CONTENTS

This blog is now complete and provides as detailed an account as possible of my childhood soiling problem.

I have also written a single post blog for children who soil, telling my story in simple language: The Boy Who Pooed His Pants

You can click on the post titles below to either read the articles in the order posted or go straight to areas that are of interest to you.

INTRODUCTION

WHY I POOED MY PANTS

SO MANY CHILDREN

HOW I STOPPED SOILING MY PANTS

OUT AND ABOUT

MY FINAL ACCIDENT

SOILING AT SCHOOL

STAYING IN MESSY PANTS

THE "DON'T CARE" ATTITUDE

THE DAY I POOED MYSELF ON PURPOSE

A POOEY BOTTOM AT NURSERY

HELP!!!! MY CHILD HAS ENCOPRESIS

ERIC - THE CHILDREN'S BOWEL & BLADDER CHARITY

THE RIGHT TO GO

'A BOY LIKE YOU' AND 'A GIRL LIKE YOU'

'NEWS FROM THE LOOS'

'HELP! I POO MY PANTS'

POSITIVE OUTCOMES

Please click here if you wish to contact the author of this blog

POSITIVE OUTCOMES

I wouldn’t wish encopresis on anyone, and certainly not on my younger self.  Yet, despite the painful and embarrassing experiences of soiling myself as a child, there have, I think, been some positive outcomes.  In this final blog post I would like to consider these.

The things I did as a child,
including soiling myself,
have made me very patient
 with children as an adult.

Firstly, I think that my childhood experiences have made me very patient with children, which was undoubtedly useful when I did voluntary work in local primary schools, day nurseries and playgroups.  If any of the children did or said anything silly, I remembered back to some of the things which I did when I was their age, which may be considered silly when viewed through adult eyes, but which made perfect sense to me at the time.  I am particularly patient when it comes to children’s toilet issues and think nothing of it when I see a girl or boy past the usual age for potty training who is still wearing nappies or pull-ups, and would never punish any child in my care for a toilet accident, no matter how old they were, or feel anything but sympathy for that child.

I believe this empathy with the feelings of children who wet or soil themselves began at an early age.  As I said in my post A Pooey Bottom at Nursery, I never teased Holly when she pooed her pants at school, nor did I ever mention her accident to her or to anyone else.  Similarly, I never said anything to Melanie about wetting herself during rehearsals for the school’s nativity play, outlined in Soiling at School, or to a 7 year old friend who wet his pants while we were walking home from school.

I also think that encopresis has given me an appreciation of bowel control, and a determination to hang onto it, that is stronger than in many other adults.  For example, while a lot of adults dislike having a bowel movement while they are at work, or try to avoid using public toilets if they need a poo, I am happy to park my bottom anywhere when nature calls.  I have seen the consequences of withholding and I have no intention whatsoever of repeating the mistakes of my childhood.  Good bowel control is now too important for me to jeopardise it again.

Using my experiences to help today's
children who soil, and their parents,
has been the silver lining to the
cloud of encopresis. (c)

However, undoubtedly the biggest positive from my experiences has been the ability to help the children of today who have soiling problems, and their parents.  Although there must be thousands of adults who had similar issues when they were younger, there are few who are willing to share their experiences, which is perfectly understandable.  Though I was hesitant at first, choosing to write about my childhood soiling was one of the best decisions I have made and I am delighted that so many parents have found my reminiscences useful, and that older children who soil have found comfort and help from my books A Boy Like You and A Girl Like You.  I could not have written these books if I had not suffered from encopresis myself as knowing exactly how it felt to frequently poo yourself when you were 7, 8 or 9 years old was a key component to their success.  I have been asked more questions by parents about my toilet problems than I care to recall, which I have been happy to answer as honestly and candidly as I can.  Now this blog is complete it should hopefully be useful to more parents who are struggling to help and understand their feelings of their son or daughter who is suffering from this condition.

Someone once told me that I had to go through the painful experiences of encopresis as a child in order to help others as an adult.  While my younger self, and my mother who frequently had to clean me up, may never have thought that anything good could have come out of my withholding and soiling habit, I am very pleased that even the cloud of this humiliating condition has proved to have had a silver lining.

'HELP! I POO MY PANTS'

If you’ve read my earlier post, you will know that in 2014 I decided to write a book for older children who soil, as the only books on the market for kids who had poo accidents were picture books for very young children.  In 2016, following requests from some parents, I reissued these books in gender specific editions called A Boy Like You and A Girl Like You.  They were very successful and have helped many children with encopresis to understand that they are not alone with their problems and that they can, with help, overcome them.  Many parents have also found these books useful in understanding encopresis from a child’s point of view, and helping to start a conversation with their child about their soiling problems.  These books are still available and are recommended for children aged 8 to 12 years.  You can find out more about them by clicking here to read the relevant post.

A new book designed to encourage
younger children to use the toilet
instead of withholding their poo.

In 2020 I decided that there was still a gap that needed to be bridged between the picture books that were available and my books for older children.  I decided therefore to write a new book for younger children who soiled their pants.  This book would have shorter chapters and a simpler storyline than my existing book.  Once again there would be separate editions for boys and girls, as I am now convinced that for an issue as personal as toilet problems, most kids would rather read a book in which the child who shared their problem was also the same sex as themselves.  The title of this book would be Help! I Poo My Pants, it would be designed for children aged 5 to 8 years and the lead character would be 7 years old.

This set of books places a greater emphasis on discouraging the reader from withholding their poo, a major cause of soiling, and encouraging them to go to the toilet instead, including when they are at school or away from home.  The lead character – I shall use Amelia from the Girl version of the book for convenience – frequently withholds her poo when she doesn’t want to stop playing, and feels totally unable to poo in the school toilets, or the toilets at other people’s homes as well as public toilets. 

This, of course, means that Amelia often poos her pants, which she finds very embarrassing and upsetting, especially when it happens at school or in public.  She also wets herself occasionally, when the poo she has withheld in her body presses on her bladder.  She is unable to change herself when she is messy and is reliant on an adult to do it for her.  She finds it particularly humiliating when she has to be cleaned up in public toilets or baby changing rooms, or when she has to wait in the school corridor for her mother to come to change her pull-up, which her teacher insists that she wears at school.

Can Toby, the hero of the Boy
version of the book, find the courage
to go to the toilet every time he
needs to poo, even at school? 

Although the situations are largely invented, the emotional experiences of Amelia mostly mirror my own feelings of being this age, when I was frequently soiling myself and felt very unhappy about my toilet problems.  Like me, Amelia has to learn that she must always go to the toilet when she needs to poo, including when she is on a day out or at school.  She also starts to tell someone when she does have an accident and needs changing, something which I never did myself.

I also designed a series of ‘posters’ to go between some of the chapters to reinforce the message of the book and encourage good bladder and bowel health and bathroom hygiene.  These are similar to those used in the book I wrote the previous year, News from the Loos.

The American Edition of this book is titled Help! I Poop My Pants.  The story is identical to the British version, but the vocabulary, spelling and phrasing of the American Edition has been adapted to make it familiar to North American readers.  Both the British and American editions are available in paperback and for the Kindle and Kindle apps.  Initial sales of the books have been encouraging, and I really hope that these new books help younger children who have soiling problems, as well as their parents and carers.

'NEWS FROM THE LOOS'

Raising awareness of encopresis, and children’s toilet problems generally, has long been an aim of mine.  As of August 2019, this blog has had nearly 35,000 hits.  While many viewers of these pages will be parents of kids with encopresis, I imagine that some people reading this blog will be learning about this condition for the first time.  Other resources, mostly online, have also meant that more adults have heard of encopresis than was previously the case, although it remains one of the lesser known juvenile medical conditions.

There is one group of people, however, who remain almost universally unaware of childhood soiling issues, and that is other children.  Unless they have the condition

The front cover of
'News from the Loos'

themselves, or have a close friend or relative who does, then they are likely to assume that all kids are perfectly able to poo in the toilet and avoid having accidents shortly after they come out of nappies.  They are therefore likely to consider any kid aged around 5 and above who soils his pants to be a ‘baby’ and a legitimate target for ridicule.  The same thing applies to peers who suffer from daytime wetting problems, especially if it happens on multiple occasions.  Most kids know that some children wet the bed, but hardly any seem to know that some also have wetting problems during the day.

It’s probably not surprising therefore, though rather upsetting, that many parents of children who have continence issues often report that their offspring are teased or bullied at school and find it hard to make friends.  From all I have heard about the extent of soiling and wetting problems, I imagine that in most primary school classes there is at least one student who suffers from them, and probably several in some classes.

I therefore decided to write a book of short stories, for kids aged 7 to 11, set around the toilets of a primary school, designed to raise awareness amongst children of wetting and soiling issues, in the hope that reading it will make them more sympathetic to the plight of their classmates who suffer from these problems.  If it also helped educate parents and teachers on this subject then this would be a valuable bonus.

One of the posters in the book,
designed to promote good
bladder and bowel health. (c)

Another thing which I have found alarming is reports that many children drink only a minimal amount of fluids during the school day to try to avoid having to go to the toilet, with potentially damaging consequences to their health.  Worse still, a lot of kids refused to use school toilets if they needed to poo, with some even regarding doing a poo at school, or at a friend’s house, to be a social taboo.  It seems that my message that ‘It’s Cool to Poo at School’ needed to be spread to a much wider audience than just children with encopresis. 

I decided, therefore, that my new book should also promote good bladder and bowel health, at school and elsewhere, amongst ALL children.  As with my previous books, I would not be shy in talking about weeing and pooing, and the children in the book would set a good example in always using the school toilets, whether they needed to go Number 1 or Number 2.  Of course, the stories do not only involve bodily functions and also cover themes such as friendship, honesty and helping others.  Menstruation is featured in one story, as I believe that both girls and boys should learn about periods before the age when a girl is likely to start having them.

The toilets at Parktree Primary School, where the stories are set, are unisex, which made it easy for the girl and boy characters to interact.  They are kept clean and well maintained and children have access to them at all times.  The teachers are aware that a child’s need to use the toilet does not always conveniently occur at break times and allow their students to leave their lessons if they need to do so.  Additionally, the staff work with the families of children who have toilet issues to help them cope at school.  This is an idealised situation, but it is an ideal to which I think all schools should strive and which parents should demand.  As I said in my post The Right to Go, every child should have the right to use a safe, hygienic school toilet whenever nature calls.

One of the posters in the book,
designed to discourage teasing
and bullying of children
with continence issues. (c)

I also designed a series of posters to go between the stories, mostly featuring kids of a similar age to the intended readership.  The children in these posters ask readers to wash their hands, drink enough water and wipe their bottoms from front to back.  They also offer advice for relieving constipation and urge kids not to tease their classmates who wet or soil themselves at school.

To make the stories seem realistic and help convince children that their peers really do have problems like the ones described in the book, I invented a School Librarian, Penny Spender, from whose notes the stories were written.  The book and the school, however, are wholly fictitious, although a few of the stories are inspired by actual events.

The resulting book, News from the Loos, will, I hope, in some small way, help to end the taboo around children’s continence issues and encourages the use of school toilets.  And, most important of all, I hope it’s a fun read for kids!

'A BOY LIKE YOU' AND 'A GIRL LIKE YOU'

Type ‘soiling’ into Google’s search engine and you will get over 5 million results.  Outside of cyberspace, however, encopresis remains a topic that few people want to talk about and it never seems to be discussed on television.  I have stated before how when I was a boy I thought I was the only school aged child in the world who still pooed his pants.  Three years ago I got to wondering how many other children felt the same way and were miserable as a result.  I suspected that the answer was rather a lot.

I did a bit of research and found that, while there were picture books available for young children who soiled, there was nothing for the many older children with the same condition.  Also, while children’s writers such as Jacqueline Wilson had showed that a bedwetter, like Tracy Beaker, could be a heroine, there seemed to be no mainstream books in which the lead character was a child who pooed her pants.  It looked like there was no-one for the older child who had encopresis to identify with, no-one who shared their problem and could act as a role model.  I decided that it was time to turn my own experiences into something that could help the children of today.  It was time for a child who soiled to become a heroine!

The cover of the 
original book.

In 2014 I self-published A Child Like You, in both paperback and for the Kindle and Kindle apps.  I tried to make it realistic, but positive.  Beth, the lead character, has painful memories from when she first began soiling, but she is now able to manage her condition and is well on the way to becoming completely clean.  Her thoughts and feelings largely mirrored my own, although her experiences were also based on those of other children with encopresis, such as taking off her soiled pants and hiding them, which I never did.  Drama was provided when another girl smelt that Beth had messed herself in assembly and she feared that the whole class would soon know her embarrassing secret.

The reaction to the book was overwhelmingly positive.  Many children who soiled were delighted to read a book in which the lead character had the same problem as them, and could often identify with what was happening to Beth and how she was feeling, and several parents told me that their child did not want to put the book down or had read it multiple times. Some readers were amazed to find out that other kids had this condition, having previously believing that they were the only one. 

Parents themselves also found the book useful, both in understanding the problem from a child’s point of view and in helping to start a conversation with their son or daughter about their toilet issues.  Some parents even told me how it had encouraged their child to try to poo on the toilet and to change themselves after an accident. 

The only negative comment was from some mothers of boys who said they found it difficult, or impossible, to get their son to read a book in which the main character was a girl.  Although I knew that girls tended to be less resistant in reading a book with a male protagonist, I did not want to simply change Beth into a boy.  While they are outnumbered by their male peers, I know that there are a lot of girls who soil, and I did not want to deprive them of their heroine.  I also felt that for an issue as personal as toilet problems, children would better be able to identify with a fellow sufferer who was the same sex as themselves.

The gender specific titles
offer the same story from the
perspective of both
a boy and a girl who soil.

The solution I decided was to split the book into two separate gender specific titles.  The result was A Boy Like You and A Girl Like You, which I published in April 2016.  In the new edition for boys, Beth has become Justin, but the story is the same with the sexes of all the child characters reversed.  I also took the opportunity to amend the original book, introducing some new material based on my conversations with parents, such as the belief that withholding poo makes it disappear, which was a misconception that I also had as a child, and altering some passages which I felt did not completely work in the original version. 

As with the original book, these new editions were endorsed by ERIC, the children’s bowel and bladder charity, who agreed to stock the paperback versions of the British Edition in their online shop.  An American Edition, in both paperback and on the Kindle, is also available.  The story is identical to the British version, but the vocabulary, spelling and phrasing of the American Edition has been adapted to make it familiar to North American readers.

The new versions have proved even more popular than the first book, parents with boys who soil being particularly grateful for a ‘boy friendly’ version, and I continue to receive favourable comments.  In my original blog I wrote that if just one child who soils his or her pants is helped by reading this book then it will have been well worth the effort to write it.  It has clearly done more than that and I am delighted that the new versions are continuing to help older children who have this terrible condition.  I make no money from them, but I am always thrilled when I hear from another parent telling me how reading one of these books has helped them and their child.

THE RIGHT TO GO

Imagine this: you are spending the evening at the theatre with a group of friends.  You are enjoying the show, but the drinks you had during the interval have inconveniently made their way to your bladder.  Afraid that you are not going to be able to wait until the final curtain, and having no wish to suffer the discomfort of a full bladder for longer than is necessary, you decide to excuse yourself and make use of the theatre’s toilets.  Getting up, you clamber over your friends and the other patrons on your row and make your way to the nearest exit out from the auditorium. 

You are in for a shock, however.  An usher is standing in front of the exit, blocking your escape, and he refuses to let you pass.  Slightly embarrassed, you explain that you need the toilet and when he still refuses you say that you are desperate and cannot wait.  He is implacable.  ‘You should have gone during the interval,’ he says.  ‘You’ll have to wait until the show is over now.’

It is impossible for a child to
fully concentrate on her 

schoolwork if she needs to
go to the toilet. (c)

Defeated you return to your seat.  Maybe it would have been wise to have made use of the facilities during the interval, but you didn’t really need to go then and, in any case, the queues were fairly long and you have never liked a crowd when you use the loo.  You resume your seat, but you are unable to enjoy the rest of the play.  Your concentration is focussed solely on the steadily increasing pain from your bladder, and your growing fear that you are going to have an embarrassing accident in front of your friends, which will probably be part of the conversation of dinner parties for years to come.  You also hope that your companions do not notice your hand placed firmly in your crotch, and your legs crossed ever tighter as you desperately try to avoid wetting yourself in your seat.  The only other thought occupying your mind is your sense of anger towards the usher.  What gives one human the right to deny another access to the toilet?  Surely being able to use the toilet when you need to is a basic human right, isn’t it?

Wetting his pants in the
classroom is one of the most
 embarrassing things that
can happen to a child. (c)

The above scenario may seem ridiculous, but every day in schools children face a similar dilemma, needing to wee or poo during lesson time but being refused permission to use the toilet because ‘you should have gone at breaktime,’ or not bothering to ask because they know the answer will be in the negative.  Such children are then unlikely to be able to concentrate on their work, as the increasingly strong signals from their bladder or bowel occupies their attention, and they worry about whether they are going to have an accident in front of their peers.  For a child who is past nursery age, wetting or soiling your pants in class is one of the most humiliating experiences imaginable, and peers are not likely to let the poor kid forget their accident in a hurry.  And yet the child has done nothing wrong except needing the toilet at a slightly inconvenient time.

Every parent will know that when a
young child needs to go, he needs to
go NOW, but watering the grass is not
an option for him in the classroom. (c)

For several years I did volunteer work at various local primary schools, working with children aged from 3 to 11.  If a child asked me if they could go to the toilet I always said ‘yes’ without hesitation.  The teachers, however, were not always so accommodating.  In a Year 2 class in one school a 6 year old boy repeatedly asked during a lesson if he could use the toilet but the teacher refused him permission: ‘playtime is the time for going to the toilet,’ she told him.  The poor boy had to keep returning to his desk, increasingly desperate and unable to do much of the task he had been set.  In a different school, a 7 year old girl had to wait to use the toilet because of the rule that only one child of each sex from the class were allowed to go to the toilet at a time.  The girl was clearly desperate for a wee as she hovered near the classroom door, unable to keep still and lifting up first one foot and then the other as she tried to avoid the humiliation of wetting herself in front of her classmates.  It is one of the most harrowing sights I have ever seen. 

Let's encourage kids to poo at school
if they need to. (c)

As well as the risk of having a embarrasing accident in the classroom, there are also health issues involved in forcing a child to wait to use the toilet.  Withholding urine can cause urinary tract infections (UTIs) and continence problems, and, as we have seen in my case, withholding poo can cause constipation and soiling problems.  The need to poo, in particular, can strike at any time, and a child should be encouraged to open their bowel as soon as possible when the need arises.  Many children who otherwise have no toilet issues are reluctant to use the school toilets when they need to poo, preferring to wait until they get home, by which time the urge might have gone, risking constipation problems, or they may have soiled.  Personally, I think that children should be encouraged ask to go to the toilet when they need to poo during lessons and should certainly not be denied permission.  I’ve thought up my own soundbite for a campaign around this issue: ‘It’s Cool to Poo at School!’

You can probably guess that I am fully supportive of ERIC’s ‘The Right to Go’campaign, which calls for schoolchildren to have access to safe and hygienic school toilets at all times, as well as highlighting every child’s right to good care for a continence problem at school.

Children should have
access to safe and hygienic 
school toilets at all times. (c)

Of course, it’s better for the smooth running of a lesson if children use the toilets during their breaks and I’m not suggesting that they should not do this.  But there will always be times when the need to go does not coincide with playtime or lunchtime and all teachers should make allowances for this.  Also, some children will feel uncomfortable going to the toilets when they are crowded, particularly for a poo.  Such children should not be made to suffer because of this and arrangements should be made to allow them to attend to their toilet needs in a manner that is comfortable for them.  And yes, there will be the odd pupil who deliberately uses the excuse of needing the toilet to get out of lessons they do not enjoy, or for nefarious activities such as smoking, but these should be dealt with on an individual basis, and not by punishing the whole class by stopping everyone going to the toilet in lesson time.

I’m sure that there will be teachers who disagree with me and predict chaos in the classroom if they allow their pupils unrestricted access to the toilets.  But ultimately it comes down to the question I posed in my imaginary scenario at the theatre: what gives one human the right to deny another access to the toilet?  

ERIC - THE CHILDREN'S BOWEL & BLADDER CHARITY

There are many excellent charities operating in the UK and across the world.  Everyone has their favourite, often based on personal experience or circumstances.  There are many charities I admire, particularly those working to improve the lives of children, such as the NSPCC and Barnardos.  But without doubt my favourite charity is ERIC – The Children’s Bowel & Bladder Charity, a small UK based charity which does brilliant work in an unglamorous area.

ERIC provides a lifeline for parents
 being driven potty by their child's
wetting or soiling problems (c)

Set up by The Children’s Society in 1988, ERIC, which now stands for Education and Resources for Improving Childhood Continence, originally specialised in helping families to deal with bedwetting in children and teenagers, but has since expanded to cover other toilet problems in young people such as daytime wetting, constipation and soiling. 

From its offices in Bristol in the west of England, ERIC’s helpline, website and publications are a lifeline for parents and children dealing with continence issues.  Wetting and soiling issues in children and teenagers are a distressing problem for the young person concerned as well as for their parents, who often feel unable to discuss their child’s condition with their families and friends, and sometimes also have difficulty dealing with the medical profession.  ERIC’s helpline, in particular, is a great help to parents both in providing a listening, non-judgemental ear and offering expert advice.  Their staff and volunteers are happy to talk about wee and poo all day and have helped countless desperate families over the years.

But it is not only because of the excellent work that they do that I love ERIC so much.  They are also great in looking after their supporters.  They do not bombard you with requests for donations, but treat you with the human touch.  I have had several personal emails, and even handwritten letters, from various members of staff.  They keep you updated on the work they are doing and really make you feel valued.

The only sad thing is that ERIC was not around when I was a child.  I’m sure with their help I would have been able to overcome my soiling problem quicker, and they would also have been a great source of comfort and help to my mother.  Although she often got cross with me when I had accidents, my mother is a wonderful person, always helping others and devoted to her family.  My soiling undoubtedly caused her anguish and, like me, she probably thought that no other school aged child still had accidents in his pants like I did.  There was no internet to turn to for information and, like so many parents, she felt unable to discuss my poo problems with others.  Being able to speak to an organisation like ERIC would, I’m sure, have brought a great sense of relief to her.

Advice on toilet training is another
of ERIC's specialities (c)

ERIC can also help with potty training, and their online shop sells bedwetting alarms, travel potties, vibrating watches and even pee and poo soft toys and keyrings.  They also sell a wide range of protective pants and swimwear suitable for containing poo accidents.  And finally, they have a wide range of books covering all aspects of children’s toileting, including my own books for older children who soil, A Boy Like You and A Girl LikeYou, which will be the subject of a future post.

For more information please go to ERIC’s website, www.eric.org.uk, or click on the box on this website.

ERIC, 36 Old School House, Britannia Road, Kingswood, Bristol, BS15 8DB, United Kingdom.  ERIC is a Registered Charity (no 1002424) and a Company Limited by Guarantee (no 2580579) registered in England and Wales.