I began doing this routine out of frustration becayse the beginning of my morning BM is always harder than the rest of it. 3 prunes every morning before breakfast, followed by two large glasses of water (sipped slowly). So far so good. I may be able to reduce my daily miralax intake but that'll need some experimentation.

My experience is that the hard tip is always the cause of "leftovers" stool from the previous day. Since I am trying not to strain it is usually impossible to "get everything out", and what stays behind gets hard over night.

Maybe it's the same for you?

I use a small bit of water after most BMs to get anything that's left out, so I don't think that's the problem. In my case I think the reason for the harder beginning BM is that miralax makes things move along faster, so the beginning part is sitting and getting dried out internally while I sleep. Hence I thought that extra water would help hydrate my colon before I start eating, which should help the next day. I also found that going twice a day means the next morning BM starts softer.

Yesterday I had a near perfect BM thanks to the gluteal massage I got from my massage therapist. It proved that my pelvic floor tension is the cause behind the regular pain. In order to heal I definitely need to have daily soft BMs, but not too soft or it causes burning.