"Elimination" what now??

All pregnant women want all the info they can possibly soak up before the little one gets here and with the Internet it seems the "What the expect" Bible (as so many people told me I NEEDED to have and no, I don't have one) is all but obsolete now! Google has become the new best friend to everyone and I don't know who utilizes google more than a newly pregnant or new mommy (or daddy... I have caught Mr googleing a few baby related things since She has arrived). But the Internet can be a scary place! During my pregnancy I Googled LOADS of things and during my searches on natural parenting choices I stumbled upon several things that I thought, ok that is just weird and hmmm maybe we will give that a shot. One of the "weird" topics was known as "Elimination Communication". Sounds complicated huh?

So I became intrigued and searched more... even found and flipped through a book I found at my favorite local health food store. But even after all that reading I decided then that I am just not that crunchy. (And speaking of crunchy, when did breastfeeding and cloth diapering become "crunchy") So the whole idea behind this "Elimination Communication" (or EC as its known in the Internet world) is that your baby from the second she is born tells you when she needs to go potty! Look here for more info I laughed at this thought while pregnant and giggled at the pictures in that book which depicted a woman holding a yogurt cup (empty of course) up to her babies bum to collect poo. How weird I thought.... what would possess a parent to try this? Well the EC world says that you are successful if you just avoid the usage on one diaper a day. I cloth diaper so for me its not like EC would save the environment from a diaper or anything.... just that I would be washing one less diaper. And really, in the great scheme of things, what's one more diaper!

When baby was only a few hours old we learned that OH YES babies can tell you when they need to go! We still crack up at the big production a poop is for our little one! Breast milk poo is pretty much pure liquid with some seedy stuff thrown in there but for some reason my little monkey still makes the face and the grunt and the sigh. She also only goes maybe once a day or even once every couple of days, which is normal for breastfed babies. Its normal for them to go with every feed or to only go every once in a while... this is because breast milk is digested more completely. Anywho, Often this face-grunt-sigh production happens several times before poo actually happens. Mr and I often take this time to talk to our little one and laugh at her silliness which usually makes her smile and laugh until BAM!!!! And I say BAM because it shoots out at mach 10 speed which we discovered last week when I was changing her and she apparently was not finished (she hadn't pooped in 2 days I guess she had a lot in there!) and it shot out and hit me square in the chest! Oh yea, she has range and pretty good aim! Caution new parents... this can happen to you! Wait til they are done before trying to change!

So two months of watching this whole big poop production and laughing about how its so obvious when she needs to poop I remember hey, there are crazy people out there who have their baby poop in yogurt cups and such. Well after the other day I know for sure my little angel's poop is so NOT fitting in a yogurt cup! hahahaha But it occurs to me... maybe we can try this and then I think, Oh God no.... I have become one of the crazies! And I am here to tell ya that as of this morning I am now one of those crazies! We woke up this morning belly to belly nice and happy (did I mention we co-sleep? no, we'll talk about that later) and I sat her up on my chest and we were talking and sharing a cute mother daughter moment when face-grunt-sigh! and I had a scary thought, its been 2 days! this is going to be bad! So laughing and talking to my little one, who is doing more grunting, face-making and sighs, I get up and bring her to our master bathroom. It took a moment to figure out how to position she and I so that we both didn't end up in the toilet itself! We have a 2 month old, the thought of one of those little potty seats hasn't occurred to me until now. So after some adjustment I get us both in a good angle (me kneeling facing the thrown and holding baby by the legs with her back against my chest hovering over the potty) and she continues her face-grunt-sigh until BAM!  We have success! And thank goodness I chose to attempt this then because there was no diaper on the face of this planet (or yogurt cup for that matter!) that could have handled that! She finished with a giggle and she and I then took a bubble bath!

Baby is now passed out on my chest (hey a poop like that will make anyone need a nap!) smelling like baby soap with super soft skin! I don't think I am going to be doing it all the time but hey, why not! She makes it very easy to try by being so obvious when she has to go. "Real" EC parents will say that you can tell even when your baby needs to pee. I am not sure about that for us yet but we do know when she needs to poop. I wonder if this will help us when potty training time comes! I am just a normal semi-crunchy mom and I never expected to try EC but I must say I don't know why I thought it was so silly. Maybe I was thrown off by the yogurt cup idea but now I don't see the big deal. I know she has to poop so why not let her do it where the rest of the family does! I don't think I will get too crazy into this but I don't see why I cant do it occasionally.

So other mommies out there... give it a shot... what's the worst that can happen? You save yourself a diaper or some laundry?