Toilet Hulk
How interacting with his action figures convince Max to use the toilet
Max was just four years old. He had been constipated since he was two.
A single painful bathroom experience can be enough to seed fear and start the issue of refusing to use the toilet. His parents had tried various remedies, osteopathy, and a full year with a child psychologist, but Max still refused.
Younger children have limited attention spans, so I had to keep it short. In our first session I used a concept called the Tummy Slide. Max visualized a slide inside his body. At the top, a PooPoo Ferrari wearing a red helmet, ready to zoom down.
I asked Max whether sliding was fun when you kept getting stopped.
He paused. Something shifted in how he was looking at it.
In the second session we worked on the fear of pain itself. He said it was a red, white and brown lump in his stomach. But when we tried to remove it, Max blocked. He wasn’t ready.
I tried a different approach.
He always came to sessions with his favorite action figures: Spiderman, Hulk, Captain America and Thor.
I turned to Spiderman and asked him directly whether he had any fear of going to the toilet.
Of course not, said Spiderman. He wasn’t afraid of anything.
Max went quiet. His pride had been activated.
He allowed Spiderman to help him remove the lump in his tummy. Eyes closed, he watched Spiderman shoot webs at it, pull it out, and crush it.
His mother reported that Max had gone to the toilet voluntarily for the first time in months.
We were making progress but weren’t quite there yet.
In our next session Max described a stuck door. In his bottom. Jammed shut.
His fear of pain was still too strong and he blocked again. This time he didn’t really want to participate.
So I turned to his action figures again. I took Hulk. He whispered something in my ear.
Max was intrigued.
I told him that Hulk had told me a secret. That he also had a stuck door. That he had been holding back going to the toilet so long that he had turned green.
I remember how this four-year-old leapt out of his chair. He grabbed Hulk, held him up to his face, and said:
“Hulk! But you’re so strong and brave!”
We spent several minutes encouraging Hulk. Telling him he could do it. That he was strong enough. Hulk opened his door. He said he felt much better.
Then Hulk offered to help Max in return.
Max closed his eyes. He watched Hulk use his full strength to open the door in his bottom.
This was the breakthrough.
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