Welcome to Monday Mornings with Dr. Mona where each week I answer your questions.

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Let's get to our caller.

Hi Dr. Mona, my son is two and a half and probably for the past three months.

Maybe a little bit longer. He doesn't want us to clean or even touch his penis or his

skull down and you know it's weird because he doesn't seem to be bothered by anything.

He just doesn't want us to touch it and reacts kind of strongly to it and I was just wondering

if this was normal for boys to not want that area touched at such a young age or if there's

anything else that we should be worried about and trying to look into for others. Thank you.

Thank you so much for this a great question and I wanted to tackle this not only to normalize

a situation but offer an opportunity to teach our kids about body parts and body autonomy which

is important and it's our job as parents and it can be taught in this toddler years. Sometimes

as parents we feel a little bit shy or uncertain about talking about these things with our children

because maybe we feel a little bit uncomfortable but we really need to normalize having these

conversations not only about body autonomy but because it can also lead to safety in case we ever

find that our child is being touched inappropriately. I know as parents it's not something that we want

to think about or know about but it is really important that children understand the difference between

an okay touch and a not okay touch and in this situation how you can navigate it as their parent

who is looking out for their best interest. So number one this is normal for boys and girls

to be very private at this age. Some are not and some are and it's very normal if the children

are or are not it's all based on temperament. So some kids by nature are going to be more shy

they're going to guard more for their genital privacy while a sibling in the same household is

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