2 year old plays with poop
Hi Dr. Laura,
My daughter is two. One half of a twin, which is a boy.
When she soils her diaper she has the need to "paint" things with it. Whether it be in her bed for nap or bedtime or if she is in the play room with her brother. We have told her it was naughty to put her poo poo on the walls or face and that she needs to tell mommy or daddy she poo pooed and we will put her on the potty. Or if she poo pooed in the diaper to tell us and we will change the diaper. She has put it on anything she can reach, bed, drapes toys etc. We can't stop it from happening. We are getting not only frustrated but tired of washing and disinfecting sometimes up to twice a day. What can we do?
I know this is incredibly frustrating and unpleasant. You'll be happy to know it's also completely normal. Two year olds don't have the disgust reaction to feces that develops later, so they don't see anything wrong with touching it. What a great consistency, perfect for smearing! And how powerful they feel, that they can make their own clay/fingerpaint!
So how do you stop it? I guarantee you that punishment will just make it worse. Instead, here's your three point plan: Prevent access, stay calm, and fill her need to mess with art.
1. Always put the diaper on backward so she can't undo it.
2. Start always dressing her in onesies so she can't just reach into her diaper.
3. Supervise her constantly when she's awake.
4. Before you put her in bed, add pjs over the onesie -- the kind that zip up -- but put them on backward, so she cant reach them.
Stay completely calm and loving as you clean and dress her, don't act like it's a punishment, or you'll be giving her incentive to fight with you about it. Just be matter of fact that you're helping her learn not to play with her poop. Tell her "Poop goes in the potty. We don't play with poop. We play with clay."
It's also important that you remove the need to play with poop by giving your child lots of opportunity for messy play. On a daily basis, let her play with playdoh and clay, as well as fingerpaint. She will probably want to smear the clay around, so
give her a piece of paper on a cookie sheet with sides, and let her
smear to her heart's content. Or give her fingerpaint to play with in the bathtub. Or let her play outside in real mud. Give her lots of positive affirmation
about how good that feels: "You love to play with clay. Clay is good to play with."
This will probably break your daughter of her habit, because she is meeting the need to play this way and because she does not have access to poop as a play material.
Please do all this immediately. Feces-smearing has a way of undermining the parent-child relationship and can develop quickly into a habit that otherwise takes months to outgrow.
Good luck,
Dr. Laura
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Supervision is the only thing that works for us. The cold water seems to work a little. The trick so far has been the calmness my wife brings to the situation. Spending more on paper towels and cleaners is really worth more than creating a negative relationship
with my baby doll!!!
then it is a common act of a child that age. However if it is occurring more than once a day you child can have a sensory integration disorder. Certain textures can be very bothersome, even hurt. Feces against the body can be a pressure that is very uncomfortable.
If this is the case, you will see other concerns regarding sensory/pressure. Do they dislike certain textures? Are you seeing they are having meltowns with certain shoes? Clothes? Do they not like hugs? I have many children who receive Occupation Therapy for
this main reason....and smearing feces is common among them diagnose with sensory integration.
in with the cold-water washings since we've tried everything else. Hope this works....pretty sure that it will.
give the dog water, anything that might take attention away from her more than a couple of minutes, she goes #2 and then smears it all over. She can do this is a matter of 5 min. I don't know what to do, I have spoke to our pedi and he says its normal and
to give it time. But I can't endure the screaming during another cold shower. It is heart breaking and she isnt learning anything from it.
her help (age appropriately) with making cookies. She or he is clearly creative. Praise her artistic efforts with acceptable media and calmly wash away her poo murals.