Potty talk: our diapering adventures aboard

I’ve hesitated to talk about what we are doing on the pottying front, mostly because parents are notorious for talking about their children’s bodily functions way too much. But I figured some people might have questions about babies and diapering aboard. So if this doesn’t interest you in the least bit, you can skip this one and follow our dinghy saga instead.

Right now we’re taking a multi-pronged approach to O’s diapering needs. We have flat indian diapers from our landlubber days. They are thicker and more absorbent than the Chinese prefolds. Those are paired with Bummis and Imse Vimse diaper wraps. We also have a half dozen pocket diapers (our favorites are Bum Genius) for convenience and some disposables for nighttime.

But our main focus is on EC’ing (“Elimination Communication”). The results have been a mixed bag.

We’ve been EC’ing V since she was only a few weeks old. In the pictures above, she is about nine months. With two adults on one baby, it worked out well for us. By one and a half, she was out of diapers during the day. And by two, she nighttime potty trained herself. This is not to brag or anything, that’s just how she rolled.

With O, it’s been a bit slower. It could be because he’s a boy, or because there’s only one half-vigilant adult watching two kids now. At any rate, it’s been a longer slog through pottyland with him. At one point, we had 95% of the number two’s down, but recently we’ve had a regression and a potty strike. All our EC’ing resources say to not make a big deal of it…so we soldier on. I’m getting new books to spice up potty time, and V gets in on the action and reads to O. Heck, I even entice him with treats on the potty (I never did that with V!). But in the end, he will do it on his own timeline.

As for washing our diapers, we cheat. We use the laundry at our house. And sometimes our good friend lets us use his laundry machine. We haven’t exactly figured out how to wash the diapers when we are underway.

But O’s gonna have to pitch it…get ’em clean, little man!

Resources

5/21/12 update: Little man, now 20 months, made the leap to undies during the day, yah! We still use pocket diapers during naps and disposables at night. 

2 Replies to “Potty talk: our diapering adventures aboard

  1. Diaper-schmiper… that little guy is so stinking cute! Don’t beat yourself up. He is on a very “normal” track. V was what we call exceptional. We have had a similar comparison with language. Zach started saying words at 9 months and by the time he was 16 months (where Naia is now) he was fully speaking. Naia is still all alien babble with a few semi-recognizable words or phrases thrown in. It’s not that she is behind, we realize in hind sight that Zach was way ahead in the language game. We thought it was “normal” because he was our first and we had nothing to guage against. So, go easy on the little guy. I know it would rock to have him out of dipes by the time you cast off… he’ll get there!

  2. So I read a book where they tied the cloth diapers to a rope and let it trail behind them for a while. When they pulled them in they were very clean. By the time I have a boat my daughter will hopefully be out of diapers but I thought to use the idea for other types of cloth cleaning.

    ~shawna

    PS. I have a blog for my daughter and talk about poop constantly because its a hot topic in my life and I’m crass like that.

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