Poopsicle

This is a post about poop. If you can't stomach that, please come back in a day or two and there will be something new for you to read.

I spent an 8hr round trip with our 4yr old yesterday on a trip to Children's Hospital Urology. I've had this appt since September to see if we can help her in the peeing/pooping area of her life.

She did a urine sample (in a "hat" in the toilet). Then an ultra sound, which showed she still has 4oz of urine left in her bladder after she goes to the bathroom. We then saw a 20 minute Power Point presentation on pee/poop (fun). Our 4yr old then cried. She said she hates this place because they talk about her peeing. We then moved onto the doctor appt. They interviewed me about her health, background, peeing/pooping issues. Off to radiology we went to get an Xray of her stomach. Then back to the doctor's office. The Xray showed from her colon to her stomach, she is severely constipated. It is so severe it has stretched out her upper and lower intestines to the point where they are not moving poop. She is so full of poop, her bowels are pressing on her bladder and spine, giving her pain in her back.

This is called encopresis.

When she moved in, I knew she had been constipated living with the foster parents. So I immediately put her on a high fiber diet. Within 24 hrs she was pooping every day or two, and has been ever since. So I erroneously thought she wasn't constipated any more. Apparently, her body only signals that she is "full", and she poops until that full feeling is gone. Same for peeing. She doesn't empty out the rest.

So, to make a long story short, I pressed them on why she would have this condition, especially at such a young age. After they danced around it a while and avoided my question, I kept pressing to know why so that we can deal with this and keep it from happening again. Finally they asked me if she has had a neuro eval. I said no, but I've been working on that referral all week. They said they want her to have a neuro eval because they feel she has encopresis due to either developmental delay and/or a brain problem where her brain isn't signaling her to pee/poop. I told them Friday the neuro dept is giving me our appt date. They want the results of the neuro before urology sees her again in three months.

We have to give her an even higher "high fiber" diet, which includes many drinks & foods that she cannot have, and many drinks foods we have to add. Also she is on an extremely high dose laxative for 48 hours, then she will be on a regular dose of this laxative for a year or more. Urology wants to see her every three months for at least a year, since the state SW's DSHS office won't pay for her to go to the Encopresis Clinic.

After she is pooping soft poop at least once a day regularly, then her intestines can start to heal. They said too that once her bowels aren't pressing on her bladder, that should help with the peeing/wetting issues.

In addition to the special diet, we have to put her on a peeing/pooping schedule. Called '2-2-2', for every two hours she sits on the toilet two minutes and has to pee twice in that two minutes. This is to get her to learn to empty her bladder before she feels full, and to teach her to fully empty her bladder each time. Additionally we have to put her on the toilet every morning for 10-20 minutes for mandatory pooping time.

What fun.

We have to log (no pun intended) her peeing and pooping.

I've been given a list of websites to check out, a urology folder, and a list of books I'm supposed to read. I'll keep you posted on that after I check out the books and websites.

On a positive note, our daughter has been accepted to EACAP preschool and will start in the pm class in a couple weeks. The preschool rep will visit our home next week to assess our daughter and interview me. This pm preschool will completely interfere with nap time, little sister too. Little sister will get a very short nap, and big sister will get none. Both girls usually take a 2.5-3hr nap. To help combat this I will be putting them to bed 60-90 minutes earlier each night. I've never put kids to bed at 7pm on a regular basis, but maybe this will work well. If the girls are just too crabby, I'll pull her out of pm preschool and wait for an opening in the am class.