Potty trained - but quit

Hi,

My two year old daughter was potty trained at around 18 months old. She had learned while we were training her 3-year-old sister and was even telling us when she needed to go. She was so proud of herself and we constantly told her how proud of her we were and even called her a big girl like her sister which always made her smile. It wasn't really a surprise to us that she learned so early - she learns almost everything from her older sister. They are 19 months apart.

So she was perfectly trained like her older sister but 3 months later she quit telling us she had to go potty. So we started taking her to the potty every couple of hours like we did with her older sister but then she began holding it and would refuse to sit on the potty for us anymore.  We know when she's holding it because she would make funny faces and crosses her legs. This led her to going in her panties and even to constipation. After a week or two of pooping in her pants and us trying everything to get her on the potty my wife and I thought that maybe she was still too young for training and put her back in diapers.

She's been back in diapers for 5 months and our efforts to get her back on the potty still met with heavy opposition. We've actually quit trying other than a mention of the potty-chair once a day or so. And even though she is back in diapers - she still holds her poo and gets herself constipated on a regular basis.

So I guess my question is why would she decide to quit using the potty in the first place? And why would she WANT hold her poo?

Thanks in advance for your assistance.

Dave

[Kevin Kennedy, Ph.D.]

Sounds like the first time around she was really not developmentally ready to be trained. If you remain patient, and wait until she indicates she is ready, nature will take care of this. And remember that when children become constipated and moving their bowels hurts, it often results in their avoiding the anticipated pain. Apart from diet problems, worry about pain is probably the single greatest cause of constipation in otherwise healthy pre-school children.