We had a lot of trouble with my son pooping in the toilet. He never had issues pooping in his diaper but once we potty trained at 2.5, he was terrified of pooping in the toilet. He still wore a diaper overnight so he would hold his poop until the middle of the night when he finally relaxed and pooped in his sleep. So every morning, the first thing we had to do upon waking up was change his gross poop diaper. It really sucked.

Finally when he was around 3.5/4, I got so fed up with it that I had him clean up after himself. That means he would wipe himself as best he could, then I would wipe him clean and then he would have to wrap up the poop diaper and throw it out. At the same time, at nights we would spend up to half an hour and multiple tries being super encouraging with him in the bathroom to get him to poop. We had to explain the sensation of what it should feel like pooping and all the noises and tell him it was almost coming out. The first couple evenings, he just made noises but after having to clean up after himself a couple mornings, he really put the effort in to try to poop. I think it was really easy for him to just poop in his diaper because he didn’t have to deal with the consequences of it but once the consequences were forced on him, he was much more motivated to learn to poop in the toilet. After the first couple of poops, he lost the anxiety and fear and since then he’s been a very regular and quick evening pooper.

Good luck! I’m so happy that phase is over.