Elimination Communication, an update

It's now been about three months since I started practicing EC with Nova most of the time.  I didn't realize until today that I hadn't blogged about it since late March.  At that point, I was washing roughly 18 diapers every day, was bleary-eyed and confused and only half settled in to our new home.  

On our trip back to America in late April, I started to discover how far we'd come.  Once I got out of the urban environment of Galway and into the woods, it became much easier to respond when Nova seemed to need to pee.  We just had to be in a place where it was all right to just stop and tinkle into the bushes.  I didn't have to work so hard at finding places to pee because the whole outdoors was at our disposal.  The warm, sunny weather helped, too.

Back in Galway, where the environment around us is all people and pavement, we need to make special detours to find places to pee -- pub toilets, occasional parks, and home are nearly the only options.  I started keeping a log of Nova's elimination patterns, which was pretty easy once I got going on it, and scheduling stops around times when I thought she would need to go.  Between that, our improved diapering system, my "catch rate" went from around 25% to about 75%, sometimes as much as 90%.  I slowly gained confidence, and I'm getting better at picking up on Nova's signals and using my own intuition.  Now I sometimes even know when she's about to go when someone else is holding her and I'm doing something else on the other side of the room.  

It's crazy, but it seems to be working.  We had about two poopy diapers in the week after we got back from America, and another one last week, just before Nova's first tooth pushed up through the gums.  Other than that, every single poo has landed in the toilet or potty (or other appropriate, easily cleaned receptacle).  She's starting to tell me when she needs to go, or at least I think she is.  I still try too hard sometimes and have to remind myself to relax, but now that we're seeing some results, now that I know that this isn't futile, it's easier to be laid back about the misses and dirty diapers.  

Last week I bought Nova a pack of tiny undies (the 2-3 year size, which are baggy on her but still fit) to wear around the house and they're the cutest thing ever.  And for now, I'm doing a lot less laundry.  I still have doubts and misgivings about EC, though, which mostly have to do with the fact that I'm the only person around here who seems to be doing it. I think that consistency is important, and I hate to leave her with someone who would leave her in a wet or dirty diaper for even a little while. I can't imagine finding a caregiver around here who would be willing and able to help her use the potty.  It's one of the major factors in my lack of interest in returning to work, although admittedly breastfeeding is also a major factor there.

It's strange to me that something so sensible, so obviously healthier for babies and the environment, can be so profoundly counter-cultural.  The average age of potty training used to be between a year and 18 months, now it's over 3 years.   And then there are all those enormous children riding around in buggies looking bored, and well able to walk.  I'll leave that for another day.

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