The parents of children with defective neurotic development are as far as possible to be included in the treatment. The material for the work with the child must be mainly obtained as projective material with playing, individual or in groups, being of the greatest importance. Within the frame of the conception of the four-stage playing therapy, which is employed in the county clinic for nervous diseases in Uchtespringe, the treatment of a 14-year-old boy suffering from chronic constipation with encopresis is discussed in detail. In this case, the symptoms subsided parallel to the change in the child's and the parents' behaviour and the establishment of an Anus praeter which was planned because of the existing intestinal stenosis could be avoided. The harmonic co-operation with the therapeutical staff is indispensable for the effectiveness of a short-term hospital treatment. The result obtained in the treatment must be safeguarded by a continued, longer lasting treatment by an outpatient department.