Tage has struggled with constipation for most of his life, often going days on end without pooping. Since he’s been potty-trained the situation has gotten quite a lot better, but there have been some emotional side effects and he’s a bit anal-retentive, in the very truest sense of the term. He’s so resistant sometimes, even though he clearly needs to go. He has a whole repertoire of evasive maneuvers that he breaks out when he’s seriously not in the mood, and he’s surprisingly inventive.

One afternoon a couple of months ago Olof called up the stairs to me, “Did you tell Tage that he couldn’t go poop?”

“No,” I yelled back down. “Why would I do that?”

“When I tried to put him on the toilet to poop, he told me, ‘Mama say I no go poop!'”

Clever, eh? He’s branched out with that tactic, telling us that “Farmor say no” when we want him to eat or that “Petra say no” when we’re trying to get him to bed.

As far as the pooping goes, we’ve resorted on occasion to appealing to his greedy side, offering him, say, a cookie, or five dollars, if he’ll poop. Lately, however, even bribes have failed us. A couple of days ago, after he’d spent an hour running around the room holding his butt and crying that his belly hurt, I put him on the toilet against his will, thinking that he wouldn’t be able to resist going. Clearly I underestimated him.

He kicked his legs angrily and shouted. “Lydia say no! No hundred dollars! No eat!”

Looks like I need to rethink my strategy.