Bathtime woes

I am faced with a hearbreaking circumstance right now with my sweet little Anna. Somewhere along the way she's developed a crazy, rotten fear of her baths. I think of it specifically this morning cause I gave baths that should have been done last night. Just the mention of a bath and Anna falls apart. The common scenario is me gently forcing her in the tub, speaking soft and kind to her all the while. Anna is screaming bloody murder. My inclination is to say "Fine, I can't handle seeing you this way, so forget the bath." But the "mom" in me knows that she'll end up being the stinky kid. Who wants that? So, there she is standing in the tub--not a chance of her sitting down--I always let her feel the water first and give one of her bath fishes a bath. She enjoys those two things, but inevitably I do need to actually bathe her. As soon as the water hits her body, she hangs her entire torsoe out of the tub onto my lab. Of course as you can imagine I always end up with as much water in the bathroom as in the tub. The tricky part is washing her hair now that it's down to the middle of her back. It actually requires some effort to wash it. Once I pry her off of my lap, I use the shower sprayer to gently wet and wash her beautiful hair. If any water runs down her face, she has the look of complete terror and fear. Of course you can imagine that I finish as quickly as possible. Then it's on to the other two with Anna curled up on my lap recovering from all the trauma.

Bath time used to be one of my favorite and their favorite times of the day. The kids would always beg to play longer in the tub. They'd splash and play for sometimes an hour before I made them get out. It was so enjoyable. But now, I literally dread doing baths. Andrew still loves it, Alissa is rather indifferent at this point, but getting Anna done is the real chore. I confess that I've let days go by without baths cause I don't have it in me to do it at the end of the day.

I hear that there are times around 2 years old when some kids develop odd fears to things they never feared before. I also hear they grow out of it. Please, let her grow out of this fear sooner rather than later. If anyone reading this has any wisdom or ideas on the issue, I'd be happy to hear them. But for now...happy bathing to everyone else!