ANAL RETENTION,advice needed.

[LEX]

Our 3yr old son has been holing in his poos for a while now and we have been to our GPs and tried Lactulose but no success, any advice out there. LEX

[LEX]

Our 3 yr old son holds in his poos and we have tried Lactulose and fed up being told that he will grow out of it, any advice out there.

[Kia]

I expect you've heard this too, then?!

Plenty of fresh orange juice, not drink or squash but juice!!

If you are being overly hygienic and cleaning up after every dribble and frantically bleaching everything out of existence at the mere sight of dust - stop now!! At the risk of upsetting you - its a classic way that puppies react if they are not being allowed to do their business when they want to - so they eat it.

Put him back in nappies till he's ready to use the loo.

Get him a friend who does his sitting on a potty in the living room (eew! I hated being faced with that at people's houses, but there we are!). Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery etc!

Stop reacting one way or the other about it, just ignore it. It's attention-seeking, but only he knows why and what for.

Dont over-react when he finally does do something, just act as if it's normal and eventually he will too.

Put some books in the toilet area and let him sit there and read them.

Whatever you do - don't let in-laws interfere with the programme!

Well, you did ask!

[Phillippa]

I have a five year old boy and we wreastled with this problem from the age of 18 months onwards,we did the lot including seeing a paediatrician at the hopspital,we were on such large doses of lactulose and laxoberylthat the poor child was in agony.All the lactulose does is soften the stool it will not make them go,the laxatives like laxoberyl give them cramps because they cause the bowel to contract.By the way we have plentyof fibre aand he drinks like fish but once they have decided not to go these things have little effect.
Anyway to cut a long story sho thr problem was cracked by visiting a homeopath ,in a short space of time aour lives went from being dominated by whther w had "been" to it being almosta non issue and he became happy and relaxed again.It will always be a weak spot for him but I cannot believe the muiddle we got ourselves into with the cycle of laxatives and how simple,although not rapid the solution turned out to be.
I have also heard v.good reports of cranial osteopathy in youger children.
Hope this is helpful,I know haow distressing this can be for the whole family.

[ariel]

my ds whos now 6 had this problem from as young as 6 months,we thought he was constipated and tried all the known remidies,including lactulose and sennakot syrup,we got so annoyed with doctors saying he would grow out of it,it got alot worse when he came out of nappies,he eventully did grow out of it when he was about 4,it helped alot when he was in pre school, just seeing other children going to the loo easily seemed to help alot. i fully understand how annoying it is to be continully told that it will correct itself,in my ds case thankfully it did , ican only say you are the expert on your child and if you think there is a problem then you need to continue to see your gp,if your not happy maybe see another gp.Also ,you could try sennakot syrup my son was perscribed 10mls of senna twice a day and 20mls of lactulose twice a day along with a high fibre diet.hope thats of some use to you.