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Adventures in Part Time Baby Pottying: Elise, David, Ethan and Emma

Discover Valuable Insights in The Stories of Parents Practicing EC! How do they combine their busy modern lives with being part time nappy or diaper free?

What can your learn from someone who has a similar story to yours?

Elise, David, Ethan and Emma, in the United States…

Elise and David live in Boulder, Colorado with a son, Ethan and daughter, Emma. Boulder is the Mecca for green, organic, and progressive parenting. We began EC shortly after our children were born, using all-in-one cloth diapers. David is an security professional and Elise a nanny and a SAHM.’

“I would say that it has eased some of our terrible two issues. The reality is that much of your second or third year is spent waiting for the dreaded potty training. Parents either want to get it done and be done with diapers or they are preventing their children from potty training because they don’t want to take them to the potty all the time. We never fought that battle because my son never knew a time without a potty.”

We chose to start EC with our son at 8 weeks of age. Our paediatrician had a sceptical look, at best, when I told her. My belief is that it is natural for any animal to want to eliminate away from their bodies. We just offered him the tools to do that when possible. The first day, we sat with him over a little potty until he peed. By day two, he was hitting the potty about 1/2 the time. We watched for grunting, squirming, and straining. We were always more successful at catching the poops- but I would certainly rather wash a wet diaper than a dirty one.

We started off using disposables- but were quickly disillusioned with the waste and expense. We switched to cloth all-in-one’s around 4 months of age and used them until my son went diaper free at 15 months. My daughter started in disposables (she was a preemie) and is now in cloth.

My mom says that my son looked down one day around six months of age and had a eureka moment. It was like he realized exactly what was happening.

I would say that it has eased some of our terrible two issues. The reality is that much of your second or third year is spent waiting for the dreaded potty training. Parents either want to get it done and be done with diapers or they are preventing their children from potty training because they don’t want to take them to the potty all the time. We never fought that battle because my son never knew a time without a potty.

On another note, our little girl pooped in the potty for the first time today. She looked relieved.

Babies change so darn fast. My son caught on very quickly- within days. He would go several times a day if we caught him. Then there were phases where he was too busy to be bothered- the start of crawling or walking created a hiatus where he might potty only once a day. That was fine- our goal was for him to be comfortable and happy with the potty from an early age. We tried to go diaper free 1x per month starting at 12 months- and by 15 months, he was done with diapers.

We do not always have time to run to the potty. Considering that I have four children in the house, I think it’s a miracle when they are all dressed and fed. Anyways- we offer potty when we change diapers. We just sit the kiddo down for a couple of minutes several times per day. Often times, it works out just right. When we were most busy, he often sat down just a couple times per day- and that was fine.

We cloth diapered- so I would imagine that the impact wasn’t huge- though we only needed one size and I know it saved a couple of loads of laundry per week for a year or more.

I am always surprised how American’s view EC. They believe that babies cannot possibly understand how to eliminate away from their bodies and they feel strongly that there is a right and wrong way to do things. EC is on the fringes of parenting in a lot of ways- so it is the ‘wrong way’. There are very few places in the world where babies are encouraged to soil themselves into the third year and then told that it’s abnormal to soil themselves. That must be an incredibly confusing paradigm for young children.

Just like cloth diapering, being diaper free is not an ‘all-or-nothing’ experience. We used diapers, but we encouraged our son to sit on the potty. It is a longer process than potty training at two or three years old, but I feel that children feel empowered and learn to know their own bodies through this process.

We were unsure of whether we would practice EC with my daughter because she is a preemie. We did start her later (5 months old)- but she is now successfully pooping in the potty almost daily.

Elise.

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