Read Mummy Told Me Not to Tell for Free Online Page A

repeated the instructions again. Then I said, ‘Reece, are you wiping your bottom?’
    ‘No.’
    I eased open the toilet door and looked in. He was still sitting happily on the toilet, joggers and pants round his ankles, elbows resting on his knees as though he was in a deck chair on the beach, and making no attempt to clean himself.
    ‘Come on,’ I encouraged. ‘If you have finished, get off and wipe your bottom.’
    ‘Can’t,’ he said.
    ‘You can’t wipe your bottom?’
    ‘No.’
    Although I was surprised that a child of his age, even with learning difficulties, hadn’t been taught to wipe his own bottom, I wasn’t going to make an issue of it; but neither was I going to do it for him, which was presumably what had happened in the past. His abilities and coordination, although delayed, were quite adequate to master this skill: if he could count to a hundred I felt sure he could learn to wipe his own bottom.
    ‘All right. I’ll show you what to do. Now watch me carefully, Reece, then you can do it. First you tear off three sheets of toilet paper, like this.’ I tore them off. ‘Then you fold them like this, and wipe yourself like this.’ I turned slightly away from him and ran the folded toilet paper over the outside of my trouser where he should wipe. ‘You only use it once. Then you throw it down the toilet and tear off the next few sheets.’ Obvious though it may be to most of us, you’d be surprised at the number of children who have never been taught this and try to reuse the paper by turning it over and end up with excrement all over their hands.
    ‘Now you do it,’ I said. I passed him the folded tissue paper and he made a clumsy effort at trying to get it round to his bottom while still seated. ‘You’ll have to stand up to do it,’ I said.
    He wriggled off the toilet and, standing ungainly, made a brave attempt at wiping his bottom. Then he sat down again.
    ‘Right, the next piece. Watch carefully,’ I said. I tore off another strip of paper, folded it and passed it to him. Again he tried to wipe his bottom, still sitting down. ‘Remember to stand up to do it,’ I said.
    ‘Can’t you do it?’ he grumbled.
    ‘I could, but I want you to learn. You will feel very clever being able to wipe your own bottom, won’t you?’
    He shrugged, unconvinced, but accepted the next folded sheets of paper, stood and managed reasonably successfully to use them. And so we continued, with me tearing off the sheets of paper and him wiping, until he was clean.
    ‘Well done,’ I said. ‘Now flush the toilet.’
    He did that successfully first time, presumably used to flushing a toilet after going for a wee. Then he pulled up his pants and joggers.
    ‘Good. Now before you touch anything you need to wash your hands very well in hot water and soap.’
    Reece stood helplessly as I put the plug in the basin and ran the hot water. I then squirted soap into the palms of his hands and plunged them into the water.
    ‘Who wiped your bottom at home?’ I asked as he rubbed his hands in the water.
    ‘Don’t know,’ he said, and laughed.
    ‘What about when you were at school? Who did it there?’
    ‘I never did a pooh at school.’ Which didn’t surprise me, because children who have never mastered toilet skills will wait all day, until they have returned home, before relieving themselves. There’s little alternative if you aren’t going to be seriously embarrassed. It is for the child’s self-respect as much as anything that we teach these self-care skills early.
    ‘Now you will be able to use the toilet at school. Well done.’ I smiled. ‘Shake the water off your hands and then dry them on the towel.’ Reece was very enthusiastic about shaking the water off his hands and it sprayed everywhere. I directed his hands to the towel and waited until he had finished drying them. He nipped back into his bedroom while I opened the toilet window.
    I looked in his room on my way past. He was seated on the