When I made the decision to use cloth diapers, I got quite a few "are you crazy?!?!" looks. Even a year later, a colleague looked at me as if I had 3 heads when I mentioned using cloth diapers. It amazes me that people don't realize that diaper technology has advanced in the past 30 years. Disposable diapers have "improved" over time, as have cloth.
"But cloth takes too much time!" False. Put diaper on baby - same time as disposable. Take diaper off baby - if pee only, throw it in the pail! if breast fed poop, throw it in the pail! if solid food poop, take to toilet, plop/spray/swish then throw it in the pail! I will give you that solid food adds an extra step on a few diaper changes each day, but think of the time you spend driving to the store, finding the diapers you want (hopefully on sale and in the right size...which isn't always that easy in my experience), stand in line, pay and drive back home. Washing diapers takes time...really, throwing them in your machine and turning it on is too much work? However, I am the first to admit that if I didn't have my own washer/dryer, cloth would not have been in our house! And sure, after a hard day of work and entertaining a toddler, I may not want to walk to the basement to switch the wash over or hang diapers to dry, but I would much rather the 5 minutes that takes to the 30 minutes it would take me if I ran out of disposables.
That's right...I chose cloth diapers because I am LAZY! Well, that is one reason.
Initially, I used disposable wipes thinking, "ew, gross...I do NOT want to touch a reused wipe!" Then I discovered how quickly you run out of disposable wipes. The average refill package contains 60 wipes. With a newborn, you are doing upwards of 8 - 10 diaper changes a day (depending on how poopy your child is, which I had and still have the poopiest kid ever it seems!). That means, if you are lucky, you get through 1 week without having to refill your wipes container. But wait....blow outs? up the back poops? child who instantly grabs nether regions as soon as the diaper has been removed? I'm not using 1 wipe per change...on average we were going through 2 refills per week. If I could find a good sale, and multi-refill packages, that totals $4-$5 per week for wipe refills!
That's right...I am also cheap! (don't even get me started on the cost of diapers here!)
When I first mentioned cloth wipes to my husband, he said yes, but fully expected my experiment to fail I think. As it turns out, he is a huge supporter of the cloth wipe! Now, we can use just one wipe per change, and, in general, your hands remain safe from the dreaded poop transfer that was more common with disposable wipes.
"But cloth diapers smell!" I don't care what magic your diaper genie uses, disposable diapers STINK! It starts with the perfumed scent added to mask the odour, then there is whatever chemical they use to absorb the pee that has it's own unique odour, then the kid pees and you get another wet diaper smell, then the kid poops and my word, I want to vomit! There is a chemical reaction between baby poop and disposable diapers that is horrendous. Don't get me wrong, if a kid poops in a cloth diaper, you are likely to smell poop, but odds are, the people around you won't smell it from a distance.
And now it is time to get real. Cloth diapers are.....ADORABLE! I had so much fun picking out patterns for Parker's tushie! I have enough diapers for 2 or 3 children to be in diapers full-time because I had no restraint. The volume of diapers is great now that he is in daycare though, so we really have 2 stashes to get us through life. I really thought more people would see his diapers on a regular basis, but it hasn't really happened. So I took to having "naked baby photo shoots" when I was home with Parker. Strip the kid down to his cutest fluff and snap away so his diapered butt can be enjoyed by friends and family (they may not all agree with the enjoy part).
Do I judge people who use disposable diapers? No...I use them too! My kid pees so much at night his butt would be the size of a blimp to contain it in cloth (at least that is how I envision it). There is no way I am carting cloth diapers with us for a day at the zoo. I could do it, but if I don't have to carry the dirty ones around all afternoon in the summer heat, I won't.
Obviously there are pros and cons to both cloth and disposables. I just hope that people realize cloth doesn't need pins anymore or plastic pants. And they are cute....seriously...you can't deny the cuteness!!!
Awesome post! I agree 2,300,400% with all of this!!!
ReplyDeleteI wanted to add, I get more comments on how great my daughter smells because we use cloth... If we used disposables I doubt she would be getting those compliments because she would smell like a chemically diaper, gross!
The smell is something I never thought of before trying cloth. Now it really bothers me when he is in a sposie!
DeleteOh, and I forgot that I hope cloth helps potty train early, but if not, at least we don't have to keep buying diapers! ;)