(Warning: This post contains the words pee and poop more than some may be comfortable with.)
We started elimination communication (or infant potty training) when Nathan was about 3.5 months. I feel like we are about to take a major turn in this process as he begins to crawl, communicate nonverbally through pointing or signing, and communicate verbally. So I wanted to make some notes about our elimination communication experience with a non-communicative baby.
From birth to about six or seven weeks, we only used disposable diapers with Nathan. Many times during this period, he would cry for “no” reason; we would change his barely-peed-in, just-changed-10-minutes-ago diaper after trying everything, and he would stop crying. He didn’t do this as much when we started the Fuzzi Bunz (the fleece cover wicks away the moisture so that he feels dry).
From Diaper-Free Baby by Christine Gross-Loh, I learned that babies pee really frequently (as much as every 20 minutes when they are newborns), that they pee more frequently in the morning than the afternoon, and that they usually wake at least partially to pee when they are sleeping. All of these facts helped me get an idea of where to start with E.C. I started taking Nathan to pee immediately after he woke from a nap or in the morning; I would give him the cue (“psss”) until he peed. We also started doing diaper-free time every now and again to get an idea of how often he went, how long after nursing, etc. Diaper-free time also helped us see if he gave any indication in his body language that communicated he needed to go. We learned that many times when he was active (most of the time), he would get really still just before peeing. We also learned that when you held him, he would squirm and fuss just before he needed to go. Diaper-Free Baby also said that babies, who are usually content in slings and wraps, will squirm when they need to pee. Apparently, babies like to have their space when they need to go, and we found that to be true with Nathan.
It took me awhile to catch his first poop, and even that was an accident. Once I started noticing his signals to pee, they were relatively easy to pick up. Some days, I would catch at least half his pees in the toilet. I couldn’t, however, seem to get his poop signals in time to get him to the toilet. After a few times of accidentally catching a poop when taking him to pee, Nathan started pooping every single morning as soon as he woke up. Before this, his poop had absolutely no pattern whatsoever. He would poop a total of 2 to 4 times a day from 3.5 to about 6 months, and most of them had no pattern except for the one first thing in the morning. I gradually picked up his signals for poop (stillness, furrowed eyebrows, soft grunting), and it became really easy for me to recognize when he was about to go and get him to the toilet.
When he was about 6 months, it seems like we had a little breakdown in communication. Babies’ digestive systems mature during this time, so I think that may have been a factor (he wasn’t as uncomfortable when he needed to go, so his signals were more subtle). We were also in the process of moving to our cabin, so I think I was distracted. We didn’t really do diaper-free time with him anymore, and he stopped pooping first thing every morning. We missed a bunch of poops for a couple weeks, but we started noticing different signals (heavy breathing, stomach grumbling, passing gas).
From 7 months to present, we only take him to pee every morning and after naps, but I stopped trying to figure out other times he was going. Now I’m sort of waiting until he can indicate more clearly that he needs to go to start taking him more frequently. Most of his poops go in his little potty. Sometimes he will still go while in the carseat, or I will miss the first little bit of poop before getting him on the potty.
Around 6 months, we started recognizing that he really understood the cue. One morning, Gus sat him on the potty in the morning and forgot to cue him. He waited about five minutes and told me that he probably had already went in his diaper. I reminded him to use the cue, and Nathan peed immediately after Gus said “psss.” Similar things have happened several times since then.
When he was about 7 months, I put him in a pre-fold diaper with a pre-fold belt one afternoon when we were running low on cloth diapers and I didn’t feel like going to my parents’ house to wash them. This is sort of like diaper-free time because I am able to cue him as soon as he goes as you can see the diaper getting wet as he is peeing. It also gives him somewhat of the same effect as diaper-free time because he can feel the wetness more than he can with Fuzzi Bunz, and since there is no cover on the pre-fold, I think he also feels like he isn’t wearing a diaper (at least compared to the security of the Fuzzi Bunz). While he was playing, he started fussing and army-crawling to the potty. I had just taken him off the potty about 5-10 minutes before, and he didn’t go. So I assumed that he was fussing for some other reason. I was sitting right next to the potty, so I picked him up to see if he just wanted to be held. He continued to squirm and fuss, trying to leap out of my arms toward the potty. I put him on the potty, and sure enough, he peed. And then he did this two more times in the 1.5-2 hours he was in the pre-fold.
I’m not sure if Nathan pees because he wakes up or if he wakes up because he needs to pee. Sometimes at night I know he is waking because he needs to pee because I can tell by the half-asleep squirms. For naps, he fully wakes to pee. When we started E.C. at 3.5 months, I took him to pee when he woke up even if it was only after 30 minutes of napping. I noticed that when I took him to pee, he would go back to sleep almost immediately after going back to bed. He would not go back to sleep when I let him pee in his diaper, though. I have a theory that the uncomfortable feeling of wetness in the moments right after peeing in his Fuzzi Bunz before it soaked into the insert would wake him more fully than when I took him to go in the toilet.
In the last few weeks, his napping and poop patterns have been noticeably linked. He usually poops in the morning, sometime before his first nap. He naps from about 9 to 10:30/11 but usually wakes one time for a few minutes to look around about an hour into the nap. If he has not pooped before his nap that morning, he will not go back to sleep when he wakes up in the middle of his nap. Sometimes he still won’t poop for another half hour, but I can tell that he is thinking about going and he will not go back to sleep. He also poops before his second nap from 1:30-3:30/4 and does the same thing if he does not poop before the nap. He also will not go to sleep if he needs to poop. I always know he is about to poop when he is on the verge of sleep and suddenly flips from his side to his back wide awake.
Before we started E.C., I just assumed babies just leaked all night. One night when he was 5.5 months, he peed in the potty just before going to bed at 7. He woke up when we came to bed at 11, and we took him potty again. He woke up at 4 and peed again in the toilet, and again when we woke up at 7. His diaper stayed dry all night. We usually don’t take him in the middle of the night, though, but now it doesn’t seem too scary once we master the days.
I am hoping to really start working with him more in the coming months. We keep our cabin a little cold, but in the afternoons the sun really heats it up. I end up taking off his pants in the afternoon anyway, so I’m going to try to do diaper-free time with him consistently. I’m hoping by his first birthday to use less diapers and only wash a load every 4 to 7 days instead of every 2 to 3, and I’m hoping to be brave enough to start using trainer underwear at least for a few hours during the day. From the way things are going now, I don’t think it is too presumptuous to hope that he will be completely trained by 18 months if not before.
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