Wash private parts and bottom

#private parts#bottom#wash#toilet#hygiene

By the time the last two steps come around, there is maybe a minute of patience left in the shower. The visual support below splits private parts and bottom into an order short enough to finish before that minute runs out.

A child sits on the toilet and washes the private area and bottom with a yellow washcloth.

Wash private parts and bottom

A child sits on the toilet and washes the private area and bottom with a yellow washcloth.

About this visual support

The water is going lukewarm, the towel is already out, and one foot is halfway onto the bathmat. That is exactly when the two most sensitive parts of the wash are still waiting, and neither of them handles being rushed.

Order matters here, and an order is easier to hold on to as pictures than as a string of spoken reminders under running water. Wash front to back, and swap the cloth or rinse hands between the two areas. Give that swap a picture of its own, so it becomes a step in the sequence rather than something your child has to remember unprompted. Placed at eye level on the shower wall, the strip also shows how many steps are left, which takes some of the pressure out of the last minute.

If a timer showing how much shower is left works better than words do, you can build the whole routine in Routined and try it for fourteen days at no cost. The pictures on this page cost nothing.