Stressful bathtimes

[Lizzidee]

For the past few weeks when we've attempted to bath our almost 2 year old he just stands there and screams. He won't sit down, just cries and pushes my hands away. It's become a real chore to try and get him clean and wash his hair.

I think it stems back to about 3 weeks ago when he had a tummy bug, we were putting him to bed one evening and he threw up all over himself so we gave him a quick bath, no bubbles or toys just a quick bodywash and back to bed.

I'm worried this has somehow traumatised him! It makes me so sad because he has always loved bath time ever since he was tiny! He would happily sit there for half an hour or more, splashing and playing with toys and he'd have a great time!

I've tried everything i can think of, getting in with him, getting my mum to bath him at her house, new bath toys, playing songs on my phone, nothing helps!

Any suggestions or advice would be very much appreciated!

How often are you trying to bath him? I would just go to a quick wipe down for now, break the cycle of him being upset, maybe try the shower in the bath instead of an actual bath?

Thank you for replying. We've always bathed him every other day or so (more if he's been dirty and needed it) at the moment we're stretching it to a couple of times a week with a wipe down with a flannel in between which is also a bit of a struggle!

We have the same problem with our 2yo DD. Bathtime was part of her bedtime routine but it made the whole routine a nightmare as she'd be so upset afterwards. In the end, I decided to eliminate it from her routine and just give her a wash when she needed it at another time of the day. She didn't want a shower so we started washing her in the sink. It made an awful lot of puddles in the kitchen but was the only way I could clean her. Then after a couple of weeks she started asking for baths again. It's not a part of her daily routine anymore but I think having a break helped fix the power struggle.

You may have already tried this but bubbles and bath colors? Maybe the novelty if he hasn’t seen the Color drops would be enough to entice him.

@Alitlebitsleepy Sorry to hear your DD isn't enjoying her baths either. I think the sink might be a good shout actually, he's still happy to wash his hands at the sink. Getting him to stand still for more than 2 seconds while I wash him with a flannel is a bit of an issue but the sink might contain him a bit! Thankyou!

@Suetodo2 I hadn't heard of bath colours but thank you for the recommendation, I'll look into that!

We had this at this age.

We tried to make it fun so we'd put food colouring in, or paintbrushes for 'writing' with the bubbles, what actually worked best was two things: we got a small inflatable duck shaped baby bath, and bathed her in that for while, and also we bought a baby doll bath and a plastic doll, she would bath the baby herself whilst in the big bath.

Alternatively, could one of you get in there too?

We had similar issues at this age so started using the shower with ds instead of a bath.
Started with him joining me in the shower and he really enjoyed it.

When my son was about two, I squeezed the water out of a bath toy (a little zebra) and a ton of black mould came out. I said, "Oh look, the zebra is pooing, " (before I scooped him out and threw away said bath toy). He screamed and screamed in absolute terror. He was seriously traumatized and would scream whenever I tried to bath him again over the next few days.
I felt awful - he used to love baths, now he was terrified, and it was all my fault. I thought I had ruined baths forever.
However, a week or so later, I tried again and he was fine. Give the routine a break for a couple of days or so, then try again. It will probably be fine.