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

'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!

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.

WHY I POOED MY PANTS

This is a slightly amended version of the post on my first blog, in which I wrote in detail for the first time about my childhood soiling.

Aged 3 and still in nappies.

My toilet troubles began at an early age.  Potty training was a slow process for me and I didn't come out of nappies until I was three and a half years old.  But though I was ‘dry’, I was still not completely ‘clean’ and often messed my pants.  This occurred between the ages of 3 and 11, although it was worst up to the age of 7.  It happened because I often avoided going to the toilet when I felt the need to poo.  Instead I would clench my bottom and breath inwards and wait for the need to pass.  If I felt the urge again I would repeat the process. I freely admit that withholding began as an act of laziness on my part, not wanting to stop playing in order to attend to my bodily needs, but it was never an act of naughtiness.  I didn't deliberately go in my pants, but I would soil myself sometime later because of my failure to use the toilet earlier. I never felt myself actually pooing, I just became aware later that my pants were messy.

It was a long time before I made the connection between avoiding using the toilet and having dirty pants, because the need to poo seemed to go away when I ignored it, making me believe that I had made my poo disappear.  This was different to the feeling of a full bladder which, if I did not go to the toilet straight away, would gradually get stronger until eventually I wet my pants, something which I never did after my toddler years.  Because of the time lapse between avoiding using the bathroom and soiling myself, I really don’t think I made the connection between the two events for a quite a while. 

A typical withholding position for me
when I needed a poo and decided
not to go to the toilet. (c)

For a long time I had wanted to stop soiling myself but didn’t know how to do it. Once I had made the connection I then made more of an effort to start using the toilet when I knew I needed to poo. It wasn’t easy as avoiding going to the toilet had become quite a habit, and there were times when I still did it. However, before my 8th birthday I was mostly clean, other than on trips as I disliked using public toilets for bowel movements.  My very last accident occurred on holiday at the age of 11.  By that stage I had suffered the embarrassment of being messy and smelly, and gone through the humiliation of being changed by my mother, more times than I would wish to remember.  I had put my parents through a lot of worry and heartache, not to mention some horrible laundry and clean-ups, and I had been shouted at and told off on numerous occasions.  But at least the nightmare was over and I could forget about this awful chapter of my childhood.

I thought at the time, and for a long time afterwards, that I was the only child in the world who dirtied his pants.  But I was later to discover that this was not the case...

To read about soiling from the point of view of a girl sufferer, take a look at this blog post from Dimity Telfer: The Story of My Life

INTRODUCTION

In December 2012 I nervously hit the ‘publish’ button on my latest blog post.  I was about to tell the world (well, anyone who cared to read it!) about something which I had always thought I would never tell anyone, something which I considered to be my shameful childhood secret.  I was about to reveal that I frequently soiled myself as a child, and had carried on doing this until I was 11 years old.

For many years I had believed that people would think the same as me, that frequently pooing my pants when I was well past potty

The words are spoken by a fictional character,
but they could have come from my own mouth.

training age was a babyish and disgusting thing to do, and would judge me accordingly.  This was reinforced by the fact that for so many years I had thought that I was the only school aged child in the world that did this.  Although I later became aware that this was not the case, it was still something that I kept quiet about, a part of my past that was best kept secret.

My discovery, via the internet, of just how many children and young people regularly soiled themselves convinced me to open up and tell my story, in the hope that it might help some of them to understand that they were not alone in having this problem, and for the benefit of the many parents who were struggling to cope with their children’s soiling.  In the previous few years I had posted on internet parenting forums about my experiences, but this was the first time I had told my story in a blog post that would include my full name and photographs.

Fortunately the response from parents was positive, many thanking me for sharing my history and, in particular, finding comfort from the fact that I had eventually stopped soiling my pants.  I was not plagued by any internet trolls and no-one was judgemental or disgusted about what I had done as a child.  The post was also consistently the one with the most hits on my blog.

The covers of my books
for children who soil.

In 2014 I published a book for older children who soil, called A Child Like You, partly based on my own experiences and have recently republished this in separate editions for boys and girls, called A Boy Like You and A Girl Like You. 

Now I have decided that the time has come to start a new blog, this time concentrating on the subject of childhood soiling, which is still often considered a taboo subject in ‘the real world’.  I plan to write in greater detail about my experiences through a series of posts, which may be TMI for some people but I have found that being frank and candid about my childhood toilet problems is appreciated by parents of children who soil.  This blog will not continue indefinitely, when I had said everything I have to say I will stop posting, but the blog will remain to hopefully help future sufferers cope with the distressing condition that is encopresis.

Finally, please note that I live in the UK and will be using British terminology in this blog, but I’m sure American readers will be able to translate ‘pants’ into ‘underwear’!  There will be several childhood photographs of myself, but other pictures are posed by models.  These images, which are marked '(c)', are copyright and used under licence.

For more information on childhood soiling and constipation, and other continence issues in children such as bedwetting, daytime wetting and potty training, why not visit the website of the charity ERIC who specialise in helping with these problems.