Every baby has a fear. Sometimes it is the vacuum, the dog, or the blender. My baby actually doesn’t seem to mind the blender all that much, and he loves the food chopper. Weird. But, there are a few things that he is afraid of from time to time. While I don’t enjoy my child’s fear, it is sometimes cute to see what he is afraid of.
One of the things that I have learned that he is afraid of is the car wash. In fact, I remember my oldest being scared of that, too as a baby. Now, she loves it. But, the big sounds, can be overwhelming inside the car.
I usually do a self-serve type of car wash. The first time I took my little guy, he screamed the entire time. I felt so bad. He obviously didn’t know what was going on, and there was not much I could do to make him happy. A couple of days ago I needed to wash the car again (thanks to my 3 year old gently reminding me) and, I thought he might be a little bit better. My 3 year old wants to “help” so he wants to get out of the car. I reminded him that his brother might be scared all alone inside, so maybe he should stay inside so his baby brother wasn’t worried, but there was no persuading him.
So, we go outside the car and get working on washing it, and all seems to be going well, until I had to do the power sprayer. My little guy did not like that! He immediately burst into tears. I would stop by his window and wave at him through the glass and smile really big. As I did that, he got a confused look on his face like, “why is she smiling?” but it made him stop crying for a few seconds. I guess his fear of the car wash isn’t over. We will have to see what happens next time.
Whatever your baby’s fears are, it is important to always reassure them that all is OK. With vacuuming, I held my little guy while I vacuumed so that he could see that it was not that scary, and he seems OK now with the vacuum cleaner now. Maybe next time, I will let him sit in the stroller and watch me clean the car. Hopefully in time, he will see that the car wash is OK too.