Bathroom Behaviors

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The other night my kids and I had just got back to our car after some shopping when my 6yo aspie daughter said she had to go to the bathroom & couldn’t hold it. Our shopping trips are frequently interrupted by such emergencies; I’m sure that’s just a kid thing but it’s almost predictable in my daughter’s case. After my older son’s initial grumbling at having to get back out of the car, we managed to find a store that was still open (we were shopping in a small town where everything closes early) and the owner allowed my daughter to use the employee restroom (there wasn’t a public one). I could tell we were imposing and keeping the owner past closing time but she was very gracious about it.

In any case, my son and I waited downstairs until my daughter and the owner returned, I bought something as a thanks for her trouble, and we finally headed back to the car. As I turned on the engine, my daughter said, “I didn’t want to be rude but their bathroom was gross,” and then explained to me the details that grossed her out (from her description, it didn’t sound very dirty, just quite old and not aesthetically appealing at all).

I told her I was sorry it hadn’t been a nice place to have to use the bathroom, and she said, “Oh, I didn’t go, I just stood there until I came out. I didn’t want to make her feel bad so I just pretended to go.”

At this point, I was not feeling very patient about things. I’d reached the end of my day, and, like a lot of us, I’m a single mom who’s usually half-exhausted. So I demanded to know why the heck she’d insisted she had to go if she then was NOT going to go. “I don’t have to go anymore,” she said. “What?!” I asked, but no, she hadn’t had an accident, she just said again that she didn’t feel like she had to go anymore. Okay, fine, I didn’t feel like questioning it. We went home without incident and she did go to the bathroom later.

However, bathroom issues abound with her and I’m not quite sure how to handle them. She still wets the bed but that isn’t a big deal. She has a mattress protector under her sheets and I wash them every day – she doesn’t want to wear anything besides underwear and I don’t blame her so I haven’t tried going back to overnight training pants. Through the day sometimes she doesn’t seem to feel that she has to pee, and she will call from the bathroom that she needs fresh underwear. Sometimes she has had an accident on the school bus (it’s an hour-long ride) and has been too embarrassed to tell the driver. Her grandmother has scolded her for bedwetting when she's spent the night - which INFURIATED both me and her dad - so I always reassure her about her accidents.

But what's frustrating is that she has an obsession with the bathroom and seems to consider it her room – when she’s been scolded or is mad/upset/defiant about something, she’ll run down the hall and lock herself in the bathroom rather than her room. Later I’ll discover she’s been playing with the things under the sink and I’ll have to explain why she can’t do that. Several times I’ve discovered a nearly empty shampoo/body wash bottle is now full of water. Once my son was aggravated to discover his toothbrush had been knocked off the sink while she played with rearranging bottles and it had been left on the floor. And whenever she’s in there and the furnace kicks on, she’ll sit on the heating vent to enjoy the warmth until it turns off again.

It would be easier if I at least understood where she was coming from, but I’m not sure she knows. Can anyone relate to this?

I myself hate the "I gotta go pee" issue that my little sisters have it's so annoying especially getting to check just to have to run to the back of the store to the bathroom. LOL! It's interesting your daughter locks herself in the bathroom. Instead of messing with shampoo perhaps buy some bubble stuff for bath time or some bath toys for her to play with during bath time. I don't blame her with the dirty bathroom no thanks! As a kid I played with foam alphabet things that stuck to the wall when wet something like that or one of those baby dolls you can play with in the bathtub.

Oh boy, can I relate!

I have a 6 year old boy who also has potty issues. He's been trained for #1 for a while now (he was almost 5 when he trained) but we are having a tough time with #2. He's given me the "I don't have to go anymore" line as well. It's tough to know what to do sometimes. He loves cleaning (hooray!) but had an accident in his pants this week, had a bath, and lots of poo got in the water. When he asked if he could clean the tub, I heard myself say, "no, you can't." Don't want to accidentally reward him for this. He still wears a pull-up at night and it's always wet in the morning. We just had a meeting with a Floortime professional to talk about what to do about it, so I don't have any advice just support.

I'm guessing you have only 1 bathroom and it's a problem when your daughter decides to spend a lot of time in there? What do you do if someone needs to go? Have you tried making rules around having her spend time in there? Have you tried using it as leverage, as in, if you don't do your chores you can't hang out in the bathroom, or if you finish your homework you'll have time to hang out in the bathroom?

Good luck,

It seems as though my son became very interested in bathrooms just after he got fully potty trained at 4 yrs.old.
Everywhere we went (grocery store, restaurants, peoples homes) He really wanted to go to the potty. For a while, I automatically took him because I did not know if he would have an accident. Then I started to notice that it seemed as though it was becoming a "special interest" for him. So instead of automatically taking him everytime, I would ask him if he could hold it until we got home. Fortunately, we were usually very close to home and did not have any accidents. After a while, it seems like his interest in them is starting to decrease.

I knew of another ASD little boy who was intensely focused on bathrooms. Whenever he would go anywhere, that was the first thing he had to do was check out the bathroom, and he was definitely preoccupied with them.

I wish I had more advice for you
Good luck

Ds had an thing for bathrooms when he was 3 yrs to 4 yrs old. Every place we went he always had to "go." We would go in and he would look around and that was it. Once time we were in the grocery store and he had to "go" I took him in and of course he stood there. Not even a minute later he had to go again. I told him no and he screamed "Pee coming down!" I told him he could wait and he screamed it again. I took him back and again nothing not even a minute later he did it again. I ignored him and he screamed and I left with him. Everyone looked at me and glared for not taking him back again. If they only knew. He did recently get under the sink and pull all of the womens items out and take them out of the wrappers. I was mad and of course he laughed. I never understood the thing with seeing bathrooms but now know he was not the only one.

my husbands little cousin (he is 11 I think) does that. First he had a strong repulsion with bathrooms (couldn't go anywhere outside his house) but that he overcame and became obsessed with them. He needs to check them out wherever they go. Can you make a deal like one bathroom per trip?

The first part sounds most like my NT daughter. She had accidents up through age 6 and she can't go unless she has to go at that moment - no getting her on a potty before a long drive just because it is going to be a long drive, and so on. And, yes, she can mysteriously have to go and then change her mind.

I can only tell you that it has eventually gotten better. A maturity thing, it seems, at least with her.

Thinking of this from a sensory point of view, bathrooms are kind of cool. The nice ones smell good, they have relaxing sounds like the water flowing, and cool things to play with under the sink....
Could you daughter be upset that the public bathroom was dirty and thus she did not want to use it?


Also, does she have a lock on her bedroom door? Maybe there is an appeal to being able to have "quiet time", and be able to lock the world away.

My daughter loves cleaning, too. Funny story about the bath: when she was a toddler she accidentally went #2 in the bath and when it came into view she panicked, standing up so quickly that it, well, floated toward her. Now, convinced it was alive, she shrieked and clawed her way up me like a drowning cat. I was torn between hysterical laughter and sympathy for my terrified daughter. Because I couldn’t make her understand that it had come from her, she was afraid of the bathtub and refused to take baths for a few months. I eased her back into it by sponge-bathing her closer and closer to the tub until we were sitting on the edge, and then she would get back in it if I got in with her. Now, of course, she loves the bath.

Yes, just one bathroom and often if she hears my son say he has to go, she’ll hurry and run to lock herself in before he can get in. I don’t know why she does this but she seems to have a contrary or teasing-sibling attitude about it and it has caused many near-accidents. I usually stand outside and count to three and then she’ll usually open the door, but I still have to physically move her out of the doorway so he can get in because she’ll just stand there with a stubborn challenging look on her face.



I probably should make a deal that we’ll find the bathroom right off the bat but for some reason I always forget. *eyeroll*



Yes, she always comments on nice bathrooms and is particularly interested if she gets the chance to use the bathroom of someone whose house we’re visiting. She brought up the subject again last night and apologized to me for not having gone in the hardware store restroom, and I said it was okay and I understood. The more I thought about it, if I’d walked in as a 6yo girl and saw the toilet tank lid was missing and the sink looked bloody (it was stained from paint having been poured down it), it would have given ME pause, too! So, although this has happened many other times, where she’s urgently had to go and then didn’t when she was presented with the opportunity, I can easily excuse this one.

I do think being able to seclude herself in the bathroom is soothing for her. I’ve had to switch the lock around on her bedroom door so she can’t really lock herself in there. Maybe I can suggest that, when she feels the need for alone time, she let her brother and me know first so we can use the bathroom before she goes in, the same as we would do before someone took a bath.

I’m glad to know this seems to be a common problem and am quite thankful for all your thoughts!

I agree-some public bathrooms are pretty nasty!! ! I have seen some real disgusting things when we go on road trips---Ughhhhh