The Diaper-Free Movement / Elimination Communication. On Babble.com.
How the diaper-free movement tested my oldest friendship.
“You just learn to read the cues,” Emma elaborated on the air. “He squirms or makes a face, and I know it’s time to pee him.” No, no, no, I thought. Don’t say, “pee him.” I blushed deeply, as though I were somehow responsible for my friend’s ca-ca-mania.
I didn’t want to listen to crazy talk about baby poop on The Leonard Lopate Show. But I made no move to turn the dial. Emma is, after all, my oldest friend. I’ve known her since birth (our mothers were friends before us), and she has generally maintained an advantage over me on the developmental curve: being born, learning to read, getting married, adopting a shelter dog, having a kid. She was the first in my circle to embrace vegetarianism, yoga, meditation and holistic meds. All that is practically mainstream now. Emma is a forward thinker. But when she became a mother, her forward-thinking rocketed into a whole other stratosphere – the loopy-sphere. Yet, clearly she wasn’t alone. She was talking to Lenny Lopate about her baby’s crap, and he was listening.
The guest expert on the radio, a kind-sounding woman with a Midwestern accent, touted other benefits of EC: no diaper rash; no landfills crammed with toxic swaddling. She explained that babies in many other places never wore diapers, such as in parts of Africa, China and India. They had splits in their pants so they could squat by the side of the road, no big deal. My husband, who had wandered back into the living room at this point, snorted. “Those kids don’t have indoor plumbing either.”
About the Author
Gina Zucker
Gina Zucker is a writer and teacher living in Brooklyn.
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9 thoughts on “The Diaper-Free Movement / Elimination Communication. On Babble.com.”
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I agree about the judgmental tone of parents and non-parents. If diaperless works for you that’s cool with me.
Here is what Dr. Berry Brazelton thought when I talked to him last year about potty training infants.
“It’s nothing new. Every culture in the world that carries their babies…all mothers that carry their babies know when to hold them out and have them do it.
The new thing is our adaptation because we aren’t really equipped to carry our babies around all day.
The thing that bothered me about this – using it as a new way of interacting with your child – was it makes mothers who can’t be with their babies all the time feel guilty. And I think they feel guilty enough if they are having to leave them and go to work, things like that, which you know 80 percent of mothers are having to do.”
Working Dad,
If you want to let your child run around the house without clothes.. feel free. Do whatever makes you happy.But if you honestly think that either:A) You are bringing that pantless child near meorB) You are brining that child into my place of businessThen you have lost your mind.Accidents will happen, and if they happen at work.. expect to get chewed out when the housekeeper shows up huffing and puffing. And if it happens at my house, don’t be surprised when my wife serves you with a subpoena to cover our carpet replacement. You mine as well just be letting a toddler run around on the carpet with a glass of wine..
You gotta wonder how the child feels about all of this…it’s not really respecting them, giving them privacy etc (outside of your own home, I mean). My aunt did this with her son, and he needed to poo when they were on a walk with her sister in her neighbourhood. So he pulled his pants down and prepared to go in the gutter. Her sister, slightly horrifed, said why don’t we take him back home etc, but my aunt said, ‘Nah, its fine,’ let her son finish and scooped it up in a plastic bag, like you would a dog. I’m sorry, that I kinda have a problem with. That’s out in public, people. That poor child. why exactly do parents do this? I’m a little confused..is it just so the child won’t get nappy rash? If you put them on a potty or let them run around naked to pee in the garden at an early age, I don’t think that teaching them to toliet train when thier bodies aren’t ready for it (developmentally). Surely this would just prolong the process? You’d feel like you’d been toliet training for a thousand years. If you wait until they are ready, the process would go by much faster. That’s just my opinion though.
If the child is still pooping on the floor, then he’s not any more trained than a kid wearing diapers or pull-ups. He’s not going when she asks him to, she is making noises when he was already going to go anyway. Sounds like she’s being trained to me. Kids will be trained when they’re ready.
I like your perspective, to each his own! (Although it makes me think twice about laying on the floor in a rental house.) I just cannot imagine staring at my child every minute of every day looking for a facial expression.My son just developed a new facial expression (I think he’s trying to wink). I’d probably still be holding him above the toilet in a panic.
Seriously – no diapers mean you can’t take your baby anywhere. Few friends or relatives will want you in their house, and you can’t take them in public. It is illegal for people to defecate or urinate in public place in the US. And stores are unlikely to be amused if your baby poos in the freezer aisle.
Elimination communication is pretty big in parts of Europe these days, from what I hear. I’ve considered trying it with my second child, due in a few months. It sounds from the above posts like a lot of people probably aren’t too tolerant of the method, but when you consider the number of diapers you’re not using… environmentally speaking, it makes a big difference. But, as the first poster pointed out, only a select few mothers can be with their kid all the time, and if you’re not with the kid all the time, someone else has to also pick up those cues, etc. I see that as the biggest difficulty…
EC sounds suspiciously similar to the way I was potty trained and have seen babies potty trained in Asia. I knew nothing about EC until reading this article, but huh, someone watched what my grandma/and great grandma (yes, I still remember she was still alive when I was a tot) did and wrote it up in a book and sold millions of copies!! I missed the boat! (by the way, I lived in a first world city in Asia. indoor plumbing, toilets, all readily available everywhere.)
Once more I am fascinated by the US mentality of commercializing and over-hyping everything when it comes to parenting, no wonder we are all confused. I myself, will defer to the experts (my parents and grandparents) for advice. Spare me some angst and the confidence that a method that has worked generation after generation, it will work for my child too.
I followed a similar method with both children, my 2nd child from 5days old. He would wake me in the night, not to feed, but to urinate. It blew my mind believe me. He was dry in the day at around 6 months, but I would never take him out to a public place without any pants on just incase. Instead of stacks of nappies in my bag (or him sitting in a disposable sack full of expanded wet gel) I took a tiny pot out for him to “go” in with a piece of cloth nappy to clean up any mess, and a plastic bag just as you would with a cloth nappy. Rarely messy however as he had really regular movements!
in the first few days of a new born babies life they are giving you all sorts of signals. Im hungry/cold/tired/thirsty…and as a parent you learn to read these signs and tune in. Well they are no different from ‘I need to pee/poop’! its just another physical sensation they are feeling and telling you about. If you dont tune in and they just do it in a nappy/diaper they make no communication distinction – just like you said to them ‘ you are walking/you are hungry/you are tired’ if you communicate to them what is happening they communicate back well before words are even on the horizon.
Dont knock it. its what millions of people have done before washing machines and disposable landfillers, and still do all over the world. They dont however all get covered in poo. I agree with Apple1, it doesnt need to be an overhyped fad, but we do need gently reminding of the possibilitis, whatever that takes.