We made the decision before Luke was born that we would practice Elimination Communciation with him. For those of you who do not know what Elimination Communication is, you can read about it here. Anyways, we have been offering him his potty since the day we brought him home from the hospital. And he uses it! About half of his pees/poos are on the potty every day, and on a good day that we are very tuned in to one another, I can catch most of his pees and poos. This makes a big difference in the amount of diapers we are using, and since he is cloth diapered, it directly affects the amount of laundry I am doing.
However, we are not practicing EC to cut down on laundry. We are doing it because we believe that Luke has a right to eliminate in a place other than his own diaper. We realize that babies are born knowing how to signal that they need to eliminate. And we are fostering that by allowing him the chance to use a potty instead of teaching him to use his diaper. Some days he loves his potty. And some days he hates it. And that is ok. We offer him the potty and if he uses it, great, and if not, that's ok too.
EC is not infant potty training. Our child doesn't get rewards for using the potty, and he certainly is not punished for not using it. We are simply teaching him that there is an option for where he can eliminate. I find diapers to be disgusting. How gross is it to have to sit in your own pee or poop!? Babies who are EC'ed generally are diaper-free way before age two. These children are not taught to eliminate in a diaper, and therefore do not have to "unlearn" that behavior. They simply learn where they are supposed to go! If you think about it, our society ignore the cues that infants give us for elimination, thereby teaching children that they should soil their diapers. And then at the tender age of two or three, when children are just figuring out how the world around them works, we are trying to reverse what they have learned about where to eliminate! It doesn't make sense.
The diaper business is just that. A business. Big business. And the diaper companies want you to believe that children in our country (no other country in the world is as reliant on diapers as ours) NEED to be in diapers for years and years. And we buy into it! One of the men who has been most vocal about saying that children should not be forced in to using a potty, and that they will use it only when they are ready, is pediatrician T. Berry Brazelton. He is considered to be an expert in the world of diapering, but get this! He is also a consultant for Pampers. Coincidence? I think not.
In 1957, 92 percent of children were potty trained by age 18 months. In 2004, less than 25 percent of children were trained by that same age, and in fact 40 percent of children were still not potty trained at age three! What gives? Money, my friends. Money. Pampers pays Mr. Brazelton to make a blanket statement that children need to stay in diapers until they "are ready" to use a potty, and in turn, uneducated people keep right on buying the diapers and letting their children soil themselves until they are three or four or older, which puts millions and millions of dollars in the pockets of the diaper companies. The truth is that children are born knowing when they need to eliminate, and we as parents need to tune in to their cues and give them a place to do so.
Elimination Communication is a lot of work. It really is. Luke's cue is typically a short, high pitched whine. But I don't always know if his whine is because he needs to go, or if it's for something else. It's not a sure thing. But if my child is able and trying to communicate to me when he has to eliminate, and I ignore him, I don't feel I am doing my best as a parent. Do I catch all of his pees and poos? Absolutely not. Some days I barely catch any at all. But we are learning this together, and anytime we catch anything in the potty, that's one less time he has to soil himself. And that makes us both happy.
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