I’m done with diapers.

Posted on by Suzanne Hemming
Dear Daughter,
 
I’ll cut right to the chase: I’m so over changing your nappy, I’m done with the diapers, it’s time for your tush to meet the toilet.
 
And let me tell you why.  Early last summer, and feeling as though the world and his wife had commented on it being time to potty train (simply because you’d passed your second birthday), we took the plunge and decided to say goodbye to nappies.  I prepared.  Really prepared, I’m a preparer.  I read books, read blogs, and spoke to other mums who’d made the successful transition to toilet trained toddler.  I thought that we had everything ready:
 
Fancy new big girl pants that you loved?  Tick.
Schedule cleared and staying home for a week?  Tick.
A potty on each floor for speed and ease?  Tick.
Reward chart made, stickers bought and a small ‘you did it!’ present planned?  Tick.
A week of relatively warm weather forecast, meaning we could spend our days in the garden, thus easier to deal with any little accidents?  Tick.
 
 
So five days from hell later, it became apparent that you just weren’t ready.  You didn’t care about being wet or dirty.  You couldn’t care less about reward stickers.  And you clearly did not recognise that feeling that you were about to go.  You just weren’t ready and actually, we were just fine with accepting that now was not your time.
 
I kept reading and discovered that many professionals felt two was still young, and that I shouldn’t worry at all – every child is different and every child gets there in their own time.  So I stopped worrying, and decided to wait and take cues from you.
 
Fast forward to now, almost a year later and quite frankly my dear, I do give a damn, and I’m done!  You’re too tall and big to lift onto our changing table at home, let alone those flimsy cantilevered pull downs you get in public places.  So we now change nappies standing up (though it’s close to impossible to pull the sticky tabs around a moving toddler properly enough to secure said nappy).  We change you lying on the floor of public toilets which as we all know is never going to be the cleanest of spaces (albeit you lie on that cocktail-napkin-sized travel-changing-mat that came with the nappy bag.  Though not wishing to offend makers of said nappy bags, I do concede that the mat didn’t seem so napkin-sized when you were a newborn…).  I have crouched and knelt and squished myself into cubicles that my ageing knees and very un-yogic inflexible body can no longer squish itself into.  I changed you on the passenger seat of our car the other week, while parked in a car park.  In the rain.  Bent over at the waist: the worst possible angle for that aforementioned ageing body of mine.  And please don’t get me started on the physiological, chemical (magical?) ability of toddler poo to seep into the skin, where the smell seems to remain, despite vigorous and continuous hand washing.
 
So I am done.  My darling: I want out from this age of nappies.
 
But.  As with everything, as I learn about being a parent, I will wait until you are ready.  I will wait until it is your time.  I will not force my timetable, and my needs onto you: that’s not my job.  My job is to be ready when you are.  And so my sweet, I’ll wait.  And in the meantime, I’ll go and do some stretches for my worn out body.  Or maybe just make another coffee.  And wash my hands again.
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4 thoughts on “I’m done with diapers.”

  1. Currently on day two of potty training, hoping that we can make it work for us. I am so with you on the trying to change them in ridiculous spaces eg the front seat of the car etc. Lets bring on the age of underwear rather than crappy nappies x

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  3. Such a familiar story for me…Maurice was 3 when we started, as he wasn’t showing any of the signs of being “ready” and it was an emotional battle for him. He said “pants don’t make me happy”. This too shall pass….good luck! x x

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