Bathing Issues

My girls are 2 1/2 years old, up until about 2 weeks ago they loved baths and I could hardly get them to get out. All of a sudden Paige decides that the water is too hot. (it wasn't too hot). So for a couple of days I would just wash her off really good but not make her take a bath, thinking this is a phase and will go away. So my next plan I bought each of them new bath toys and would only let them play with them in the tub still didn't help. So in the mean time Riley has also decided the water is too hot. So last night I made them take a bath (they really needed their hair washed), I made the water even cooler than normal and tried everything to get them in. So eventually i had to pick them up and give them the quickest bath ever as they screamed, I mean screamed like they were being tortured. They just keep scraming that it is hot. I would love any suggestions to get them to like bathing again.

Thanks for you help

Karen

 

Just a suggestion, but what if you put them in the shower?

 

Get a plastic pool and put it in your kitchen and let them "go swimming" see if that helps, it probably is just a phase, but I would not let them develop a phobia of the water.

I did this when I had to bath DS 4x's a day after a minor sugery, we got sick of it pretty fast so we soaked in the pool. It was summer so we could be outside, but in the kitchen would probably work too.

Good Luck!

 

What if....at non-bath times they were allowed to play outside the tub and drop stuff in etc. and then it'll be come non-threatening- just a thought. You could fill it and they could drop all the bath toys in and make a little splash and then maybe blow bubbles or something. Then let the water out and move on to the next activity.

I don't know for sure, but it sounds like they want to make more choices or something. Maybe they are just asserting their will because they can kwim? So, let them choose some other things and maybe they'll give in to bath time again. (shrug, not sure...)

 

Thanks so much for your replies. They are definately at an age where they want to make there own decisions. Hopefully soon they will "decide" to take a bath. I didn't try to put a pull in the kitchen but i did give them a bucket of buble bath so that they could wash there dishes and by they end they were covered in water so i snuck in and washed them real quick. I guess I'll just have to be creative for a while. Hopefully this will pass soon. Thanks so much for your advice.

 

My son went thru a stage like that around the same age. It was so bad that he'd start throwing up in the tub. I tried just letting him play in the water, shower, bubbles, toys everything! I finally would just put a little water in a wash tub inside the big tub. I had to basically do the spongebath thing until he got past that phase. it took a couple of weeks, but then he started getting in the big tub with water in it. Washing hair got interesting too, we ended up having to wet/rinse his hair with a washrag ensuring that no water got into his eyes or ears because he would go balistic. he's just now started letting me rinse his hair with a cup again. I don't know what triggered it, but it seems to be passed now.

Good luck to ya!

 

Mine have been on a kick with this "its too hot" routine lately. I have just been forcing the issue, which is probably wrong, but once I get them in there, they mellow out if I give them bath crayons, or little bottles of roll on soap from avon. Then I tell them that the Dora and Boots bath toys are dirty and need to be washed with the soap, etc. I just try to come up with a new bath "toy" and some fun story to go along with it.