"Oh, you young mothers...You have no idea!"

These are the words I heard author Dean Hughes say at a Time Out for Women conference that I went to in Spokane a few years ago. He was relating a story from his book of reflections, "All Moms Go to Heaven" and telling us about the summer he spent as a mom in 1973. When he got to the part about having to change his baby boy's cloth diapers the above subject is basically what he said. In his book it's written as, "You young mothers don't know what we used to go through." I am here to say...HOORAY FOR DISPOSABLE DIAPERS!

Rebecca has been struggling with diaper rash recently and a few weeks ago it was really bad. No matter what I did or what remedy I tried it just wasn't clearing up. The expensive diaper rash cream wasn't doing it's job. Letting her little bum "air out" was only resulting in accidents on the carpet. So I tried something I'd done with Samantha before.

Samantha had a horrible case of diaper rash once as a toddler and my mom recommended trying some cloth diapers to let her skin "breathe" a little better. We were visiting Montana at the time and figured anything was worth a shot to help our visit go better. We bought the cloth diapers, put one on Samantha, and then it came time to change her. AAUUUUUUUGGHH! I about died when my mother helped me get my squirmy girl out of the soiled one and then proceeded to tell me that what happens next is taking it over to the toilet and swirling it around in the water to clean it off! WHAT?! You mean you don't just fold it up and get rid of it? You've got to rinse it and flush multiple times to get it all off so you can wash it? Eeeeew. Gross.

Anyway, as you can see by the pictures, Rebecca also got the cloth diaper treatment. I had to remember how to get it on her so it would stay securely and without poking her with the safety pins. She peed through that one in no time and the process was repeated. I had to get the icky diapers into the next wash load I could before they got yuckier than they already were. Not fun.

It helped a little and Rebecca's cute little behind is doing much better thanks to time, perseverence, and plenty of baby powder, which seemed to help the most this time. (Cures always vary for my kids...)

In his book Dean Hughes talks about all this in greater detail. He mentions dealing with the smell of ammonia that builds up from the wet diapers, the times his other kids flushed a soiled diaper down the toilet before he could finish putting a clean one on the baby, having to decide whether to drag all the kids out or not to the clothes line to hang the clean diapers up to dry, forgetting the soiled diaper on the floor before he got it rinsed out and the unfortunate mess that happened as a result, and more. Blech.

So, I'm sorry if it's bad for the environment to use the disposable diapers nowadays and that all the diapers I've used on my kids could stretch to the moon and back hundreds of times. Just the same, it's a beautiful thing now to take care of the diapers "quick and dirty." ;o)

And to all the mothers of the former generation, including my own, bless you for doing that. Sainthood is deserved.



Isn't she adorable?