I am going to make an announcement today. A revelation that might not make me any friends and may hurt my credibility as the Most Awesome Mother ever, but it’s time to stop living a lie. I cannot deceive you any longer.

I have failed at cloth diapering.

To be honest, the only reason I tried it was because it was trendy and cute and I convinced myself we could, I don’t know, take a trip to Paris or something with all the money we were going to save. Although if we DID save enough money to go to Paris I certainly wouldn’t want to carry around crap-filled pants the whole time. That right there should clue you in on how dedicated I was to cloth diapering. It was more “awwww, look at the polka dots!” and less “I love being environmentally responsible and making wise choices!” I’m kind of shallow.

It’s a shame, really, because I DO think cloth is a great way to go. I loved not having to buy disposables all the time and gloated a little bit at every person I saw with a whole cart full of Pampers at the warehouse store. Using cloth prevents so much trash and waste from going into landfills. You avoid all the weird chemicals in disposables, especially the kind that gave Little Evan a horrible rash. Using cloth does save money, especially when you use them for multiple kids – which, hey, sounds perfect for me! I have multiple kids!

But. The poop. OH MY GOD SO MUCH POOP.

My slow slide away from cloth started with the morning sickness. Getting pregnant directly coincided with Little Evan weaning, which meant no more nice, easy breastfed poops. Instead, my toddler started producing GIANT SMELLY MAN SIZED CRAP. The kind I could barely stand to be in the same zip code with, let alone carry around until I could shake it out into a toilet. And if it was…sticky? Forget about it. Anything that required the diaper sprayer also required 20 minutes of heaving into the toilet thanks to my insane sense of smell and hair-trigger gag reflex. AREN’T YOU DYING TO HEAR MORE ABOUT THIS?

So we used disposables. Then the night time peeing got totally out of hand and going back to cloth would have resulted in even MORE soaked PJ’s and sheet changes. We bought another box of Luvs. And another. Then my cloth stash started to smell sort of…weird so I had plans to strip them all and sort the ones I could use with the new baby into her dresser. I totally Googled “how to strip your cloth diapers” and everything. But I was tired and still didn’t feel so well and wasn’t really interested in doing anything that would create more laundry for myself so I never did.

Do you want to hear MORE excuses? KIDNEY STONES. Boom. Hard to enforce the cloth diaper use from the hospital.

Now, with two in diapers and no end to that scenario in sight, I feel like all I do ALL DAY is look at dirty butts. Pooping is Caroline’s only real skill right now so she’s decided to dedicate herself to what she’s good at. It is not at all uncommon for her to poop immediately after a diaper change, only to do it AGAIN after the next one. That’s three poops in less than 5 minutes, which, multiplied by 5 times a day means I would need approximately EIGHTYBAZILLIONTEEN baby-sized diapers to avoid several loads of laundry daily. It doesn’t help that Little Evan is apparently competing for the title of Poop Champion and is no longer on the twice-a-day schedule.

So. Much. Poop.

I think once Caroline gets a little older I might switch her back to cloth. I really did like it for the 4 months I did use them. And when we start *ACK* potty training Little Evan I think the cloth might be a good transition between disposables and underpants. Because I still have all these diapers. And they do save money. And they are super cute. And I do like being a cloth diaper mom.

But for now, please accept my apology for not being quite as crunchy as I used to be.

Back in April when I finally decided to switch to cloth diapers I was SO EXCITED, partly because I knew it was the eco-friendly, responsible choice…but also a little because I was finally going to be part of the cool kid’s diaper club, where everyone knew what AIO and AI2 and pre-fold and PUL and insert and pocket meant. I thought maybe someone would even teach me the secret handshake.

Turns out the handshake is just my EW EW EW EW EW! reaction to getting poop on myself AGAIN and I still don’t know what all the abbreviations mean. Luckily, it turns out you don’t have to know all that stuff to use cloth diapers, especially if you’re like us and still haven’t switched full time. It’s not an all-or-nothing experience and every cloth diaper I use is one less disposable in a landfill – and one more adorable fluffy butt I get to squeeze.

Our experience so far:

The good:
– The Katydids are my favorites by far, both because they’re super easy to use and because they’ve never leaked. I stopped using both inserts all the time and they still hold a whole morning full of pee. I also love that they’re easy to carry with me in my (admittedly huge) diaper bag – just once piece & easy to stuff in the wet bag.
– I also really like the one Happy Heiny and one Swaddlebee diaper we have. I’ve quickly learned that pocket diapers or all-in-ones are my favorite and would switch to them full time if I had a budget that allowed me to stock up.
– E has figured out how all our diapers work and will voluntarily put them on Baby Evan as long as they’re stuffed, stacked and available next to the changing table. Most of the time.
– My biggest fear – the WASHING – has been easy-peasy. I use Charlie’s Soap for the diapers and All Free & Clear for the rest of our laundry and haven’t had any trouble with build-up. I also really love hanging my diapers out on the clothes line. Which I know makes me a weirdo.

The bad
-We can’t bring ourselves to give up the disposables at night or when we travel. For a while Baby Evan was doing all his pooping at night, which made a disposable just too tempting. Now it’s just because I know he won’t wake up at 2 am screaming for a diaper change because he’s wet. We also used disposables this weekend when Baby Evan’s teething/new foods diaper rash got out of control and we went through a tube of Desitin every day. I haven’t found something that works as well and is safe for cloth.
– As much as I WANT to love my adorable GoodMamas, the extra step of using a cover makes me sort of dread them. They work great, my new Thirsties Duo covers work great, they really are NOT THAT HARD…but in my diaper stash they’re my second to last choice (last choice being regular old-fashioned pre-folds, which I have yet to even try, despite having 3 dozen stripped and ready to go).
– Although our diaper sprayer does get the poop off the diapers, it also gets the poop on the toilet, the walls, the floor and the person spraying the diaper. Maybe we just have really high water pressure. Maybe we are just not smart enough to do it right. It doesn’t really matter when tiny bits of poop are flying ALL OVER YOUR FACE.

The ugly
– I picked just about the WORST TIME EVER to make this switch. Not only did Baby Evan finally start eating solid food regularly, he started eating meat. If you haven’t had the joy of smelling meat-fed baby poop yet you’re a lucky, lucky person. These diapers are GROSS. The fewer seconds I have to look at or smell the poop the less likely I am to puke on the changing table. It doesn’t help that my super-power-strength sense of smell (thanks pregnancy!) is at an all time high. I can smell a dirty diaper from 30 yards and have to hold my nose when I toss my diaper pail bag in the machine. I’m reallyreallyreallyreally looking forward to trying full-time cloth with a new, exclusively breastfed baby whose poop doesn’t make me throw up in my mouth.

So to sum up: Good change, poor timing. I’m definitely going to keep using cloth at least part-time, and hope to switch to full-time in the future. Anyone have any newborn/small/medium sized all-in-ones or pocket diapers they’re looking to unload?

(Oh! AND! If you’re one of those people who have no interest in switching to cloth but had trouble with a certain diaper brand that may or may not have caused ugly chemical burns on some babies – including ours – may I recommend Luvs? I know, right, who uses Luvs?!?! We needed some disposables for our vacation a few weeks ago and they were the cheapest option at BJ’s so I picked up a box. They work great! They don’t smell funny! The box says something about a money-back guarantee although I know nothing about that! This endorsement is in no way sponsored by Luvs – they don’t know me from a hole in the wall – but my dislike of a certain other brand makes me want to support companies that don’t give my baby a horrible rash.)