Tips for bath time fears

My son used to love the bath and asked to do it most days. He pooped in the tub once and is now terrified. It’s been two months of trying to get him to enjoy it again. Ball pit baths, watching bath time shows in the bath, his favorite show in the bath, bucket of warm water to stick feet in and adjust, bathing suit, me in tub in bathing suit. Now we resort to sponge baths most days but still hates that. I do force him to shower or bath at least once a week but he screams in fear the entire time. What do I do? Forgot to mention, he just turned 2 on February 2nd and he was just diagnosed Level 2

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THE WAY I GOT MY BABY BACK USE TO BATH TIME BY PLAYING IN THE RAIN. IT CAN BE HARD CAUSE THEY PROCESS EMBARRASSMENT DIFFERENT WHICH CAN RESULT IN FEAR OF DOING IT AGAIN FOR MANY REASONS

@Mimie thank you! We’ve actually been playing in the rain a lot lately, I hope this will help. It’s funny sink water and the ocean don’t scare him one bit. Just the tub

IT'S CAUSE HE'S EMBARRASSED AND FOUND IT GROSS AWWUH POOR BABY

I think if you think of which idea gave the least freak out so far and then repeat that idea each time over time for a few weeks or months he may adjust to it again. Hopefully it could be a phase fear and pass over time when he realizes it's part of his routine. Consistency might be helpful even if it's a little battle for a while because switching things up can add more stress and routine can add more comfort. Maybe I'm wrong tho lol that's just how it goes w my kids. They both went through bath time fears and that took a while to pass.. my youngest is still weary if he can see the drain so I have to make sure we have bubbles

Also he was acting scared of the bubbles at first too but I kept it up and now bubbles is the only way 🤷‍♀️ I hope you find your way 🙏

@Mimie I know I feel bad. It’s happened with me and I just scooped it out before he saw and flushed it. It doesn’t help that it happened when I was in the hospital having baby #2. It was our first time apart and his dad was giving him a bath and it was diarrhea and he made him get out and it was done for. Then I came home after 3 days with a new baby. My poor kiddo, everything bad happened all at once

@ren I think your right, I will try this. I read you’re not supposed to force him but he gets so dirty playing outside i I have to. Maybe if I do it more often he’ll just know It’s the routine and be okay with it again. Thank you for the advice

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