Need some tips and advice

[airial95]

Our son is younger still, he'll be 4 next month. Most parents of "normal" kids would say it's common for kids that age to still have an accident now and again - especially at night.

 

My kid does NOT have accidents - especially at night - if he's not dealing with strep or an exacerbation. We keep doubting this fact ourselves. This most recent positive culture (last Monday), we saw 4-5 bedwetting episodes in the previous 2 weeks but dismissed a few because of summertime fun (babysitter letting him drink right up until bedtime, backyard barbques where he drank more than normal, etc...) After an especially hyper weekend and overnight accident again, we took him in and - BAM - postive culture. (we did do a home test on him in the 2 weeks preceeding - but it was negative. I'm fairly certain I didn't get a good swab though - what can I say - I'm a rookie at that.)

 

Since the positve culture, he's had 2 more accidents in bed. We actually finally got him a new mattress because his old one was well...getting kinda gross.

 

This time around, however, he's added some new twists. Twice this week (that we knowe of) he's peed in his room, on the floor. Just randomly. We find out by him casually saying something to the effect of "if someone finds my pee pee in my room I'll get very angry". Which then sends me on a pee-hunt of his bedroom. I have no idea if he's done this more than the 2 times we know about...I just know that I'll be steam cleaning his carpet this weekend.

 

On Sunday night, while we were swimming, he swam over to the steps, and sat down. My hubby noticed it looked like he was taking a poop - so he asked him. He said no, but my husband went over there anyway, and sure enough... That was a new one even for us!!!

 

I'm sure this is probably all TMI, but we're really not sure what to do about this anymore. If we remind him that he has to use the toilet, he gets all defensive and angry. He's been out of diapers and pull-ups since he was around 20 months old or so, so I'm not sure we want to go back to that - even at night, becuase I'm afraid that will send him the wrong message -PANDAS aside. Also, I'm not sure that would help with the random pee locations, since he's already pulling his pants down for that (when we can get him to wear pants...but that's another post!)

 

Has anyone else dealt with these types of issues to this level? I'm sure others have dealt with the nighttime issues - and any suggestions would be helpful. (we already use 2 mattress covers - sometimes it doesn't help.) But what about the urinating (and now defacating?) anywhere but the bathroom??

 

There was also a odd puddle in our dining room this past weekend that we had assumed was one of the dogs...we're second guessing that assumption now! I wonder how many other times we've blamed the dogs for something tha was actually my son's doing!! (I'm trying to find some humor in this...if not, I think I'll lose it!!!)

[MomWithOCDSon]

Airial --

 

While we haven't dealt with those specific issues in the past, the first thing that comes to my mind is that your DS is, for some reason, avoiding the actual, physical potty. Maybe you can talk with him a bit to see if, due to this exacerbation, he's developed a new fear about the potty in particular or the bathroom in general?

 

I know that, during peak exacerbations, particularly at younger ages, my DS literally feared the bathroom because of all the rituals he felt compelled to undertake when in there. So he would avoid it like the devil, as long as he could. He was older, though, and had contamination OCD along with everything else, so he wouldn't just pick some less-anxiety-producing, random place to go. But maybe that's what's up with your DS?

 

I can understand not wanting to go back to Pull-ups (sort of validating the behavioral piece of the regressive behavior at that point, eh?), but maybe you can use some of the other techniques we use during initial potty training, like insisting on potty breaks at reasonable intervals. This might also clarify whether or not it is, in fact, using the potty that he's trying to avoid.

[peglem]

My daughter (at age 11!) had the peeing/pooping inappropriate places thing. It lasted a few months and just went away with treatment. We did not deal with it behaviorally, except to remind her that it belonged in the toilet. Still don't know what it was all about because my daughter is nonverbal, but thinking it may have been a compulsion. Although, once during this time...My older daughter had 2 Gameboys, an older one that somebody had given her and a newer one. Allie wanted to play w/ the newer one and my older daughter (not wanting her new one all messed up) gave her the older, less fancy one to play with. Allie took the older one, set it on the floor, and proceeded to pee on it. I'm thinking that one was a protest?

But, other times during this period, she would just randomly pull down her pants and pee/poop on the floor.

 

There was another time when she developed a fear of going down the hallway that leads to both bathrooms in our home. She did the potty elsewhere thing then, too, but we knew why.

 

Then there was the period where she would go in the backyard and defecate in the dog's drinking water...

 

Anyway, I don't think there is a danger of this behavior becoming permanent in a child who has been successfully toilet trained- it'll just be messy until he gets over it. I do use pull-ups for my daughter when she gets the PANDAS related nighttime wetting. I call them her "sleepy panties" but, she does go back to regular when the PANDAS episode resolves.

Edited September 7, 2011 by peglem

[butterflymom]

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Edited October 5, 2015 by tampicc

[Kayanne]

I believe my boys peed at night because of mild PANDAS...it seemed to last off and on for months after we had strep.

 

I just deal with tons of laundry...but as far as the mattresses go they still look brand new. We put vinyl fitted sheets, and then a mattress pad so it doesn't feel too much like sleeping on plastic, then the regular fitted sheet.

 

Here is a zippered one:

 

http://www.target.com/p/Vinyl-Zippered-White-Mattress-Cover/-/A-10107583

 

I have ones that are just like fitted sheets.

[dcmom]

Hi Arial-

 

My younger daughter did have a several "accidents" (a couple at night, a couple during the day) during the worst of her initial pandas episode. She had never had issues like this before, and hasn't since. At that time (and some times since) she was having major rituals surrounding toileting. She would avoid using the bathroom if possible, and I do think this contributed to the accidents. I do also think there is a physical component here, as some of urinary function is controlled in the basal ganglia.

 

My older daughter, who never had wetting issues, also had some urinary frequency. She said she constantly had the feeling that she needed to urinate, even immediately after emptying her bladder. She was older (9) at the time, and no ocd was involved with this issue, so I think it was a bit easier for her to handle.

 

My thought would be that you may have a few issues; there is most likely a physical component of a frequent feeling the need to urinate, maybe this is causing him stress. Most likely there is also an ocd component (in my mind- triggered initially by the physical feeling)- maybe there is a worry that is making him avoid or postpone using the bathroom.

 

I would consider treating this like you probably treat other pandas/ocd issues. Be kind and compassionate, don't make a big deal, don't scold- yet be firm about needing to use the potty, and maybe implement a temporary reward program to motivate him, and celebrate when he has success. I don't know if he will be able to verbalize an ocd fear- of course that would be helpful.

 

I know you know all of this, and are on top of it- but just wanted to respond, toileting issues have been big here (thankfully not to many accidents, but lots of ocd/panic), so I totally relate.

 

This too, shall pass

[smartyjones]

arial -- you've done a lot of OCD work, yes? has hoarding been one of your ds's issues? we've certainly had our share of potty issues --

 

ds developed extreme potty phoba when we tried to potty train at age 3. he got the message to not go in his pants but didn't want to use the potty. what a quandry, huh? his solution was to just not go. for like 10 hours or more. of course, then he'd have an extreme flood. we put him back in pull ups. during the couple of weeks' time he was holding, he threw up and i took him to dr. she said his throat looked 'strep-like' but the culture was negative. this was 1.5 yrs before 'sudden onset', 1 yr after known strep infection. interesting, huh?

 

our potty troubles continued, even included peeing on a towel on the bathroom floor instead of the potty. he conquered it with desensitization from a program on anxietybc.com. 73 days, mind you, of baby steps -- underwear on on towel, towel on potty, etc -- comically until the towel was a little sliver. so, we desensitized the issue in an ERP manner and got him to a functioning level. . . but never really addressed what fueled the problem. he was young and i don't really even know if he consciencously knew the root cause. it did not seem contamination related.

 

i now wonder if it was a form of hoarding behavior b/c may have included 'letting go' of the pee down the potty. ds does not generally have hoarding issues. i've seen a very few, isolated incidents that could be termed hoarding but that were not even really impairing to function, just to make me wonder b/c of what i've learned about OCD. ds didn't care to keep the towels or anything, but it seemed a better solution than the potty.

 

i wonder if your ds could be doing something similar -- in that peeing in the house is keeping him from losing it down the potty -- ???

 

i agree about wanting to keep him out of pull-ups -- which we termed "kid pants" to help with self-esteem when he needed them. i wonder if you could offer an old towel on the floor of the bathroom --- ?? yes, LOTS of laundry. . . but may help with random areas around the house and keeps the issue in the bathroom -- ??

[airial95]

Hoarding has totally been one of our issues!!! But I'm not sure that's what this is. I started to try to talk to him about why he's going in his room. At first the only answers I could get was because he had to. (He's not quite 4 - so I'm not sure what I was expecting). Well, while he was in the bathtub last night (after he peed in his room again!)We were talking about trying harder to get to the potty, etc. and I asked again why he goes in his room. He told me it was because when he has to go and he's in there, he doesn't think he can make it to the potty so he just goes. (The fact that his bedroom is right next to the bathroom doesn't seem to matter).

 

This was actually a bit of a clue for us. Until he said this, I hadn't noticed, if he's in any other room in the house when he has to go potty, he goes to the bathroom with no problems. It's only if he's already in his bedroom that he'll go in there.

 

Now, I have no idea why - or what the issue is, but at least it's a start!

 

But thank you all for your advice and support, if it wasn't for you guys, I wouldn't have thought that it might be something he was avoiding or thought to ask him why!!

 

Thanks so much!!!