Unstuck - The Official Constipation Coach Blog
We need to talk about MiraLax (and laxatives in general)
Ahh MiraLax. Doctors love it. Parents love it but only every now and then. Or they hate it because they don’t think it works. Or they know it works but they hate the thought of their kids being on a laxative. Kids are usually OK with taking MiraLax. But parents … Parents take some convincing. But here’s the thing: If you were researching how to manage constipation in kids back in the 80s or 90s, you would have found several studies reporting that laxative use alone is not effective at treating childhood constipation in the long-term. When treated with lactulose...
Why is my kid so grumpy lately?
Have you ever found yourself wondering: why is my kid (or my student, or my patient) so grumpy lately? I learned early on from my incontinence patients and their families that constipated kids can sometimes be irritable kids. They have outbursts, they refuse to participate in activities, they just want to sit around. Time after time, I advise families to do a clean-out (after checking with their doctor, which I always recommend), and they come back gushing: “she’s eating so much more!” “He’s running around and playing instead of just moping!” It makes sense, right? I won’t make assumptions about...
Not convinced your kid is constipated?
What if a child refuses to sit on the toilet?
A speech therapist friend of mine reached out a few weeks ago to ask for advice for a family with a five-year-old child who refused to poop on the toilet. I get this question a lot, and, frankly, it’s part of the reason I started this newsletter and wrote The Constipation Game Plan. As a physical therapist, I can teach kids all about how to sit on the toilet, relax their pelvic floor muscles, and use their belly muscles to bear down to push out a poop. But when I evaluate a kid who is refusing to sit on the...
Spring is here! And so is dehydration :(
It happened again last week: We sent our daughter off to a track meet and didn’t double check that she had her water bottle. If we don’t ask at least three times for this child to grab her water bottle, she will not remember it. So she spent an afternoon running in the sun with no breaks to rehydrate. This is the story of our daughter’s athletic career. She doesn’t remember water bottles, she rarely pauses for drink breaks, and she almost never reports feeling thirsty. Where I know I would be dying of thirst, she just keeps on running,...