Wheatley is doing absolutely great now! He's getting big quickly, had a successful shed, eats very well.

I have him on a current routine of every 5 days he gets a large mouse. He always has fresh water.

about a day after eating, once a day for three days he will pass urates, and the third day usually follows a poop. His urates are a healthy white, and his poop a healthy brown. This was routine, basically.

He refuses to use his tank as a bathroom. I had to work a lot one day and he made a small mess in his cage. He did not want anything to do with me for all of the next day, even after I cleaned his tank. He'd slink back to his strike position as if I startled him and smack me with his body. He did this only for a day, until after he passed another, this time out of his tank.

He and I are still getting used to each other. I'm beginning to be able to read him rather well now, although he catches me by surprise sometimes.

So today, was his usual day to poop. I wait for him to do this before feeding him, so typically this happens the day before he feeds. I had a 16 hour shift, and when I got home finally, he was in one of his hides. He came out a bit to see who was out there, but after figuring out it was me, he pulled back into his hide faster than a turtle does its shell.

I started checking his tank, looking for fecal matter, and couldn't find any. In the meantime, Wheatley is wound up, taking a semi-aggressive stance, which is abnormal for him. He's normally very calm. Hardly ever freaks out unless I manage to startle him, and that usually doesn't take long for him to recover from. He's usually a sweety. So I figure he REALLY needs to go. I pick him up gently, being careful not to startle him, and put him on a paper towel. After he calmed down, he pooped, I cleaned him up, and is currently cruising around in hunting mode.

Is it normal for a Ball Python to refuse to relieve him/herself in their tank? Not that I'm complaining, but I feel I might be spoiling him a bit. I'm a bit worried that he will retain it for too long and force himself into constipation.
Additionally, I want to know when to start spacing his food out from 5 days to 7 days.

if he is going into food mode right after a poop on the fifth day, I see no issue with feeding him. However, I don't know if this is just a routine he's used to which means I could still be overfeeding him, or if he's actually hungry.