Eco-Pooping

TIME Magazine ran a story in their 21 January 2008 edition that “it may come as a surprise to learn that cloth diapering is making a comeback,” because, as the headline says, they are “eco-friendly and cost-conscious.”

Indeed it was a surprise! In the last few years, I have known (at least) 10 families that have had kids, including several more recently. Of these, one family tried cloth diapers – for a few weeks – before giving up in favor of the similarly environmentally conscious diapers made of recycled material (which sometimes look like you have wrapped a brown bag around your baby’s bottom).

Still, for the math challenged, one out of 10 equals 10%, and 10% is not a bad number. Not to mention that we here at TPAISI are concerned about the environment, too (although diapers were not much on our minds when that was written...). So for anyone interested in or concerned about the impact of using disposable diapers, this is an article to read. It does mention the names of a few companies, such as bumGenius and Fuzzi Bunz, that sell the newfangled diapers and related accouterments, and as anyone with a newborn, infant, or very small child will tell you: you can never have enough baby accouterments.

(As an aside, the author of this article is listed as Pamela Paul. No indicator that it’s the same Pamela Paul who wrote Pornified: How Pornography Is Transforming Our Lives, Our Relationships, and Our Families, which I reviewed back in June 2006 – but how many Pamela Pauls could there be?)

Not-Smoke On The Water

Well, it had to happen some day. Last night’s bath time was a doubly extended affair, a bath-and-shower combo. Mommy, Daddy, and our little darling were all feeling relaxed, so the usual condensed routine (scrub, rinse, play, out) was slightly extended. The baby was enjoying her time in the tub, kicking and banging her hands, experimenting with how much of a splash she could make, or trying to figure out why she couldn’t actually grab the water coming out of the spigot. She was a right prune by the end, and we were just about to call it over, when...

...She pooped. Into the bathtub. It happens she was standing (and I was holding her) so we got the full effect of the plop-plop of poop hitting the water. The first item out was a 1.5 inch chunk that proceeded to float around the tub. The majority of subsequent excretions disintegrated upon contact, at least partially. The smell was charming. And best of all: it kept coming. And coming. And coming. At one point I thought it was over; turns out, that was only the half-way point.

There’s a twist to this story, however: Daddy was in the bath with the baby. Yay! Poop for all! Mommy chased around the floaty bits, then Daddy grabbed the soap, opened the drain, and turned on the shower. Fortunately, our little girl likes the shower, and even the process of having her head under the stream doesn’t bother her much. I showered her off and handed her over to Mommy waiting with the towel, and then cleaned myself up, too.

Some people tell me that having your child poop in the tub is a rite of passage. “Passage” does seem like the right word in this context, but as for the “rite” part: if it turns out to be a once-in-a-lifetime thing, that’s OK with me!

hyPOOallergenic

For the last few weeks (ok, months) our precious one has been spitting up. A lot. With the addition of actual food, however, the spitting up evolved from regurgitated formula to regurgitated-formula-with-food. Yuck. More importantly, we worried that the spitting up was denying our little darling the nutrients she needed from the food we were feeding her. [Sidebar: Not so, according to the pediatrician. But it was somewhat after the fact that we found this out.]

Our formula had been, since early on, Enfamil Lipil. There were a few reasons for this, not least the “our closest formula to milk” label on the front, combined with the fact that Costco sells it, which makes it infinitely more affordable. With the spitting up seeming to reach new heights, we decided to switch formulas, to try something that might not trigger the same reaction (whatever it was).

We started with the canned version of Nutramigen, a hypoallergenic formula from the makers of the Enfamil Lipil. For a couple of days, she seemed a little better – but not overwhelmingly so, and, at an average of $10 per can per day, the cost was high, to put it mildly. (That would be a $300/month, for those with math issues.) If it worked, we’d likely have stuck to it, but it wasn’t foolproof. So we went looking for a hypoallergenic powdered formula to try instead.

We couldn’t find Nutramigen powder, at least not right off the bat, so we wound up with the Similac version of a hypoallergenic powder instead, called Alimentum. A word to the wise, or at least, the desperately-seeking-hypoallergenism: Alimentum is terrible stuff. It smells like dogfood, and leaves a greasy film on the inside of the baby bottle. Worse yet, when it comes back up – because, yes, regurgitation was still happening, and was now actually worse – it smells terrible, too. My recommendation: stay away from the Alimentum. [On top of which, the Similac website, under the banner of the “Welcome Addition Club,” is annoying, to boot.] Then we moved to the next logical choice, the Nutramigen powder; it was better than the Alimentum, but it’s all relative; spit-up remained fairly constant, and the smell is only a little less bad.

On the pediatrician’s orders, we moved back to the Enfamil Lipil. We have also started spacing out the feeding of food and formula differently, allowing more time in between. This has not solved the spit-up problem, but has improved it. And no matter what one might have thought of the smell of formula in the first place, the Enfamil Lipil is infinitely better than the hypoallergenic options.

What does any of this have to do with poop? Well, nothing! Except that, as always, what goes in must come out!

Back in Black (and Green)

That title almost sounds like it could be describing a swatch of plaid, no? Alas, it's not fabric we're about here, unless it's rather stained...

So at home base for TPAISI, we started introducing our lovely little one to (semi-)solid foods a few weeks ago.

On the eating side, it was slow-going for a while: it took time for the baby to get used to the whole concept of keeping the food in her mouth, tasting the flavors, and swallowing without gagging on substances with more solidity than the usual bottle-of-formula. All to be expected, certainly! And of course, there were the natural amusements: the funny face at being given sweet potato, which she didn't especially like at first; the chaos created by sneezing with a mouth full of food, which is to say, chaos for us and amusement for her; and the delightful silliness of children just learning to be silly, when (for example) doing some version of a bilabial fricative with a mouth full of applesauce seems like a keen idea.

On the (shall we politely call it) not-eating side, the effects have been different, but just as dramatic. First, there is absence - especially if the first food is rice cereal, which acts like a coagulant in the colon, and there is nothing like a constipated baby to really help set the mood for a day. Then, eventually, one achieves (hopefully) regularity again, and this is where the fun starts.

Parents of small babies, prepare yourselves: introducing solid food is traumatic. For the parent. The first horror is an olfactory one. Whatever anyone tells you about this whole process truly cannot compare to its reality, which is simply expressed in the equation:

S/mP < S/fP

Translated, for those who forgot their Physics 101, that reads as: Smell from milk-based Poop is less than Smell from food-based Poop. It's no lie. The smell will hit you, and you'll wonder whether you will ever recover.

You will recover. And then you'll look at the diaper. Depending on what you've given your beloved baby to eat, you will likely be looking at a swirl of colors; in our house, most commonly a mixture of black and green, though certain orange foods can shift the balance in one direction or the other.

Worse yet, you will learn another lesson (if you haven't already): use cream or ointment on your child's tush. When we adults use the loo, we may not give much consideration to how poop sticks to the ass. With your baby, however, you'll glean valuable insight into this interesting area of study. The short answer is: a lot. And you'll want to do something about it, lest you consume the GDP of a small nation using wipes to try to remove the poop. Whether it's Desitin, or A&D, or whatever - frankly, olive oil might do the trick! - it just helps wipe of the poop. (And check out this helpful tip from Parent Hacks.)

Because here's the bottom line: your mission and your goal is to change that diaper as fast as possible. Get it off, get the tush wiped, get the poop-covered wipe into the diaper, and roll the whole thing up as fast as you possibly can. After that, it's smooth sailing! Aside from the fact that you will be repeating this process once or twice a day for the next few years.

London Poop Is Falling Down

And I think we can probably all agree: that's a good thing.

A reader wrote in to pass along this news report from ZDNET: "Toilet-finding service offers relief," that says, in part:

On Thursday, Westminster City Council launched a new text message service that will guide Londoners and tourists to their nearest public lavatory.

Anyone who sends the word "Toilet" to 80097 will receive a reply giving details of their nearest public convenience.

Wow. I am trying to imagine such a service in New York...

Celebrity Poop: Britney Edition 2

"But a baby isn’t going to like growing up in Chez Britney, where she supposedly changes her kids’ diapers on the same white couch that she lets her little dog poop all over (we are not making this up)."

That lovely item comes directly from the VH1 Blog... (Who knew VH1 had a blog? But maybe we shouldn't be so surprised.)

Anyway, if you're a Britney-watcher, well, get a life! And if you're a Britney-watcher who already tried that, and you're still a Britney-watcher, there's more on this poop-stained couch story here -- although really, the poop-stained couch is a small detail in a much bigger (not poop-related) story...
http://www.nydailynews.com/gossip/2007/11/28/2007-11-28_britney_spears_keeps_secret_fantasy_room.html

Frosty the Poop Man

From The Canadian Press comes this report of special, pet-related gifts for the holidays - with this gem included:

According to the manufacturer, "Poop-Freeze is a specially formulated aerosol freeze spray that, upon contact, forms a frosty film on dog poop (or cat poop) to harden the surface for easy pick-up." Originally intended for those messy accidents in the house, it can be used anywhere, anytime, for more civilized canine cleanup. See www.poop-freeze.com.

Hmmm. Now, we here at TPAISI recently introduced our little five-month old to (semi-)solid foods such as peas and carrots. The results have been interesting, to say the least, and occasionally a little on the runny side. Raising the question: how would "Poop-Freeze" work on a particularly slippery diaper? If anyone investigates, do report in...

Constipated

Apologies to one and all for having been away from my doodies here for so long.

Let us get climb back on the throne, and commence anew the process of exploring all that is the poop as I see it.

To start, let's all remind ourselves of the wonder that is Wikipedia, with its explication of the Bristol Stool Scale.

Advanced Pooping

A friend brings the following site to our attention - Baby Review - and especially the story of little "Thomas Weintraub," who, seconds after birth, "opened up from both ends and hollered like hell while pinching off a trucker-sized loaf." Despite the fact that this is an image which I can safely say my life was complete without, the post, and the whole site, are quite funny.

Of course, who knows what "Thomas Weintraub's" poop will be like in a few more months. From here I can safely report that the evolution of poop is slow, but very real. Ever since we introduced formula last week, for one or two feedings a day, our little darling's poop has changed. It is both less frequent and more solid. Which seems to make her occasionally unhappy on both counts. I suppose I don't blame her; if she's been pooping liquid for the last two months, the new stuff must take a little getting used to. But it's true what people say: baby's on formula do get a little constipated, and they poop differently.

As for Baby Review, I think my favorite might just be the story of the "Pint-Sized Philistine"; maybe it's because I'm just an art person at heart?

No "P" in Our Ool

Everyone is familiar with the old "Notice there's no 'P' in our 'ool'" joke? (You can buy yourself a copy of that sign here, FYI.)

Well, apparently the residents of Utah County are having a bit of a problem with their pools this summer, and it isn't pee that's at issue.

Yes, that's right. The Salt Lake Tribune and the Daily Herald both report that Utah County is having a little issue with what the Tribune called "the infamous Cryptosporidium, a parasite that causes severe diarrhea and is transmitted through water." "Infamous," I suppose, because (as the Herald notes) "...the eggs can survive for up to a week in pool with normal chlorine levels." They are urging residents to put swim diapers on their little children, rather than just regular diapers. "She says regular diapers just won't do, to contain the poo," reports the Tribune.


Or, maybe swim somewhere else for a little while...