toilet training almost 5yr old

[cemerick]

My almost 5yr old son has been potty trained since he was 2 with the exception of bm's. He has consistently refused to even try. He was put on a stool softener last year due to him holding bm's and causing both intenstines to become impacted. He did that to himself when starting preschool and not wanting to have an accident there. He continues to refuse to use the toilet no matter what reward or take-away system we try. We tried taking away his pull-ups but after a full month of having to continually throw away pair upon pair of underwear and pants we went back to pull-ups. He simply does not care wether it is a pull up or underwear. He will go in either one equally. He has claimed to be scared of of the toilet although he pees in it just fine and has given me no reason as to why he would be scared. He will tell me time and time again that he will go on the potty. He knows that is what I want to hear and does not want to go to the doctor yet again. He rarely has an accident away from home. He will simply hold his bm untill he is home. He is able to do this even though he is on a high dosage of softener to make sure he does not become impacted again.
Can you please offer me any advice other than wait it out?

[iamsympatico]

Very curious if you made any progress hear since last year. Our son will not pee or poo in the toilet as he also says he is afraid. We have the same thing that he will not go when he is in public which makes things a bit easier at least. We also let gave in to  letting him go in his pull up as he would never go and felt this would create more problems. We have a bathroom schedule that includes after meals to  be close to when he should go but it has not worked. The comment  on waiting until it is too late I do not feel hold true as he just doesn't want to go in the toilet. He made a comment to the effect that he has to remember everything since he was a baby.  I am not sure what it meant. I think it means that this is what he is familiar with and it works. Incentives and unincentives do not prove to be any motivation. The only thing I can think of is getting him to do it without realizing it. Have you had any success since last year?

[mom@homenow]

This all sounds very familiar. I handled it by having my son sit on the toilet within 10 minutes after breakfast and lunch (if eaten at home) and also as soon as we came home from being out during the day. If he hadn't had a bowel movement by mid afternoon, he had to sit on the toilet again. I told him he could have a treat (for him it was Pez candy) if he pooped in the toilet. For a long time he would still have accidents in his pants because he wasn't doing the whole job at one time, but after several months he pretty much stopped having accidents and started going on a somewhat predictable schedule. He didn't ever want to go sit on the toilet and yes, I usually struggled with him to get him there. It's not fun.

It's possible that the reason he's scared of doing a bm on the toilet is that when he was holding it & getting constipated it hurt a lot to go. He can't verbalize that to you, but he associates doing bm on the toilet with pain. It's less painful to squat and go in his pants when he feels the urge. He doesn't do it in public because he knows that's socially unacceptable, but he feels safe enough to do it at home. Another thing that may be an issue is that after someone's bowels are impacted if the colon was stretched the nerves & muscles can take a long time to get back to their correct shape and strength, and he actually may not be feeling the urge to go until it is basically too late to get to the toilet. In public he just concentrates on holding it in, but at home he wants to release it for relief.

I wish I knew of a magic cure, believe me I do. Just know you're not alone & he's not doing this to make you angry.