It Hurts When I Poop! a Story for Children Who Are Scared to Use the Potty

Good story that is easy for children to understand why it hurts when they go #2. Unfortunately it hasn't eased his mind when he has to go and still holds it in. This book isn't a cure all but after several readings My 3 year old doesn't take an eternity when he needs to go. Don't look to this book to immediately solve constipation/bowel movement issues. It's more of an easier way of explaining to chidlren foods they should eat and not to hold in their bowels.

This book is a little more wordy than some. Definitely needs to be an older child who is being potty trained that will understand the storyline ... late 2 to 3-year-old. The book itself addresses a very important issue that a lot of people/doctors ignore which is the withholding of bowel movements in children. It's not easy to find books related to this topic.

My 5 year old daughter loves this book. She loved it and she loves the descriptions on how food is processed and becomes poop. It helped her understand the importance on going to the bathroom to poop so she can feel better.

This worked. It was crazy. My daughter would hold it for days and when she'd finally go it was painful which then made her not want to go and the cycle would continue. I ordered this book, read the book to my daughter several times, and suddenly she was pooping on the toilet on a daily basis. It's been about 2.5 weeks and no problems (knock on wood).

My two year old pee potty trained really early. There was no stopping him. Pooping however turned into a huge struggle. He was holding his poop. Enemas were traumatic but necessary and our life revolved around his bathroom habits. I ordered this book after seeing some great reviews. I was doubtful but desperate.

The very first day the book arrived my son willingly tried to poop on the potty and went a tiny tiny bit. This kid hadn't pooped on the potty in months. We celebrated and started a potty reward chart and brought back food rewards (a probiotic gummy- perfect). We continued from there to have more and more success and at the 2 week mark we were drama free using the potty. The stress. The screaming. Over!

Both my boys love this book and requested it over and over again. It is a little long and wordy. I was worried my 2 year old wouldn't stay interested but he was very focused. They are almost 3 and almost 6 years old now. Some days we'd read it 4 times. They love talking about poop. It's been months now and they will still ask if something they are eating will make their poops hard. I love how it empowers kids to help solve their own problem.

I hope the author comes back and reads the reviews. Thank you! This was such a life changer for us.

This book was the breakthrough for us. After 4 months of being pee-trained, my 2.5 yr old son was still battling epic #2 withholding issues (holding it for 5-7 days at a time). The constipation and withholding had been a part of our lives for most of the past year despite daily doses of Miralax as prescribed by our pediatrician. It was terribly stressful and hard with nights of crying, pain, etc. We got this book as we had tried everything else. After 1wk of his wanting to read this book nightly, the withholding had stopped!! He was able to relate to the book and better understand what was going on with his tummy and how he was feeling. I definitely recommend this book for anyone going through a similar situation.

The concept is great, but the problems with withholding happens around 2-3. Half of this book is allegory - a story of a messy fox who doesn't clean his house, but when he does friends come over and his parent give him a trophy. While the point might be clear to a 10 year old, it certainly is of no value to anyone younger than 5. My son likes the dinosaurs, though, even if he doesn't understand the potty part. I make up my own story that's more age appropriate instead of reading the words on the page.

This was a huge breakthrough for my little one! We really needed something. This coupled with a sticker chart and prizes right in the bathroom got us back on track. We are VERY happy with this book. Would definitely recommend for anyone who needs help with little ones that are scared to go.

My son has had poop issues for almost two years. He loves reading this book with me and has a lot of questions. It talks about foods that make poop hard or soft, and now he asks about the foods he eats in terms of how it will exit. This is a good thing, as we've been working hard on reducing his fear of the potty. This book has definitely helped in the 10 days we've had it so far.

We have been struggling with a poop problem for over a year. I have tried everything! I found this book and thought it would be worth trying. It really is better than I thought it would be. My son is 3 years old, and he really related to the boy in the book. He understood the pictures in the book that show how food turns in to poop and has to come out of your body. He also loved the idea of becoming the Boss of his body by choosing to eat foods that make his poop soft. I would reccomend this book to anyone having trouble with kids holding their poop!! I love LOVE how my son understood it!

We have been struggling with a poop problem for over a year. I have tried everything! I found this book and thought it would be worth trying. It really is better than I thought it would be. My son is 3 years old, and he really related to the boy in the book. He understood the pictures in the book that show how food turns in to poop and has to come out of your body. He also loved the idea of becoming the Boss of his body by choosing to eat foods that make his poop soft. I would reccomend this book to anyone having trouble with kids holding their poop!! I love LOVE how my son understood it!

Really helps kids understand pooping; how it works, what it is, and so forth. My 3 year old loves the story and asks me to read it almost daily. He has been potty-trained since purchasing the book, but I can't say the book deserves all the credit. What I can say is the book really helped my child be less scared of pooping and the potty, and gave him a much better understanding of what foods he should be eating and the digestive process. If you are going to purchase one potty-training book, this should be the one.

If poop withholding is an issue for your child, you need to buy this book. It works. While it's always possible that some children won't respond as well as others, this book can very quickly solve this chronic problem. After about a year of this issue with our child, now almost three years old, we were extremely frustrated. There were lots of toddler tears, fear, visits to professionals, and our child having countless bad days because of not pooping (even in a diaper) we found this book and tried it. Two weeks later the problem is completely solved. The effect of this story immediately increased the willingness to sit on the potty. The anxiety about pooping in general dissipated quickly and after two weeks we are many days into no-stress pooping on the potty every day.

The book has cute illustrations, is not overly long, and is useful for kids at various ages. Two-and-a-half seems like the very low end of the age spectrum, if a child is seriously precocious, but more realistically a kid should be three years old and up for good benefit. The story involves the use of metaphor and just doesn't seem like it would do much for a younger kid. Anyway, the story is cute, and it allowed us to converse with our child in a different way about this issue. Our daughter picked up on the language and characters immediately and asked for it to be read again and again the first few days. As scary as the topic was, this book was not threatening. It very much seemed like it was a relief for her to hear this story.

The book is printed by the American Psychological Association, printed in the United States, and is high quality for the price. If withholding poop is an issue for a child in your family there should be no question about buying this book. It's less expensive than yet another bottle of Miralax, a visit to a professional (who will probably just tell you to use Miralax), or any number of other solutions parents might attempt. Again, it may not work for all children, but it's absolutely worth trying.

My child was completely potty trained and then suddenly, for no reason we could decipher, decided he didn't want to poop anymore. It has been over 6 months since the problem began and we tried sooooooo many different things I lost count. The bottom line was that my child needed to CHOOSE to poop... and this book was the key to him making that choice. 10 days after we started reading this book he started pooping on the potty again and has consistently continued to do so. We tried other books too, but this is the book that he identified with. Every time he needs to poop he starts quoting parts of this book and often consults the diagram of the "insides" of his body to figure out what is going on inside him. As every parent of a poop withholding child knows, every kid is different and you'll try a million different things that worked for someone else before you find the thing that works for your kid, but this is the thing that worked for us. Good luck!

This book was recommended by my sons pediatrician because he suffers from a lot of anxiety with "poopies". The story is cute, informative and relatable. It actually teaches kids with pictures how the stomach works.

This book does exactly what it is supposed to do...encourage kids to poop even though they're afraid and have held it in for a long time. If you have a stubborn child who doesn't want to let the poop out because it hurts, BUY THIS BOOK! It is written perfectly at a child's level. We read the book right after it arrived, and the whole time, my son kept saying, "he's like me" about the little boy in the story. It explains how poop is made, and why and how our bodies need to get rid of it. The pictures are excellent for a preschooler's mind to comprehend as well. My son (age 4) had been holding his for a week at a time, only eventually going in a pull-up after having some miralax. Then he'd repeat the cycle again. It went on for a year, even though he was fully trained to stand up for urinating. He refused to sit on the potty because it was too hard. The boy in the story did the same thing, asking his mom for a pull up whenever his stomach hurt enough that he couldn't hold his poop in any more. The doctor in the story encourages the little boy to become the boss of his body. Now, my son says he's the boss of his tummy and his bottom, and he has been using his toilet, on his own, every day since he read this book, many days more than once. WE LOVE THIS BOOK!