So here we are today, we’re talking about wiping. By the time your child is going to preschool or kindergarten, they need to be wiping on their own after they use the toilet. But a few months before your child starts going to school, you want to make sure that your child is having the opportunity to practice.
Practice. Yes. It’s another thing that we moms have to worry about. We need to teach our kids how to wipe their butts. You don’t want them going to school and pooping at school thinking that they’re doing a good job wiping, getting poopie skid marks in their underwear, smelling probably getting a rash, and just being not really hygienic. So it’s really important that we teach our children the right way to wipe. While this may be uncomfortable for some parents, it is a necessity for parenthood. We need to prepare our children for independence.
The first thing that you always need to do when you are teaching your child how to wipe is to tell them they need to wipe from front to back. It is the oldest rule in the book. You know that your child needs to wipe from front to back to make sure that they are not cross contaminating any bacteria and that they are not getting any infection.
Here are some more steps to teach your child how to wipe:
1. There’s one of two things that you can do when telling them how much toilet paper to grab. You can either have them count 1, 2, 3, 4 squares. Then rip. Or option B. Having your child measure how much toilet paper they are using is if you have your toilet paper on a wall. So not on a free-standing toilet paper holder. But if it’s connected to the wall, you can have your toilet paper on the wall and then pre-measure out how much your child should be using. Get some blue painter’s tape and put it right under the line where the limit is where your child is allowed to get their toilet paper.
2. Once your child has four squares, you want to teach them to fold them in half. And then fold it again You might want to fold it a third time. But you want them to fold it because you want their hands and their fingers to kind of be covered if your child is getting four and they just kind of wrinkle it up. They’re going to get poop on their fingers this way, so let’s just go back go back to the folding. So we’re gonna do fold in half, fold in half again, fold in half again if you so choose then you’re gonna teach your child lean wipe and you want them to look at it whatever I know you’re probably gonna think it’s gross but they need to look at the toilet paper.
3. They need to see if they got it all. If they got it all great drop it, pull up the pants, flush it wash them have a nice day. If there is still poop on the toilet paper then they need to get another 4 squares. 1, 2, 3, 4… rip it, fold it, fold it, fold it… wipe it, check it, okay repeat that until they are clean, teach your child that they need to be clean.
4. That’s it. It’s as simple as that.
5. what you need to do when your child is in the learning phase is let your child wipe first and then tell your child that you are going to go in second and do a second wipe for them so that you can check their work and make sure that they got it all. Once your child is consistently getting it all and making sure that the toilet paper is consistently being wiped clean then you don’t have to wipe them anymore.
They are free to fly. Just let them fly. Another tip that I have for you is to buy some of the flushable wipes when your child kind of has messy poops, tons of toilet paper is just not gonna be enough. Just get some wipes and call it a day.
Here’s a bonus tip that I have for you: When your child is younger, so probably around 2, 2.5 before you start potty training, I want you to teach your child the proper anatomy in the bathtub. When your child is taking a bath, give them a washcloth with soap and water on it and tell them to find where their poopie comes out and clean that area. Your child needs to clean their butthole and they need to learn how to do this and as uncomfortable as it may seem, it is just part of parenting and you need to make sure that you are teaching your child how to do this.
It’s a really sad situation when kids were not taught to wipe properly and they’re walking around with a butt rash all the time. I know it sounds crazy and I never thought that I would be saying this on the internet, but I just want your kid to have a healthy body. Okay, so my parting words for this blog is to practice practice practice. Make it normal, make it a part of life that your child needs to make sure they have a clean butthole and you’ll be good to go. Your child will be fully prepared to go to school independently wiping their own tush after they’ve pooped.
If you haven’t started potty training yet, click here and get POTTY PARTY: The Course!
