Note: This post is all about poop, in fact the word is mentioned at least 20 times below. So if reading about poop or the word “poop” makes you uncomfortable, you may want to stop right here.
I think newborn breast-milk poop serves lots of purposes. It’s obviously a great indication that your precious newborn’s insides are working correctly. And with its non-offensive, slightly sweet smell and watery consistency, it’s a good introduction to poopy diapers for first time parents. Once you’ve mastered newborn poopy dipes, gotten a couple of blowouts under your belt and changed diapers in public restrooms, then, and only then, does Mother Nature throw you a curveball and introduce you to the real-deal, no joke, solid poop.
Though I’m not a first-time mom, I am a first-time cloth diaperer, so I think the newborn poop’s purpose in my life over the past few months was to acclimate me to washing diapers and to desensitize me to the fact that poop was in my washing machine. Oh yeah, and to prepare me to handle said real-deal, no joke poop in cloth diapers.
I have to admit, I didn’t do so much as rinse the newborn poop diapers before putting them in the pail and eventually in the washing machine. And everything washed out beautifully. Never a stink and rarely a stain. But now that my daughter is eating solid foods on a regular basis (and loves carrots and peas more than anything), her poop is the colorful, stinky, big girl poop that cannot be ignored until wash day.
The first time I encountered one of these little surprises, I had a slight moment of panic. Then I reminded myself that thousands of you out there handle this all the time and so could I. So while my mom watched, smirking, I just sort of flicked, jiggled and used a little toilet paper to knock the poop into the toilet. Success! Next, I dunked it a few times and flushed, using the force of the flush to knock off the rest. A final flush and voila, the poop went where it belongs and the diaper had only a few traces of the yucky stuff. A good wringing into the toilet and a REALLY good hand washing (okay, two or three) and the poop was only a memory.
That was a week or two ago and the jiggle-dunk-flush method has worked for me until now. But I really could live without submerging my entire hand in poopy toilet water every couple days, so I am now the proud owner of a diaper sprayer. Yay! The problem is that it is sitting in my bathroom, waiting for my husband to install (or for me and my little entourage to find the time and patience to do it). Sigh. So, until it’s installed, I will jiggle-dunk-flush the poop away. Once I get the sprayer hooked up, I will definitely let you all know how it compares.
And in the meantime, here’s to newborn poop for breaking us in slowly.
How do you deal with real deal poop?
Sarah is a mom of two and blogs about her adventures in motherhood, cloth diapering and everything in between. Catch her “Cloth Diapering Unwrapped” series on the FuzziBunz blog every Tuesday.
