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Erica's Posts, good housekeeping, it's all about the poo, Laughing Through Tears, potty training
I’m a simple woman, with simple needs. No, really. I only require one thing to make my continued existence on this planet bearable: that my sons move all of their elimination business to the toilet. There’s two of them. They’re seven. It’s time.
I don’t need them to recover from autism, I don’t need them to live independently when they grow up, I don’t even need them to ever learn to talk; I just need them to stop shitting on the carpet. Pleasegodthankyouamen. See? Simple.
And the thing is, they can. They have, even. About once a month they will actually go into the bathroom and drop a deuce in the toilet, completely independently. Nonchalantly. Just often enough to give me hope. And so we continue with the endless clothing changes, and the carpet steaming upstairs and the wet mopping downstairs, and the PECs, and the social stories, and the iPad apps, and the rewards, and absolutely no pull-ups in the daytime except on long road trips, and not always even then. We’re getting there. They’re essentially potty-trained as far as urine goes, so there really is reason to hope… right? Right?
I try to be positive, but it’s SO hard when I’m awakened at o’dark:30 to a squawking child banging out a piano concerto, only to enter his room and find that he’s pooped absolutely everywhere. And the school bus is coming in half an hour. And his brother has just done the exact same thing in his own room (except he doesn’t have a keyboard).
If I’m lucky, this only happens once a day. If I’m not, it can be 6-8 separate incidents. How is it possible that two people that small can crap that much in one day? There’s no predicting it, either. I live in a war zone of uneasiness. A successfully productive mission to the bathroom is still no guarantee that I won’t happen upon a landmine ten minutes later.
Just this morning, after I had taken both boys to the bathroom, so joyful because they both peed on cue, I went downstairs and stepped off the last stair into a rogue puddle of urine so large it had its own sound effect. Wailing, I rolled up my splashed pantlegs and sprinted into the laundry room for a towel, only to be met with an area rug covered in… you guessed it.
My husband rounded the corner to see what I was yelling about, took one look at my face and announced, “I’ll take the boys out for a long walk… Now.”
“It’s hard not to hope that the Mayans are going to be right about 2012,” I call after him.
Gallows humor aside, this is hard for me. Like, on my psyche hard. If I really, truly thought they wouldn’t get it, the whole potty-training thing, I would just put them back in diapers for good. Permanently. Really, I would be crushed, but I’d deal with it, just like I deal with everything else that life dishes out for my sons. I just don’t know if I will recognize that point when (if) we get to it, though. At what age do we throw in the towel and say this just isn’t going to happen– 10? 16? 21?
I don’t want to give up on my sons. They are so smart– I see so much intelligence when I look into their eyes as I speak to them. I know they understand so much. I know they understand why I’m angry when I have to clean up yet another mess. I see them try, in their own way, by at least going into the bathroom and doing it on the floor in there. They get it. I know they do. And so, we continue.
But this house isn’t big enough for both the carpet and me. One of us has got to go.
They were out of the “chronically naked little boy” formula, so I just got this kind.
“When you reach the bottom line
The only thing to do is climb
Pick yourself up off the floor
Don’t know what you’re waiting for” –Big Audio Dynamite
I can total relate to how you feel.
I just found your blog, and I am SO grateful to have found it. I knew I wasn’t the only mom who cleaned up poop constantly, but I I am really glad someone TALKS about it. Because trust me, no one outside my world wants to hear about the Autism Giant that lives in my home. I have 2; a 14-year-old high-ender with accompanying anxiety and OCD, and an 11-year-old severe autie, who has “sort of” mastered bladder training. We are still working on bowel training. And he doesn’t eat. Anything. Yes, I mean that literally. Oh, and he just decided its OK to pee standing 3 feet away from the toilet while surfing on his iPad. The “pee arc” is amazing:)
Where do I even begin?! Almost 14 yr. old son, autism, but high end, you would never know if you met him, lots of opposition/defiance, socially behind, holes in walls(really embarassing for the 11 yr. Old sister), 6th. Old sister just doesn’t get it, yet, tantrums, swearing, blood curdling screaming, threats, ( but can be lovable, caring, sweet, generous, etc.)
Now for the bad shit! Punn is so intended! The summer he turned 9 (attended a really bad summer camp for kids with serious issues), and not my kids kind of serious issues. In July of that summer, the 25th to be exact, sitting in a FILLED auditorium (daughters summer camp performance) with husband, new baby, my overbearing parents, and about 100 friends or aqaintances, my father and I both looked at each other at the same moment, and, we SNIFFED.
Keep in mind my then 9 yr. Old was toilet trained, although he never seemed truly comfortable with the whole thing.
He basically only shits at home (usually in his bedroom), not ever at school! Thank freaking God!! So, at home, after almost 5 years of using his bedroom as a bathroom, (our upstairs is totally open to the first floor) our house SMELLS really f-ing BAD. The overall aroma of pee and poop mixed together, and let me tell you, thank god his room just happens to be the only bedroom with wood floors, wierd fluke, wood floors like to hold onto the smells. As does the drywall, curtains, clothes, bedding, everything!!! Luckily, due to occasional violent outbursts, we have had to take just about everything out of his room, except his bed and 1 dresser (ironically, also wood).
He had always has nocturnal enuresis, yah, so he wears pull ups to be. BUT, guess what? Instead of putting on a pull up when he goes “upstairs”, he will piss and shit in his tighty whiteys! WHY!?!?!?! If I told u what we have spent on underware and pull ups, AND clothing we have had to replace, you would not believe it. He just sits in it and plays. Do you understand? He just plays, with his legos. AND, it gets better, he doesn’t like to shower, yaaah, so he just might decide to turn in early, with shitted up undies, or don’t get me wrong, he will sometimes change into a pull up before he hops into bed. His room has a good 10-11 hours to soak up the smells of poo and pee from the night before. Sometimes the indies land on whatever pants he was wearing (already full of shit too), or maybe in a corner of the room, or under his bed, closet, drawer, hidden under clothes in his dirty laundry basket! I never thought I would have to scrape poop off of walls or floors, and yes, I have had to use my coiffed nails to scrape (WITH paper towel). He does not seem to freaking care. Sometimes he absolutely does. He cries, says he can’t help it, etc.. We have been to every kind of therapist, in home, out of home, I have read every piece of info out their. This has been my life’s work. Wow! Who knew?
I could literally write here for days about all of the sordid details of the last, what is 5 times 365, days and you would probably only get a little bored. Or you may end up begging for more so you could at last, have a reason to not feel so bad about your kiddo.
I laugh, with husband, mom, and friend ( not plural), just friend. I cry and cry and cry with my husband.
I have to say, as I stumbled upon this website (I was searching for “how to get the smell of feces and urine out of my house”), I have not laughed or so totally related in forever.
Thank you, as strange as that sounds.
I would look into removable linoleum floor tiles for his room. They’ll be a lot easier to clean. For awhile we also had those air fresheners that are supposed to soak up smells in my son’s room. I know the last thing you need is something else to do, but you can work a nightly room sweep into his routine? Just take 5 minutes and have him put all his dirty clothes into a plastic laundry hamper. You’ll probably have to supervise, but it’s better than scraping it up in the morning.
It seems like the teaching self-care never ends and it is exhausting. My son just doesn’t seem to get WHY we clean ourselves and getting him to even brush his teeth is a fight every single day.
Sigh. I really, really understand how you feel. Truly. You sound exactly how I felt when I wrote this piece. It’s just this feeling of being so utterly defeated. It seems like it will never, ever get better; and the fact that it’s smelly, disgusting filth and requires such up-close and intensive effort to deal with it… every single day. Just so demoralizing. I get it.
Since I wrote this, we have had all of the carpet removed from both boys’ rooms and replaced it with laminate flooring. It’s been about a month, and I haven’t had to haul my carpet cleaner out one single time, because thankfully, they haven’t moved their business to the other carpeted areas of the house, as I had feared they might. No, they do still use their rooms as toilets fairly often, but now it takes one minute to clean up, instead of 25. The house looks and smells normal, and I no longer feel as if I live in a kennel. It’s honestly been LIFE-CHANGING for me, because I’m no longer in a pit of despair.
It has totally made all the difference in my ability to cope with this ongoing challenge of potty-training. And that’s really all we have control over– how we feel about these challenges that come along with parenting. I mean, we can do everything to teach them the skills they need to do self-care, but that ultimately will come on its own timeline (hopefully), not ours. The best thing to do is to figure out what WE need to be able to handle it in the meantime. I think Axi’s advice was spot-on– just a few small things that can make a big difference in your sanity level.
THAT is exactly what I was trying to communicate. Thanks, Erica! Figure out the small changes that can make a difference in your sanity level. It’s hard to think of changes when you are in that seemingly endless cycle of drudgery, but finding ways to manage it really makes it a million times better.
My youngun isn’t autistic, but she went thru the whole “paint the walls, the floors and all her toys” with poop phase, I feel for you. I really really really feel for you. I hope that they begin going in the potty soon for you. Good luck with this!
I used to complain about my son not wiping or flushing. OMG this is just a different league altogether. I wish I had more for you rather than just sympathy.
Our severe non-verbal son did it –after many many years of training that did not work at all –just before he turned 9.
He just…did.
Still don’t know how or why, but its awesome.
We still drink red wine every single day though.
Thanks for the laughs! My 9 year old son will only go poop in a pull up and refuses to even sit on the toilet. I often wonder when will he just go in the toilet. He’s completely trained for #1 no accidents nor any #2 accidents just won’t use the toilet for #2.
Thanks for sharing and letting all of us know we are not alone we can all relate!
I feel like I’m chiming in way late here – but I’ve been there as well. My son is now 11 and just within the last 6 months has he become independent with the toilet. He had the peeing part down pretty early (7 or so? Well.. early for autism, right?) but the #2 part was a long, hard road. I had the same thoughts as you during the cleaning up – how long will I be doing this? Will I still be wiping the wall when he’s 18? Surely not…?!? and tears, tears, tears.
The thing I have to really watch for now is toilet paper usage. Don’t get me wrong I am THRILLED to death the crap is where it should be and he’s trying to wipe himself. And honestly, as long as he doesn’t clog the toilet, he can use the whole damn roll for all I care. TP is cheap. And sooo much better than cleaning poo from places you didn’t even know poo could get to.
Oh, yes. I thought when mine would just go to the potty I’d be content for always. And I was for a while. But now he floods the bathroom regularly, using TONS of toilet paper. I still have hope we’ll get there.
I’m so sorry. I remember this and it was sooooo hard to get through. Sam would paint his room with it and I truly thought I would lose my mind some days. I will keep my fingers crossed for you that they get it SOON. What rewards have you tried? With Sam I had to resort to Thomas trains every time he pooped and then I interspersed them with small plastic toys and then phased them out. Are they afraid of the toilet flushing?
Here’s a commiseration story for ya: When Sam was still potty training, I was painting a cabinet. I heard him call for me and I went upstairs. To be ‘smart’, I took the gallon of paint with me. When I got upstairs, he had peed and pooped all over the hallways carpet. I put the gallon of paint on the table in the hallway and started scrubbing. I hear him say ‘what’s this’ (I’m translating. He wasn’t that clear-spoken) and before I can turn around, he knocked the whole gallon of paint off of the table. It was all over him, all over me, in a 2 inch thick puddle in the carpet and splashed on the walls. I called my husband bawling after I had spent an hour scooping the paint up with towels and rinsing them in the tub and it still wasn’t getting it all up. Thankfully, my h thought of calling a carpet cleaner, but I had to repaint the hallway and scrub the bathroom down for days to get the paint off of the bathtub and linoleum. I really thought I was going to lose it that day.
Okay, that made me laugh, but I can absolutely imagine how you were feeling during that massive cleanup session. Thanks for the misery-loves-company story!
Word. We are in the same boat (twins and autism), only one year behind you. If we could get ONE of them to properly use the potty and cut the crap by 50%, it would be a blessing – nay, a miracle! Here’s to the SpotBot, Kids n Pets, Little Green Machine and Folex…..and to the hope of re-carpeting the house someday, before we have to burn it to the ground.
Love me some kids n pets
Hello. I dunno what else to say except I’m sorry and I hope it gets better. My almost 4 yr old (next wk) is still in diapers and is showing no interest at all in potty training. I have no idea what lies ahead for us. Where you are could be me in 3 yrs. You’re not alone if that helps even a little bit.
You are far from alone as you can see. I am a single father of a profoundly autistic 10yo boy, who is in the same place as yours pottywise. I know he can drop the duece, too, and sometimes does, but all too often i find it in his pants or have to rush him to the potty and get half in the bowl… Hang in there and let me know if you have any new ideas.
Thanks for this. I see now that I have it EASY. My son is potty trained during the daytime, but he doesn’t like the toilet. He will actually go and put on a pull up to poop in instead of sitting on the toilet. He will pee in the toilet with no problem, but doesn’t like pooping in it. I have NO IDEA what’s the reason for that.
I have the same exact issue. He has no problem flushing the toilet so he’s not afraid of it. He completely goes #1 no problem. I have tried plopping his “deuce” from the pull up into the toilet and having him wipe his own bottom and flush the toilet and explaining that is where poop goes. I will even say yuk…and he will repeat it and laugh. I keep hearing these miracle stories that one day it will click….one day needs to hurry up!
I know a 4 year old ASD girl who only poops in pull ups too, goes and gets one then poops into it nicely etc !
It took a while but my brother finally got it. by a while i mean about 14 years or more. the worst was always the car rides on long road trips when suddenly you smell that smell and know that you are in for it for the rest of the drive cause dad ain’t stopping til he gets tired!!!!! They will get there. Keep the faith and push thru.
I had to come back and comment that I’ve literally, had to clean up crap twice. ALL OVER my bathroom floor. UGH.
But, in my son’s defense, it appears that he’s got a stomach bug, manifesting itself in watery poo, cause I don’t even think *I* could make it to the bathroom with as nasty as his poops have been. At least it’s been in the bathroom where I can throw the rugs in the wash and clean up the floor easily.
And so it goes.
Erica, hang in there! Double poop duty, oh man!
We haven’t gotten much smearing other than the flying poop from the kicking legs during cleaning/changing. Mine is younger (4) and she does well with PT in preschool (of course her body clock calls for only pee there) but at daycare and at home, pull-ups are still a constant, since then it doesn’t bother her to have #1 or #2 in the panties.
It’s good to hear from people who understand this. I get so much crap from so many who don’t understand what she has because she appears “so normal.”
I feel your pain, I have two boys 5 and 7 and until this summer I was sure I would be changing butts and scrubbing poo out of carpets for the rest of my days. On the 10-12 mess days I started drinking early. But we sent our boys to visit their grandparent who live on a farm, a very large farm and, as is still normal among my people, they live communally with my sibling which means there are 14 kids and 8 adult running around give or take a few visitors or wandering family members. My family is pretty great with the boys and the kids in their age group, all 8 or 9 of them seem to enjoy helping to “take care” of their cousins, which means they watch them to make sure they don’t wander off and are willing to play endless games of tag with them which is a godsend because it actually seems to run them out after a few hours. This summer it meant “taking them to the potty” every time one of the passel had to go, and whenever one of the younger kids had to go(the 3-5 yr olds) who were in the process of figuring out the potty. So the whole pack would run into the bathroom, everyone would drop trousers and take turns peeing or pooping and somehow, my boys, who utterly refused to go at home picked it right up and were rewarded by such a fuss by their cousins every-time that its really stuck. Now are fully trained. We still have the occasional peeing incident with my youngest and I have to wipe their butts when they poop or they’ll wipe them on wall, floors, and stray clothing, but its so much better. My youngest is still completely non verbal and we call him honey badger for a reason so take heart, stock up on carpet cleaner and vodka and keep on keeping on!
I love this comment– my boys are such honey badgers!
My friends and I have dreams of creating a communal farm for our children to work and live on someday, and your family’s place sounds like what we envision as Utopia for our own kids.
Yeah, visits to mom and dads are great. I wish I could duplicate it at home. There’s nothing quite like wide open spaces for the boys. unfortunately we’re 1200 miles from my folks so we don’t get out more then once a year. I loved this post, and all the others. It’s very. very good to know that someone out there gets what i mean when I call my boy honey badger!
Thanks for your note and I totally get what you’re going through. Mine is only 5.5 and currently isn’t smearing poop – but I too live for the day when he’s toilet trained for good.
I”m with ya sista….we’re 15, 6’3″ of nonverbal poopage…..wish I could tell you it’s gets better,,,,it only gets bigger!
Wow! Mad respect, Sister.
I get it……. “on my psyche hard”. Hands down the worst years of my life. Didn’t get the poop thing under control till age 8 and I thought I was going to jump… seriously. We have hardwood floors so I would pull up the carpet till this is over. He smeared poop on every piece of furniture we have, on the tv screen, on the computer keyboard, in front of my teenagers friends (oh they loved that
stepped in in, dog ate it, crapola everywhere everyday. He doesn’t care about food or bribes so there was nothing in his mind worth “working” for. One day he decided he wanted a Mousetrap game that he had at school so we made a chart and I told him if he pooped in the potty 5 times I would buy him the game and something clicked in him and that was it. Go figure. I cried for days and can say other than my eternal salvation, no one single event has changed my life more than my kid pooping in the potty. Its soooo hard and I thank you for your post here that we can laugh through the tears. Something will click…. keep the faith and the fight but lose the carpet, you stay!
Thank you so much, Belle. Yes, the carpet goes. We have hardwood flooring on our lower level, but will probably just do laminate flooring in their rooms for now, rather than hardwood. Maybe we can treat ourselves to upstairs hardwoods once this is all behind us in a few years (fingers double crossed). So glad to hear these stories of kids eventually getting past this!
Wow, that sounds really, really hard. I hope things get better. On the bright side, at least you didn’t slip on that giant puddle.
Erica-I wish you a martini in a bubble bath…with a foot rub…at least an ability to imagine it …since you are so busy cleaning up crap this has to a virtual thing.
Matthew is going on 8 and he still but won’t poop in the toilet. I don’t have it on the rug, but in his underwear running down both legs and inside his jeans. As I lift and carry him to the shower he leaves a trail of poop balls behind. Over winter break it has been the worst. Then just last night he went into the bathroom and pooped in the toilet. His hands were clean, clean pull up so he went, not sure how since the toilet seat was up. I hope he does it again tonight, but I’m not counting on it….
Heh. Poop balls.
One mom here, 3 kids and a husband on the spectrum, I’m laughing so hard I’m crying because I totally get it! When we moved 3 years ago I was secretly scoping out houses with no carpets!!! The kids go everywhere inside and the husband still thinks it’s ok to go outside!
Ha! All 3 of mine (2 kids, 1 husband) adore going outside as well!
My son pottytrained completely of his own accord a couple of months after his 10th birthday. Pee, poop, day and night-time trained in less than a week’s time when he made up his own mind to do it. I had resorted to full-time pull up usage and let him do it on his own terms. It worked for us, much later than anticipated, but it worked.
I remember those messes and “surprises”, it gets better, I promise!
ThankyouThankyouThankyouThankyou…
I will say that we had to get his bowels/bladder under control…. He had been gluten, dairy, soy, peanut and yeast free for 8months; I think that played a big part, he wasn’t pooping 10-15times a day and also learned bladder control.
Doh! There’s that diet again.
We actually did it for 18 months, with no changes, but then again, their poops were and still are quite normal. It’s just that even “normal poop” still leaves stains on light-beige carpet. 
This is my biggest fear. I’m sorry they continue to do it. I hope they “get it’ soon.
OMG, I thought I was the only one. Two girls, 19 and 9, both on the severe end of autism. The youngest one is almost there with the potty – but we have to remember to get her there. The oldest one is nowhere near. And she goes often, up to 10 times a day (NOT an exaggeration) and sometimes if we don’t smell it first, will paint the walls, etc. with it. I truly do feel your pain. And that is why Wal-Mart will always stay open for carpet cleaning supplies, Lysol and pharmacy trips for Xanax.
Wow. I feel your pain but I can’t imagine dealing with it at the age of 19. My heart goes out to you. ((hugs))
I do love my Wal-Mart.
God how I wish I didn’t know what you are talking about.