operation clean baby

as you may recall, bryn has been absolutely terrified of the bath for about six months now. i know lots of kids cry in the bath, but this has been full-on screaming, clutching at my neck hysterics. so we've been making do with infrequent sponge baths on the bathroom counter and trying all kinds of tactics: new toys, new tubs, showers, swimsuits, dolls/parents/friends in the bath/shower, bubbles, outdoor water toys, wading in lake chelan, you name it, but nothing worked. UNTIL...


we finally got bryn to a real swimming pool with all her little friends. she started off in the kiddie pool with her best bud and about two inches of water. then, after about an hour of watching the adults and other kids scoop water out of the big pool to put in the kiddie pool, bryn decided to venture over and give that a try. another half hour of that, and she was finally ready to get into the big pool. we went gradually, and by the end, she was in up to her chest and loving it!!

to keep up the momentum, we started offering "bubble play time" in our big bathtub, which actually turns out to be really handy when i am in the shower because they are next to each other, which makes for both easy supervision and mess containment. we let her do that for about a week, gradually increasing the amount of water and decreasing the amount of clothing, until we finally tried a bath at the end of play time. the bath was better than most, and she still wanted to play in the tub the next day. so, we're keeping up this routine and seeing baths get better little by little. here's hoping that continues!

bath photos

i figured i better get some pictures of bryn in the bath before she gets too old.



it was a good thing too, because she is T-E-R-R-I-F-I-E-D of the bath now. you don't want to see what baths look like these days. kicking, screaming, clinging. and i can't figure out what the problem is - she'll play in the tub (we've tried a of couple different ones, and several new toys), but once i take her clothes off, she won't go anywhere near it, water or no water. we also tried the shower, which is slightly better because at least her objective there is to cling to me rather than to get away. but the sheer terror is not lessened, nor is the anguished crying. i've even started giving her baby doll baths, so bryn can help and see that the bath is fun and not life-threatening. but still no progress.

my last hold-out is actually getting in a bath with her, but that just seems like a whole can of worms that i'm not ready to open yet.