Bathtime Basics

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• The First Year
• Toddlers & Preschoolers

By Ann Douglas

Mother Wisdom:
If your toddler hates the feel of cold shampoo on his head, warm up the shampoo a little. Simply float the shampoo bottle in the bathtub for a couple of minutes to get rid of the chill. Take the same approach with the lotion that you slather on his skin after bathtime: float it in the tub for a minute or two before you remove your toddler from the tub.

More Mother Wisdom:

Store your child's bath toys in a plastic colander placed on the bottom of the tub or in a mesh-style lingerie bag that's hung from the shower head. The toys will have a chance to drip dry, which will help to keep them clean. You'll still need to wash your child's toys every now and again, but you won't have to do it quite so often. When the moment of truth arrives and it's finally time to do serious battle with soap scum and mildew, here are two quick and easy solutions: either fill the bathtub with hot water and a bit of bleach and let the toys soak for a couple of minutes or run the toys through the dishwasher. (Just be careful what setting you use on the dishwasher: you don't want to accidentally melt or warp your toddler's toys.)

It's hard to find a toddler who's ambivalent about bathtime. Most have pretty strong opinions either way. Some toddlers have so much fun during bathtime that they insist on staying in the tub until the water is ice-cold, seemingly oblivious to the fact that their teeth are chattering, while other toddlers are as petrified of water as is the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz. (Remember what happened to her when she got wet? She melted!)

It's pretty easy to get along with a toddler who positively lives for bathtime-who hops down from the dinner table and sprints to the bathroom because he's so eager to get on with the show. If you happen to have been blessed with a toddler like this, count your lucky stars and skip to the next section of the chapter. The rest of the material in this section isn't for you!

It's much more difficult to get along with a toddler who makes it painfully clear that he doesn't want anything to do with the bathtub-not today, not tomorrow, not ever. While you can humour him for a day or two to see if the bathtub-refusal problem will go away on its own, at some point you'll have to force the issue a little. After all, you can get a toddler only so clean if the only tools at your disposal are a face cloth, a sink full of water, and a bar of soap. Here are some tips on helping your toddler overcome his fear and/or loathing of all things bathtub related:

• Try to figure out what's fuelling your toddler's bathtub refusal. Is he actually afraid of the tub or does he simply consider bathtime to be the least interesting part of his day? Once you've identified the root cause of the problem, you can put your parenting skills to good use and start brainstorming some creative solutions.
• If your toddler appears to be genuinely afraid of the bathtub-this despite the fact that a fear of water hasn't been a problem for him in the past-try to figure out what may have happened to cause him to suddenly become so fearful. Perhaps he got soap in his eyes, slipped in the tub, or swallowed a mouthful of water the last time he had a bath-experiences that could (understandably) have dampened his enthusiasm for bathtime. Of course, it's also possible that he'sdeveloped some strange sort of bathtub-related fear, since toddlers are notorious for this kind of thing. While a fear of going down the drain is fairly common, toddlers can come up with all kinds of strange fears that may not make any sense at all to you. (My three-year-old developed a huge phobia about black plastic shower heads. Go figure.)
• If your toddler doesn't seem to have any particular fears about getting in the tub, perhaps there's something else about bathtime that's bothering him. Maybe he dislikes the temperature of the water, the temperature of the bathroom, or the sensation of being wet. It's also possible that he simply finds bathtime boring. After all, when you've got places to go and people to see, who has time for bathtime?
• Once you've identified the problem, try to come up with a possible solution: e.g., putting a non-slip bath mat in the bottom of the bathtub so that the tub isn't quite so slippery; getting in the tub with your toddler to help him feel more secure; putting a small space heater in the bathroom so that the room doesn't feel quite so chilly when he's wet; or making a deal with your toddler that you'll lift him out of the bath before you pull the plug.
• Load up on some really fun bath toys and reserve them for bathtime only. That way, your toddler will have a solid incentive to make peace with the tub. The following make terrific bath toys: pails, boats, ducks, water wheels, baby dolls that "wet," beach toys (hey, it's a great way to get year-round mileage out of these despite the Canadian climate!), vinyl books, measuring cups, squeeze bottles, plastic containers of various shapes and sizes, sponges (cut into shapes if you're particularly ambitious and/or having a Martha Stewart moment), and puppet-style washcloths. Note: For additional inspiration in the bath toy department, check out the list of water toys in Chapter 3.

Find other creative ways to make bathtime fun for your toddler, like making hair sculptures while his hair is full of shampoo (hold up a mirror so that your toddler can admire his wacky 'do' for himself), washing him with animal-shaped or crayon-shaped soap, or treating him to a bubble bath. Note: Bubble baths should be an occasional treat because they can be tough on a toddler's tender skin and have been linked to recurrent urinary tract infections in little girls.