Sensitive topic - normal toddler behaviour or sign of sexual abuse?

[Pixiedust138]

Help! My child has been has been showing some behaviours recently that are worrying me. I don’t know know if this is normal toddler behaviour, just a phase or a sign of something serious going on?

My son is 18 months old, over the last few weeks he’s started to have extreme tantrums. several a day and they are getting difficult to manage. In addition it’s now near impossible to change his clothes or his nappy alone because he screams bloody murder, won’t open his legs to let you clean him and thrashes about to get away. He’s never liked having his nappy changed but never been this difficult to manage before! He also no longer wants to take baths with he used to love. if you negotiate and manage to get him into the bath without a big tantrum then he will be fine when he gets in the bath though.

I just changed his nappy ready for bed and he was screaming at the top of his lungs and crying ,trashing to get away, but very alarmingly to me he’s grabbed hold of his Willy and started shouting “mine, mine”. He often grabs at his Willy when he’s having a nappy change but he seemed terrified.

i am so worried. I know 1000% nothing has happened to him at home, I am his main carer and no adult or child has any access to him without my supervision but he does attend nursery full time.

is this a sign of sexual abuse or is he just going through some big toddler feelings?

My 19 month old went through a very short phase of this. When I thought back to it all, about a month or so before it she had really bad nappy rash (nursery left her in a dirty nappy for a very long time)
The nappy rash made it look like she had very dry skin so changing her nappy was painful, using wipes was painful and going for baths was painful. She would stir, scream and refuse to open her legs, even if I was just changing her trousers and not nappy.

could you speak to nursery? It could even be that someone has been a little too forceful or even given him into trouble and it’s scared him.
I really hope it’s not sexual abuse but I guess it’s something you can’t rule out. I would ask for a meeting with the nursery to discuss things and explain how he is reacting to see how they respond.
Could you also speak to your health visitor?

Ask nursery:

A. How he is with nappy change with them
B. Ask to watch them change his nappy, perhaps just before you pick him up.

You will get an idea of where the nappy change area is. There should be no privacy for adults with nappy changes. I've worked in a couple of places and if someone walked past they should be able to see everything happening. You will also get an idea of his behaviour with them. He might just be pushing boundaries with you. 18 months is that age!

He also may have a UTI. Get him checked for that ASAP. Maybe he very sore 'inside'.

Have you tried pull ups so you can sometimes change him stood up?

My Ds refused baths for over a year, we literally had to wash him with a flannel. As he got a little older we realised he's very sensitive to temperature and as his speech improved he was able to help us run it and say how he needed the water. He loves baths again now!

Thank you so much for all these responses, some really great advice and ideas to try. I really appreciate the advice!