This was about a six month process with my son. Potty training also helped. Once they start going consistently and without seeming scared, you can back off on the Miralax dose. My son now is on about 1/8 of the adult dose and no longer withholding, but it took us about two years to get to this point. Good luck, and feel free to e-mail me if you have any questions.