My potty trained 4 year old pooping himself?

lovexhp

My oldest son is 4 1/2 and he has recently started pooping on himself. He says he doesn't know whats wrong and that he forgets. He has been potty trained for a long time now and sometimes he will do this multiple times a day for days and then go a week without pooping himself. Im currently pregnant with my third and im wondering if this is a regression type thing or if this could be psychological? Any advice or personal stories? I honestly don't know what more to do!

g8trkim

My son went through a phase a couple months ago like this. He had one issue where he was very constipated and had a hard time going, then for months he was so scared to go that he would hold it for days and eventually poop his pants (and pee sometimes I think because of all the pressure). It eventually got better. I just tried to push a lot of fiber and water to prevent the constipation. Best of luck!

XCrissCrossX

I'm right there with you. Did he start school this year? Our Pedi suggested that he was holding it at Preschool because going there was scary- and then he really would forget to go at home. Or he had forgotten what it felt like. Or something.

And because he wasn't going at school when he needed to he did become constipated and it became occasionally painful. And that made him hesitate to go.

We returned to sticker charts- poop in the potty 5 times and get a toy or some reward.
It's gotten better over the past couple of months. But it still occasionally happens.

<3 Matt

My son went through this phase, he's 5 now.  He would hold it, when I asked him why he would say "mom, I'm a play kid...not a poop kid."  So basically he was holding it because he didn't want to stop playing to go.  Then he'd hold it so long it would come out a little before he'd finally go. 

I started giving him prune juice regularly to force it, seemed to help!  He had to stop playing because he really had to use the bathroom.  :-) 

dmndsr4eva

My son has been doing the same thing for a year or longer.  He turned 5 in December.  Not sure how to help him other than lots of fiber and water, etc.  It is a constipation issue with him.