Teaching my 10 year old son appropriate bathroom manners
My 10 year old son has ADHD. He has some severe issues with focus and memory. We've tried various things to help him focus and remember but they all seem to arbitrarily stick or fail.
For now he constantly leaves the toilet seat up. With a mother, a 1-yr younger sister and a toddler in our house it's become a somewhat serious issue. I'm wondering what the healthiest, smartest, most sensical means of teaching him to either not raise the toilet seat or to at least return it to closed would be?
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As a person with ADD, I can tell you what helps with me. Post-it notes! Put a post-it note or a bright colored sheet on the wall reminding everyone (don't single him out) to "Please close the toilet seat when you have finished your business". Bright colors! I use neon yellow post-its to remind me of things I have to do consistently.
Two step solution:
1) Everyone puts the seat and lid down
2) Everyone shuts the bathroom door
OR
Get a lid lock for your toilet seat
OR
Put a baby gate across your bathroom doorway
There are seats that come down on their own, like a slow spring, it's down a few minutes later. I would not put this kind of emotional pressure on a 10 year old, even without ADHD. But for your son, I'd choose very carefully what to make an issue.
While not speaking directly to this specific issue, I have found that this Reddit does a wonderful job of explaining ADHD to the non-sufferer. As an adult survivor of ADD, and having an ADHD child myself, I can say it resonates strongly with us and reflects our experiences quite well.
Patience and acceptance go a long way, and being willing to examine and change your own habits is essential. It's a relationship. Enjoy the many glorious qualities ADD brings to a personality and make allowances, where possible, for the foibles that come along too. :D
www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/16joxj/people_with_adhd_what_adhd_is_like_how_does/c7wnp37
Am I the only person who thinks that it's entirely trivial for the next person to use the toilet to correct the seat position for their needs?
I don't see why this is worth complaining about.
Just teach your kids to make sure the seat is where they need it to be so that they can do what they need to do, and leave it at that. The whole "men must be the only ones who move a toilet seat, women are incapable of doing this" thing is a subtle and often overlooked gender equality issue that we as a society should stop perpetuating.
When my Son was about 5 yrs old and asked why put the lid down, I replied "to keep the snakes from getting out". "Really Dad?" "No Son, but it is fun to think of that way". Lid has been closed ever since.
Be consistent. Rather than making the toilet a "special case", focus on teaching your child to close things he's opened when he's done with them. If you open the fridge, you close the door when you're done. When you open the door to go outside, you close it when you've gone through it. If you open a jar of pickles, you close the lid when you're done. If you open the valve that makes water come out of the faucet, you close it when you're done using water. And when you open the toilet, you close it when you're done - by putting the whole lid down, not just the seat. If the toilet is not in use, it's not open.
Teach the women in your house the same thing. ;) "Open, use, close." is a pattern that can be applied to pretty much everything, and consistency is key to retention. :)
Beyond the "consideration for your family" angle, try taking a health approach.
In order for you to smell something, little particles of that something must be floating around in the air and drift into your nose, for you to detect it. That means if you can smell poop or pee, poop or pee is drifting through the air.
Now, a 10 year old boy is probably not going to respond to "it's better for your health" arguments, but he just might respond to "You don't want to dry your face in your pee, or brush your teeth with your poop, do you?"
Explain to him how smelling works, then give him the "do you want to rub poop on your teeth" talk. It's all about talking on their level.
I wish my parents had taught me to pee sitting down whenever possible. Only in my early 20s did I realise that it was the best way to keep the toilets clean, and also more respectful of everyone I was living with.
Here is a short piece at Mamas on Call on the topic, and a funny comic at The Oatmeal, too.
Maybe there is still time for your son to be taught these facts?
I believe one of the original points about putting the "seat" down (actually the entire lid) is so that it doesn't spray stuff everywhere when you flush.
When you flush, polluted water vapour escapes and takes ages to settle - and there are probably things in any bathroom you don't want all those germs on.
Dr Charles Gerba PhD did a study
on this which is often quoted.
In 1975, Gerba published a scientific article describing the phenomenon of bacterial and viral aerosols due to toilet flushing. When this aerosol of contaminated water is ejected into the air, it lands on everything in the bathroom, including your toothbrush. According to Gerba, this isn’t just another scare tactic to get men to put the top down.
During the study, gauze pads were placed around the experimental bathroom. Close-up photos of the germy ejecta, according to Gerba, looked like “Baghdad at night during an air attack.” The study showed that significant quantities of microbes floated around the bathroom for at least two hours after each flush. Gerba discovered that a lot of virus fell on those gauze pads.
With this in mind, I would encourage your son to put the lid down each time (and the rest of you for that matter). Maybe you could invest in a small reward scheme that your other children can take part in as well?
I'm not sure if this is age appropriate, but much of the advice I've received around teaching bathroom habits has been using prominently displayed picture schedules. You could easily adapt this to be focused on the behavior you want re-enforced (putting the seat down). These seem to help a lot of kids that have trouble focusing and memorizing multi-step processes.
I'm always amused in these discussions, where women take the view that men are "at fault" because we leave the seat up. Excuse me? I'm responsible for you not watching where you're putting your butt? I never even heard of this "issue" until my girlfriend gave an anguished squawk one morning and "accused" me of leaving the seat up. My response? "Yup. So?". This was never mentioned to me growing up. NEV-ER.
There are several options here:
Chastise son about leaving toilet seat up ad infinitum.
Teach son to always sit on toilet.
Let son pee all over toilet seat.
Look before you sit down.
Allow me to suggest that option (4) is the most reasonable. You really don't want him to do (3), you're unlikely to manage to teach (2), and (1) is totally pointless.
Honestly, there are some things you want to take responsibility for, and apparently having the toilet seat in the correct position before sitting down is one of them. Guys sit down too sometimes, and y'know what? We make golly-gosh-darned sure that the seat is down! It's not rocket science! You do not need an advanced degree or special training of any sort! You look at the toilet. You note the position of the seat. You change the position of the seat if it's not where you want it!
Look before you sit. Learn it, live it, love it.
Your mileage may vary.
Share and enjoy.
To agree with several of the above non-answers, and actually answer the question, as posted:
the healthiest, smartest, most sensical means of teaching him to either not raise the toilet seat or to at least return it to closed would be
...to be a good example.
For the several reasons already mentioned about gender roles, health, toddler safety, etc, just follow the simple rule that the toilet seat AND LID ALWAYS stays all the way down and closed. When you arrive, lift the amount of lid/seat that you need to, and when you are finished, close the entire lid/seat again. EVERYONE does it the same.
As far as your ADHD son, teaching a habit of putting things back where he found them in the first place will be a lifelong, useful skill. It will save him a lot of trouble by preventing lost items, school work, etc -- both his stuff and other people's, including yours.
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