My 10-month-old screams so loud during hair wash I’m convinced the neighbors think I’m committing a crime
I’m still sitting on the bathroom floor 15 minutes after we got it over with, my sweatpants are still half soaked at the ankle, and I’m drinking coffee that was hot when I started this whole ordeal. It’s lukewarm now, which is fine, I don’t really taste it anyway. My baby’s asleep on the couch wrapped in his favorite dinosaur blanket, like nothing happened, like he didn’t turn the whole house upside down for 7 minutes of getting his hair wet. Last week the lady from 2B actually knocked on the door, right in the middle of a hair wash, and when I opened it she had this wide-eyed look and said “I just… heard screaming, is everything okay?” I wanted to die. I had a towel wrapped around my waist, baby was naked in my arms still hiccuping from crying, and I just mumbled “it’s just hair wash” and she nodded really fast and left. I haven’t made eye contact with her when we pass in the hallway since.
It wasn’t always this bad. When he was tiny, four months or so, he’d just lie there in the baby tub, kick his little feet, chew on a rubber duck, didn’t care if water got on his head. It was fine. Then one time I was rushing because my takeout delivery was 10 minutes early and I’d left the door unlocked, got a whole blob of shampoo in his eye before I could stop him from twisting. He screamed so hard his whole face went red, and that was it. That’s the whole origin story. One little mistake, and now it’s this whole thing. Every time I even set the little plastic pouring cup on the edge of the tub, he sees it, and he starts arching his back and clamping his little mouth shut like I’m about to drag him to the dentist.
I’ve tried all the basic stuff everyone tells you, obviously. My mom swore by the trick where you cup your hand over his forehead to block water from running down his face. I do that, I’ve practiced. But he flails so hard now that half the time my hand slips, or he twists away to the side, and water goes right down his neck into his back anyway, which just confirms all his worst fears. I bought that stupid $12 visor thing off Amazon, the one that’s supposed to sit around their head and keep suds and water out of their eyes. It looks like a tiny construction hard hat for a baby. He hated it on sight. The first time I tried to put it on him, he pulled it off so fast it flew across the room and chipped the edge of my glass shelf above the toilet. I still haven’t told my husband that chip came from that, I said I did it with the plunger when I had a clog last month. He hasn’t noticed, so whatever.
People kept telling me to get in the shower with him, let him see me wash my own hair, make it a game, show him it’s not scary. I tried that two Saturdays ago. I got in, brought him in, he sat on my lap fine, playing with the loofah, chewing on the shower caddy edge, everything was good. Then I tipped my head back to wet my own hair to show him it’s fine, and he lost it. Screamed so hard he threw up a little bite of the banana I’d given him 10 minutes before right on my thigh. I had to get us both out, drain the shower, pick banana chunks out of the drain, wrap him up, and by the end of it I was so stressed I just gave up on washing his hair. It was greasy and crusted with granola for three days after that. I saw a mom friend at the playground that Wednesday, and she said “oh his little curls are getting so cute!” and I just smiled. I didn’t tell her those curls were holding onto half a blueberry I’d given him for snack Tuesday.
I know it sounds silly to be this stressed about it. I know it’s just hair wash, it’s just a phase, everyone says that. All the mom groups online say “just stay consistent, just stay calm, he’ll grow out of it.” I am consistent, I do it every three days like the pediatrician said, and it’s the same thing every time. I stay calm for the first 30 seconds, then he starts screaming, then he flails and gets water all over my shirt, then I start rushing because I just want it to be over, and that makes him scream harder. It’s this stupid cycle.
The only thing that sort of works sometimes is giving him my old broken iPhone, the one I don’t use anymore that just has a black screen. He likes holding it and tapping the screen like he’s texting someone, and if I’m really fast, I can get his hair washed before he gets bored and throws it. But last week he threw it right into the tub, so I had to set it on the radiator to dry out for two days, and now the home button sticks. And half the time even that doesn’t work. He knows what’s coming now, he’ll drop the phone immediately and start screaming anyway.
It’s this tiny stupid thing that hangs over my whole week. I’ll plan hair wash for after his morning nap, and then I’ll procrastinate for an hour rolling cars around the floor with him, because I don’t want to deal with the screaming. My husband suggested the other night that we could just take him to that fancy baby salon downtown that does first haircuts and baby spa treatments, they do hair washes too. I laughed and said that’s the dumbest thing I’d ever heard, why would I pay someone else to wash my baby’s hair when I can do it for free? But then later that night when I couldn’t sleep, I looked it up. $25 for a baby hair wash. $25. That’s a whole order of tacos and chips for us for dinner. But I was this close to booking an appointment anyway.
I don’t want any big speeches about how it’s all okay and every baby goes through this. I’ve heard that a hundred times. I know every baby goes through this, that doesn’t make it less annoying, it doesn’t make the neighbor knocking less embarrassing. If you’ve been here, if you had a baby that turned every hair wash into a whole house production, what weird little trick actually worked for you? Not the “just stay calm” garbage, not the “give it time” stuff. Did giving him a cup to hold himself work? Did putting a cool washcloth over his eyes help? Did you bribe him with puffs and it actually worked? I’m willing to try anything at this point. I just want to be able to wash my baby’s hair without hiding from my neighbor in the apartment hallway. That’s all I’m asking.
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