Accustomed Chaos™: Guest Post: Adventures in Cloth to Disposable Diapers

Starting off my new guest post series on Infant Diapering is Erin (@Jmomma07) from Emommyhood.com. Erin shares her adventures in using cloth diapers and her decision to switch to disposable diapers. Here is her adventure in her own words:

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When my second son was about 8 months old I began cloth diapering. We are a family of four on one income and the budget is very tight. I was struggling a lot with trying to stay within my grocery budget every week, so I was looking to see where I could cut things and try to save money. Honestly there is not much to cut, so I thought that eliminating the cost of disposable diapers would help. Also...I don't get out much and I really really do love my cable and didn't want to give it up. It is my form of entertainment and the one thing that could be cut. Plus, Noggin and Nick Jr are pretty popular with my kids..especially on a day where I'm sick or need to finish cooking dinner.

It took some convincing to get my husband on board because it is a chunk of change to get started. They are really not cheap, but you have to look at what you will be saving in the long run. I also thought about how I could cloth diaper my next child from day one, and by the time that child is potty trained, I will have saved big..really big. So, we made the splurge and bought the diapers. I really liked it at first, they were the cutest things and he looked adorable in them. My 3yr old who is potty trained also wore them to bed. The extra laundry and occasional scraping poo off a diaper really didn't bother me and the grocery budget had some more wiggle room.

Then, my little guy started getting horrible rashes and the diapers began to leak and repel. So, I cranked up the hot water heater and stripped the diapers with Dawn dish soap. I rinsed about 5 times until I didn't see bubbles anymore. I figured this would take care of it. Not too long after that I realized that the prescription diaper rash cream that I was using was also causing a build up. So, when he needed cream, I made sure to use a disposable liner. I stripped the diapers again. I was using regular cloth detergent after doing some research on the Internet trying to figure out what detergents were cloth diaper friendly. Free and Clear detergents are not cloth friendly and those seem to be the only kinds of detergent that will not cause my son to get an awful rash. I don't use dryer sheets with the cloth diapers, but I do with my regular laundry and the residue in the dryer was also causing a build up in my diapers. I started getting pretty frustrated with the constant leaking and changing sheets every morning.

One morning not too long ago, my 3yr old's diaper had leaked all over his bed sheets and when I picked up my 1yr old my hip got all wet because his diaper had leaked so much. My toilet then got clogged after I dumped the "contents" of my 1yr old's diaper in it and tried to flush it. It was 6am, I had already stripped a crib and a toddler bed of sheets full of urine, I was plunging a toilet, my shirt had pee on it, and my kids were whining at me for breakfast. I noticed the pile of regular laundry sitting in the kitchen being neglected because my washer was once again occupied by cloth diapers that I was trying to strip and I snapped !!! I'd had enough.

I'm going back to disposables. Do I feel bad about it ? Yes. Am I probably going to get into an argument with my husband about this ? Yes. Am I going to feel some guilt when I buy a package of disposable diapers ? Probably. I feel bad about it, and my intentions were good when I began doing this, but it has become too much. I don't want to make things more difficult financially, but adding unnecessary work and frustration to my day with my children is not going to be good for any of us. I tried it and it is just not for me. I need to try and simplify a little and stop thinking that just because I'm not working outside the home, I don't deserve for anything to be easy. Am I trying to justify my decision ? Yes. To be honest, I really have a lot of respect for all you cloth diapering mommas out there ! It is not the easiest or most convenient thing to do and a lot of you make it work ! However right now for me, I believe I'm putting my sanity first.