Oh, for the love of fluff ...

Have you ever had a diaper panic? Not a noble, rational type of motherly panic, like, "Oh no, I didn't pack enough diapers in the bag for our visit to Aunt Mabel's!"--I'm talking about the totally selfish, fluff-loving, addict's kind of panic! I had just such a moment last week, and I'm embarrassed to say just what type of desperate measures it had me going to.

I have to begin by saying that I hate toilet dunking. The thought of having to dunk, swish, and rinse cloth diapers in the toilet was nearly enough to scare me off of CDing--until I found out about sprayers and liners, that is! Can you really blame me, though? When I was pregnant with Baby A, I spent a full four months hovering over that porcelain throne at least twice daily (at home, at work, at the mall, wherever), spilling my guts at all times of the day and night. When you get so accustomed that that type of horrific view, perhaps you think you would become desensitized to being so close to that dingy bowl, but no--if anything, it only made me loathe the toilet even more. Now, anything making me hover above a toilet and assume that type of position (facing it for any reason!) makes me feel a queasy revulsion just by association. So, for that reason, I was certain I'd never, ever, under any circumstances reach in and do the swish.

I'm sure you see where this is going ... ;)

Now, up til now, I've had a good thing going in terms of diaper cleanup. I've been using a dry pail from day one (with EBF diapers) and was loving the simplicity of that 'toss and forget about it' method. Now that we're onto solids, I knew things would be getting slighly more complicated, but up til now I've been able to use liners to make things easy to dispose of.

The other day, however, I had just received and prepped a new diaper for review. I would be posting photos of this diaper (on my other website) alongside its review, and I was loving how cute and soft it looked. So, just to tempt fate, I thought I would put it on my daughter for just a moment to see how it fit her. I wasn't intending to keep it on her for more than just a minute or two as I still hadn't photographed it looking clean and new for the review (I take pictures of the liner, waist, gussets, etc). I really should have known better!

Well, wouldn't you know it--she had it on for a mere minute or less when she decided to unleash within it something too horrid to speak of. I hadn't laid a liner in it, of course, because I hadn't intended her to wear it for any real duration of time. I sat by, wide-eyed and helpless, holding my breath and willing the mess to be minor.

When the coast seemed clear, I peeled back the velcro and saw that of course, as Murphy's Law would have it, there was something funky in there the likes of which I'd never seen before! And suddenly, my rational mind flew out the window! I forgot my diva-ish ways, my traumatic puking memories, and all the rest of it. I had that diaper off her little bum so fast, and I flew down the hallway to the nearest bathroom. Before I knew what I was doing, I chucked the entire dipe into the toilet bowl in a desperate act to save it from staining. After all, no careful amount of scraping or flicking could have dealt with that fiasco.

A moment later, I regained my sanity as I stood above the toilet gazing down into the very literal mess that I had gotten myself into. There in the murky waters, my brand new diaper sunk to the bottom of the bowl, waterlogged.

So, what would you have done?

I didn't! Oh, yes I did. It had to be done.

Bare-handed, I plunged my way in after it. I swished and dunked and rubbed and wrung that diaper until I thought it seemed like it was in the clear from staining. I looked down at my girly little hands, amazed I had just done such a rank thing, and all for the sake of ... saving a cute diaper! Oh, the vanity! Ha!

After a few flushes, rinses, and wrings, I carried the soggy little package back to the diaper pail and dropped it in, feeling satisfied that I had done my darndest. A day and a half later, as the little AIO came out of the laundry, gleaming, I smirked, guarding my own tiny secret as I photographed the cute little diaper for public review. I vowed to myself that I would never, ever, as long as I lived, expose what I had done in such a time of frenzied, fluff-crazed desperation...

...except perhaps here, on my blog ;)

so, how far have you gone for your fluffy love affair? ;)

The Big Blowout

Every once in a while, I think it will be a fun thing to have us share personal stories with one another--it helps us to remember that we are all just real moms out there, struggling and moving through humorous, trying, and tender moments on our own. Here's the topic for today:

What is your worst ever diaper blowout story?

I'll relay mine to you here in the posts and hope we get a ton of comments back. Let's face it--these tales were horrific at the time but are some of our funniest tales to recount now that they're in the distant past. Let's all have a good chuckle at the universality of this inevitably terrible baby moment ;)

I was home alone with Baby Aurelia, who was about three months old at the time, a preciously tender little bundle that I nearly had attached to me at all times. We were still nursing all the time as she was an exclusively breastfed baby, and we had not yet purchased any nice diapers but were using these homemade hand-me-down flannel fitteds that came from a friend of a friend of mine. Their leg elastics pretty much non-existant from being so ill-fitting and stretched out, they tried my patience but I tried to make do with wrap-style covers to contain those oozy baby poos. We often had leaks, and I scrubbed a lot of yellow stains by hand. Nevertheless, this one blowout moment really takes the cake.

I was sitting on the couch with baby falling asleep across my lap, having just finished nursing. I started to hear and feel a bit of rumbling down there and knew a diaper change was imminent. This would be the first messy diaper change for us in about 8 days as she just was not having soiled diapers all that often (her doctor said this is normal for an EBF baby). In the back of my mind, I knew it would probably be pretty bad, but I could have had no idea. I decided to give it two minutes to make sure she was "finished" before carrying her upstairs to the change table.

About thirty seconds into my waiting period, I began to feel that warm dampness spreading on my thigh and knew that waiting was no longer a viable option. I picked her up and she looked content and very sweet in her cutest ever brand new set of sleepers from Grandma. I held her close against my white t-shirt as we walked up the stairs to the change table. The instant I set her down on the change table, I knew we were in for a doozy. The entire front of my white t-shirt was a yellow smear. More than half of her sleeper set, previously a sweet, soft blue color, was now a funky green. I looked down at my favorite pair of jeans. There were drips of yellow run-off all the way down the leg and onto my sock. I looked back at her, smiling happily on the change table, and stared in shock at her, up and down. The attached foot on one of her sleeper legs was completely, totally filled up with poop. It was sagging like there was a heavy golf ball in the end of the toe! I think I screamed out loud a little--how would I deal with this?

Obviously, everything got stripped off and thrown in a basin for the scrub of its life. Baby got wiped down with about half a pack of wipes before going straight into the bathtub (smiling all the way!). I was stripped down to my bra and underwear by this point too, having started to feel some seepage through my own clothes. It took about half an hour, but I finally got myself, Aurelia, and the change table area cleaned up. Then I went downstairs.

I was horrified to see what I had missed earlier--every second stair of the carpeted staircase I had walked up had drips of yellow leading back to the scene of the crime. I spent a further half an hour scrubbing the carpet free of any remaining mess.

Of course, the minute I was giving my hands their good final rinse, my phone rings. It was my husband, on his coffee break at work. "Hey honey," he began, "Whatcha up to?"

"You don't want to know..." I laughed.

We jokingly refer back to that day now as the "poonami" ;) I just thank my lucky stars that despite everything that happened, at least we were at home!

Please leave your hilariously horrific stories in the comments section as well! ;)