5 Reasons Your 4 Year Old Won’t Poop on the Potty

Do you wonder why your 4 year old won’t poop on the potty? Kids can be coaxed into using the potty if you provide the ideal conditions. In this article, I’ll share 5 possible reasons this happens, the issues you may face, plus tips to help encourage your child to finally go!

4 Year Old Won’t Poop on the Potty

There’s something about having an older child who still isn’t completely potty trained. The reassurances that he’ll do it “when he’s ready” are starting to get old. How is it that your 4 year old poops in his pants and doesn’t care one bit?

Remember, he won’t go to kindergarten wearing diapers. This will work out, somehow, someday. But in the meantime, it’s good to examine what exactly is going on, and whether you can do something different to change your circumstances. Well, it turns out, you can.

Take a look at these reasons a 4 year old won’t poop on the potty and, more importantly, what you can do about it. As one parent said about the article:

“My 4 year old is finally pooping on the toilet! I followed the tips in this article and it really helped. I wanted to post this for parents who feel discouraged! Stay consistent!” -Cindy

1. You still rely on diapers

Does your child ask for a diaper to poop into?

For many parents, the thought of ditching diapers during the day completely feels impossible. After all, without diapers, your 4 year old will have accidents during the day or hold his poop until who knows when.

But  it’s this back-and-forth with using diapers that has enabled his behavior to begin with. He believes that if he holds his poop long enough, you’ll eventually relent and pull out that diaper for him to poop into.

But what if you go a long weekend without diapers—in fact, without anything? Many parents have potty trained their kids by setting aside three days and keeping them bare-bottomed at home—no diapers or undies.

Yes, you’ll likely have a mess, but he learns the sensation of what happens when he poops on himself. And more importantly, that he has no other alternative than using the potty.

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2. You don’t have regularly scheduled potty trips

If you’ve ever wondered how many potty training accidents are normal, you’re not alone. But perhaps the problem could be alleviated if you regularly schedule trips to the potty throughout the day.

Routines and consistency help kids know what to expect and, more importantly, do things without too much resistance. When they’ve done the same things at roughly the same times for a while, they come to accept it as part of the norm.

The same is true with pooping on the potty. Make bathroom use a regular part of your child’s life.

Take him to sit either at set times of the day (for instance, at 12pm) or before or after regular parts of the day (like after every meal).

Set a timer for a few minutes each time (more on that next). He may not poop the first few times, but he can expect these scheduled potty trips as normal and routine.

3. Your child doesn’t have a time limit

Have you asked your 4 year old to “take your time” or “use as much time as you need”? You likely wanted to make sure she didn’t feel rushed or to reassure her that she could sit for as long as she needed to.

Unfortunately, “time” doesn’t always translate well. Sometimes the lack of constraints can make pooping on the potty even more overwhelming. She doesn’t know how long she’s supposed to sit or when enough time has passed before calling it quits.

Instead, give her a time limit. Set an alarm that she can hear for, say, 10 minutes. Ask her to sit for at least 10 minutes and see if anything comes out. That way, she doesn’t feel expected to sit all day long. She’s also more likely to agree to sit for that length of time knowing there’s an end in sight.

4. The environment isn’t set up for success

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It would drive me nuts when I’d catch my son sitting on the toilet seat with his hips leaning forward and his legs dangling below the seat. He’d claim that no poop was coming out, but in the position he was in, no wonder. That sitting position wasn’t exactly making it easy to poop.

Check to see if your 4 year old’s environment and pooping position is helping or preventing her from pooping.

Use a child-sized potty seat that attaches to your toilet so she can sit comfortably (instead of trying to balance on a regular toilet). Place a step stool in front of the toilet so her knees are higher than her hips (and so she can easily climb up and down on the seat).

You can also a floor potty chair not only for easy access but because it can be less intimidating than a regular toilet (and this automatically places her knees above her hips). If so, place a rug or towel on the floor so that, if she’s barefoot, her feet aren’t stepping on cold tile floor for a long time.

Expert tip

Our muscles need to feel relaxed to pass bowel movements. Any anxiety or expectations she might have of pooping on the potty can easily make her feel tense.

So, make sure she has something to distract her each time she sits. This might be books she can read or simple toys suitable for the bathroom (no stuffed animals!). Even playing a movie on your tablet nearby can take her mind off of pooping.

5. You’re focusing on this issue too much

Kids can sense what gets us riled up and can feel more anxious than had we not made such a big deal about it. And for some kids (like one of mine), the more fuss you make, the less likely they’ll comply.

Instead, make a point to “not care.” Be nonchalant when your 4 year old won’t poop on the potty and treat it matter-of-fact. Don’t let your emotions show through your facial expressions or the sighs you heave when he poops in his undies yet again. Instead, shrug your shoulders and pay it no mind.

The same goes for overpraising him. Yes, praise him when he poops, but keep it reasonable. If you do cartwheels and say “Good job!” a million times, he’ll likely sense the over-the-top reaction and retreat.

As most parents have said, potty training simply “made sense” for their kids once it was no longer an issue.

Conclusion

It can be challenging when your 4 year old won’t poop on the potty after all this time. But as you can see, a few simple changes can be all it takes to encourage her to do so. In my case, it turned out that the elusive “he’ll do it when he’s ready” advice is actually—even if annoyingly—true.

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16 Comments

  1. Hi there, my 3.5 year old daughter is currently at this stage. She was previously a poop-withholder before we started potty training. Once we did the 3-day no bottoms thing (except for naps and bedtime), she began pooping again once she realized that the dreaded potty was worse in her mind than the diapers. So she now requests a diaper to poop right before naps or bed. We have tried doing just panties at nap time, but she’s not quite ready. She has had a few pee accidents during naps. So my question is, what do we do about trying to take the diapers away completely if she can’t stay dry all night, or even during naps?

    1. Nina Garcia says:

      Hi Samantha! I had brought this up with our pediatrician, and she said that we can’t potty train for sleep the way we can during the day. That’s why it’s still common for them to wear diapers or pull ups, more so at night than at naps, because they can’t control their bowel movements during sleep. For naps, try to have her go right before to prevent accidents, and hopefully that will keep her drier than normal.

  2. I feel a bit ashamed my son (5) is petrified of poos on toilet and can only go in a nappy. He wears undies wees on toilet but will not poo on toilet at all. I feel like I have not helped the situation as he ends up with pain in his tummy and I can’t bare to see him in pain as I know he’s needing to go poo so I want him to empty his bowels. What’s the absolute best advice for me to help him. He’s had a times with grandparents to have no nappies but comes home in pain as he won’t poo. I will try anything even if hypnosis works I’m absolutely not sure why he’s so scared of going maybe I haven’t trained him right and I’ll take ownership but I need to fix it ASAP Help

    1. Nina Garcia says:

      Hi Bee! I would reach out to your pediatrician to see what they recommend. Sometimes a quick over-the-counter medicine can help loosen bowel movements, or diet changes that help him pass stools easier. Once he realizes that pooping doesn’t (and shouldn’t) hurt, he may be more willing to poop in the toilet.

  3. My son is 5 years old and refused to poop in the toilet. He will pee all day in the toilet and wear undies but holds it in and refuses to poop. He is aware that he needs to poo cause he will come tell me but he runs for me to put a diaper on him if I say no and put him on the toilet he will not poo. But the moment I out a diaper on for bedtime he will let it out. It’s become very frustrating and draining for me as his mum cause I don’t know what else to do. I tried the letting him sit on the toilet or potty with a pull up on and let him poo but he is absolutely terrified and cries or fights me when it try to make him sit on the toilet or floor potty mid poo or before a poo. He fights so bad that I gotta just let.him go stand in his usual spot with a diaper on. If I doesn’t want to sit on the toilet with a pull up on to poo I don’t think the hole in the pull up is going to work. Please do u have any advice for a very frustrated mama who by the way has the pressure of kindergarten starting on April 2nd and is not getting any progress with her 5 year old.

    1. Nina Garcia says:

      Hi Meeru! One thing you can try is to get rid of diapers completely. Since he knows they’re there, he’s less inclined to give the toilet a chance. You can also check in with his pediatrician to see what he or she thinks about his refusal to poop in the toilet.

  4. Our 4 year old refuses to poop in the toilet. We have completely taken diapers away for 8 months now. He started out sitting to pee and now is getting that down good enough he lifts the lid and stands. With potty’s we rewarded with candy then after he got the hang of it we took it away and offered it for the pooping but that didn’t work. We have offered bribes of toys he has wanted. Right after Christmas he was loving gifts so we offered poop gifts as well because it was exciting to him. We didn’t put a lot of stress on it just had it there as a casual thing. Still didn’t work. We have tried having the iPad on the toilet while pooping, books while sitting, playing games while sitting and having certain potty toys. We tried no underwear but he didn’t care he still pooped on the floor. He doesn’t hold it in he just goes. He hides under tables (kitchen table, coffee table and side tables) but there are times he is laying on the couch and just goes. He usually come and says “I pooped and you need to clean me”. Daycare told us let him sit in it and try that and he did not care about that either. When we clean him up we have done the no worries approach, we have done the that is not ok approach, we would calmly explain the poop is suppose to go in the toilet not in underwear to the point he was telling us he pooped but it didn’t go in the toilet like it was suppose to it went in his underwear again. Any other advise you have we will take.

    1. Nina Garcia says:

      One thing you can try is to give some sort of “consequence” for not pooping in the potty. Don’t make it a punishment where he feels bad about himself, but more like an inconvenience that he now has to deal with. Right now, he might not have a problem with pooping anywhere because he doesn’t have to deal with it, especially if he knows you’ll clean it up. But maybe you can stop what he’s doing and have him accompany you to the bathroom to dump the poop in the toilet. He can get himself a new pair of underwear, or get the carpet cleaner and help clean. Or maybe you can’t stay long at the park since you have to spend several minutes cleaning the accidents, etc.

      Our pediatrician did tell us that pooping can take up to a year to master from the start of potty training, even if kids have been peeing just fine, and I’ve found that to be true with all my kids. It’s a helpful reminder that we can expect to have poop accidents here and there even if you’d potty trained them months ago.

      I hope that helps!

  5. My 4 year old is finally pooping on the toilet!
    I followed the tips in this article and it really helped.
    I also printed a potty tracker , I told me son that when we pooped 6 times we would order him a toy. I allowed him to sit in the toilet for 5 minutes and scan through Amazon on the phone to look at the toy he wanted. At first there was hesitation but I didn’t push it I said “ we will try again later when you are ready to
    Poop” I also bought him a very mild stool softener to prevent constipation. I also hid the diapers, and I didn’t bend. He is FINALLY pooping on the toilet. I wanted to post this for parents that feel discouraged!
    Stay consistent!

    1. Nina Garcia says:

      Yay, I’m so glad to hear that, Cindy! Thanks for letting me know <3

  6. Our biggest struggle is pooping on the potty. He’s 4 years old and two weeks ago we went cold turkey with the diapers. He is literally too big for size 6. They don’t fit well. And the first couple of days it was perfect. He would pee whenever he felt that he needed to. Pull down his pants, pee standing up, flush, needs help getting things back on, washes his hands. Then he needed to poop and he actually went on the potty! Which was huge because when he’s dabbled in potty learning for the past year that was a no go. He likes to stand up and play while he poops in his diaper.

    The problem was he would get up and come get me very excitedly and show me his tiny poop. I would be excited and say “look at your poop in the potty!” Or something like that. And he would shoo me away to keep pooping. This went on for 45 minutes. With me wiping off the skid marks on the seat between every round. I didn’t say anything though! Day 2 went exactly the same. On day three I told him to try staying seated until he finished pooping all the way.

    And that’s when he’s decided that he’s just never going to poop again. And he’s been holding it until miralax (pediatrician recommended) forces it out. And now he just poops his pants when he can’t hold it any longer.

    And to our shame, we’ve really made it to be a huge deal. The longer this has gone on the more frustrated we’ve gotten and the more we talk to him about it and push him.

    Help? I’m reading all your poop articles as we speak.

    1. Nina Garcia says:

      Hi Kara!

      It’s definitely rough when kids withhold their poop. Maybe he felt like he was criticized for how he was pooping? If so, an extra dose of positive praise, even for small progress, can help. You might say, “Thanks for letting me know you had to poop!” Or “Thanks for helping me clean up your poop accident.”

      Other times, it’s the actual constipation that could be scaring them from pooping again, which hopefully the medicine can help. Once he can go without discomfort, he’ll hopefully get back to using the potty again.

      Hang in there, mama <3

  7. My son just turned 4 and is due to start school. He’s completely pee trained but when it comes to poo it’s a different story.

    Feel like a total failure because everyone else’s child seems to get it and I don’t know what else to try. ANY help would be appreciated.

    1. Nina Garcia says:

      Our pediatrician told us that even though kids can pee in the potty really well, that they can still have many poop accidents for a year after they started potty training. That doesn’t mean they’ll be having accidents all year long the way they are now—it’ll taper down as the year goes on—but it’s a good reminder that it’s normal for kids to take a while to poop in the potty, even though they know how to pee in it.

  8. My son is actually nearly 4 and a half (I’m super embarrassed that we are at this point, but we desperately need help!!). He has no trouble peeing in the potty and very rarely has pee accidents, he just refuses to poop in the potty. He has been peeing regularly for about 3 months now, but he has literally NEVER pooped in a potty and I am at my wit’s end! He is also in a daycare program and they aren’t really helping much.

    Thanks for your help! I read through your blog and am going to try some of the nuggets you shared.

    1. Nina Garcia says:

      It can definitely feel nerve-wracking when your child still hasn’t learned to poop on the potty, but remind yourself that he will definitely learn this skill at some point 🙂 Our pediatrician would remind us that kids don’t go to kindergarten in diapers, so whatever worries we feel are somewhat temporary.