I have to ask this question…

A couple of nights ago, Gavin pooped in his sleep.  It’s been a long time since he’s managed to do that without waking up.  I think the last time it happened he was still exclusively on breastmilk and it was usually pretty easy to nurse him back to sleep after changing his diaper.  Now that he’s one, it’s a little hard getting him back to sleep after waking him to change his diaper, hence my hesitation to change his diaper when I got wind that he’d pooped (pardon the pun).  In the end, I woke him up to change his diaper and spent the next hour getting him back to sleep.  It made me wonder if I should have let him continue sleeping and change his diaper after he woke up.

I’ve read that it is okay to let a baby continue sleeping in a soiled diaper and change only after the baby wakes up, but I sort of had this idea that they were talking about urine only.  The idea of letting Gavin sleep in a poopy diaper seemed rather horrible and yet, if I hadn’t realised that he’d pooped, he would have continued sleeping in his soiled diaper.  The only difference is that I would have been guilt free that I didn’t change his diaper earlier because I would have been none the wiser.

So what would you do if your one year old pooped in his diaper while he was sleeping?  Would you change his diaper as soon as you discovered he pooped, or would you wait until he woke up before changing?

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If I didn’t know better, I would think that my one year old’s idea of amusement is to wake Mummy and Daddy up at three in the morning and watch us scramble out of bed while he attempts to poop into his diaper before we get him to the toilet.  After being a regular morning pooper for quite some time, Gavin seems to have done a hundred and eighty degree turn with his bowel movements.  He now poops at anytime of the day and at any place.  Unbelievable!

Here’s the little tyke looking rather pleased with himself:

I guess when you can smile groggily and share your child’s amusement instead of having to squelch an irresistible urge to flush him down the toilet with his poop, then you know you’re starting to take parenthood in stride.  Indeed, I reckon every child carries a secret weapon - cuteness.  If these little tykes weren’t so cute, I’m sure the human race would have long gone into extinction.

One of my anatomy lecturers once explained that nature had planned it all this way so we wouldn’t be able to help ourselves but want to nurture and care for these little people.  It is no mistake that the cute factor correlates with having a larger skull to face ratio - which is exactly what all babies are born with (the cranium being 80% developed at birth, compared to the face which is only about 20-25% if I recall correctly). 

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Those of you who have been following this blog may recall that I practice EC - elimination communication (also known as IPT, infant potty training, and NIH, natural infant hygiene) - with Gavin.  It is basically an early form of toilet training for babies.  Although I haven’t succeeded in effectively training him to pee into the toilet (even up until now), I have been able to help him poop into the toilet whenever I realise that he needs to go.  However, the poop sessions up until recently have usually be hits and misses.  If his poop is too loose, I occasionally miss the signs and it ends up in his diaper. 

Last night, Gavin waited for me to get him to the toilet.  He knew I would take him and he held on!  It was a proud moment for Mummy.  Okay, so the timing that he chose to poop could have been better - he decided at 3:30am in the morning that he needed to poop!  I heard the unmistakable grunts so I took him to the toilet.  I asked him if he needed to poop.  He had stopped grunting so I wondered if I had misread his signs.  I hesitated and asked him again.  I was a little reluctant to take off his diaper if he really didn’t need to poop - it was 3:30am in the morning and I had already taken him to the toilet half an hour earlier only to discover it was a false alarm.  Finally, I took off his diaper and sat him on the toilet.  No sooner had his bottom his the seat when it all came out with an explosive plop!  He had been waiting for me to put him on the toilet seat!

Yes, when you become a mother, it’s funny how little things like these can excite you…

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Since Gavin’s been sick, I have decided to stop EC temporarily except for the usual morning toilet breaks.  I have noticed that Gavin is now pretty good at pooping into the toilet.  He has managed to poop into the toilet for the last four times he has needed to use the toilet.

His usual pooping time is first thing in the morning after he wakes, although he pooped once in the afternoon.  He was pretty good for the afternoon poop because he make a big fuss and I took him to the toilet thinking he might have wanted to pee.  When I held him over the toilet and made the usual “ssss” sound I do when I want him to pee, he pooped instead (our designated pooping sound is “mmm” which is sort of like a strained cow sound).  Looks like he has come to associate the toilet bowl with elimination even if he doesn’t hear the appropriate cuing sound.

Is it safe to say that he is “poop-trained”?

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My wish has been granted.  When I took Gavin to pee this morning, I was surprised by a sudden explosion of poop straight into the toilet bowl!  Okay, so what if he pooped to the cue sound for pee, the point is that he pooped into the toilet bowl! 

This morning’s experience has given me a new incentive to potty train Gavin - I have discovered that it is a LOT easier to clean Gavin up after a poop.  Since most of the poop ends up in the toilet bowl rather than being plastered to his bottom, there isn’t as much surface area to wipe up.  Ever since Gavin started on rice cereal, his poop has developed a peanut-butter-like consistency that sticks to his bottom like superglue, making it even harder to wipe off.

The really interesting thing is that this happened after I tried something new that I read from Diaper Free.  One of the positions that the book recommends for potty training is to hold baby in a air-squat with his back against your abdomen.  The benefit of this position is that you can communicate to baby what you are trying to achieve through your breathing patterns.  For instance, if you want baby to poop, by tensing your abdomen the way you would if you were in the act of defecation, you are communicating to baby that this is his opportunity to poop.

I tried this the day before without success.  Then this morning, he just pooped.  Perhaps it is just a coincidence.  Whatever the case, I’m willing to try it again to see if it works.

The other thing I noticed today was that Gavin was extremely fussy until he pooped.  After that, he seemed more settled.  A new sign for me to look out for in future.

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Gavin: “You may kiss my hand…”

With my on and off hits and misses with Gavin’s diaper free training, the hubby and I decided that it was time to get him a potty.  Up until recently, I had been holding Gavin in a floating squat position over the toilet bowl and he seemed to be quite clued in on what I’ve been trying to do.  Ever since I switched his peeing position to the potty, my timing has been terribly off - or at least that was what I thought.  One evening after failing to pee Gavin on the potty, I shifted him to the toilet bowl and lo and behold, he peed straight into the toilet bowl.

I haven’t really been using the toilet bowl to pee Gavin for very long, but it is amazing how quickly Gavin has come to associate it with urinating.  Perhaps it is also because I put him in the bumbo when I go about my morning bathroom activities and Gavin has observed me using the toilet every morning.

One step forwards, two steps back…

After failing to pee him using the potty for several days in a row, I finally had some success last night.  Perhaps it was because I tried it while Gavin had just stirred from his sleep and he was still a little too groggy to realise that he was on the potty and not the toilet bowl.  I guess we’ll just have to retrain him to use the potty now.

Since he started solids, I expect that we may also catch a poop soon since they say babies have more regular bowel movements when they begin solids.  Well, one thing is for sure - if I thought his farts were bad before, they have increased in potency (if that is even possible) since he started solids.

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It is a fallacy that breastfed babies poop more frequently than formula fed babies. Gavin is a fully breastfed baby and despite all my efforts to keep him regular, I have not successfully managed to lock him into a routine of pooping on a daily basis for more than half a week. Perhaps I should rephrase that - Gavin poops regularly - on a weekly basis.

I used to think this was great because it is a lot easier changing a diaper with urine in it versus a diaper with poop - until recently. I’ve noticed that Gavin’s poops are becoming more and more explosive. His poop power is so great that no diaper seems able to contain it because it either leaks out the back or the front or both!

Earlier when I was playing with him on the bed, I heard him let loose one of those watery farts. A mother’s instinct is always right - I knew he had pooped and I knew it was a big one. What I didn’t expect, because he was sitting upright, was that it had shot up his back and onto the bed! And we just had the sheets changed today…

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If I thought I had seen the biggest explosion Gavin had up his sleeve it’s time to think again.

Two Sundays back, the hubby and I took Gavin out to have lunch with his godparents and godsister. We met them at Fogal Meat Market in Plaza Damas, Sri Hartamas where we ordered lunch. After we were seated, I took Gavin out of the Bjorn carrier and passed him to the hubby. As I started to remove the carrier, I saw it - a little dollop of poop smeared onto the carrier. I knew instantly from the size of the dollop that had escaped that this was by far the biggest we’ve ever seen.

By this time, the hubby had Gavin seated squarely against his chest and I knew instinctively that we would finally be putting that spare t-shirt I kept in the diaper bag to use. What I didn’t expect was that we would need two spare t-shirts. Gavin’s poop had exploded all over his diaper, his shorts and his t-shirt. Like two headless chooks, we scuried around madly cleaning up our son in the restaurant toilet.

After what seemed like endless wiping of his little poop encased bottom, we were finally ready to put on his new diaper. By that time, both hubby and I were drenched in sweat within the stuffy confines of the toilet and Gavin was starting to fuss. Just as I lifted his legs up to slide the diaper underneathe him, Gavin let out a stream of urine that sprayed his face! Poor Gavin, it just wasn’t his day.

It must have been some fifteen minutes later when we emerged from the toilet looking as though we had just been through a diaper wearing competition.

Above: Gavin looking rather forlorn at the end of the episode.

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Above: Gavin looking quite mature for his age.

Contrary to popular belief, I beg to differ that breastfed babies poop more frequently. If Gavin is any example of a breastfed baby, he certainly knows how to hold his poop. I used to worry that he would only poop once a day. Now if he poops daily, I’m happy already.

The reason why breastfed babies are believed to poop more frequently is because breast milk is so easily digested that it passes through more quickly. On the flip side of the coin, it is also believed that babies digest breast milk so well that sometimes there’s nothing left to excrete.

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Last week, Gavin held his poop again. This time he broke his old record of five days. He went a week before he decided to poop. On the seventh day when Gavin failed to poop, we called the doctor again and he assured us that there was no need for intervention if Gavin was still feeding well, his tummy was not distended, he had no temperature and he did not appear ill. And so we continued to wait uneasily for him break the “no poop” cycle.

When the eighth day arrived and Gavin still hadn’t pooped, we decided that we would take him to the doctor the next day regardless of what the doctor had said. The doctor may have had a patient who went twelve days without pooping but we certainly didn’t want Gavin to break that record.

On the eighth day, we tried a few recommendations we read on the net from various sites such as Netdoctor, and Baby Center. These were some of the recommendations to try for a constipated baby:

• Cycle baby’s legs as the motion can sometimes help babies to relax their sphincter
• Rub baby’s belly in a clockwise direction beginning from the navel. This was suggested by the article on Netdoctor. Funny, I read an article on baby massage in The Star that said the opposite. That’s the last time I ever take anything I read from The Star for granted.
• Apply pressure to baby’s belly three finger widths below the navel
• If baby is older than two months, you can try given baby some prune juice. I was reluctant to do this because I didn’t like the idea of given Gavin something sweet at such an early age. Anyway, we couldn’t have tried this even if we wanted to since Gavin refuses to take a bottle.

On the night of the eighth day, Gavin pooped but it was a peanut butter consistency poop. I feared he might be constipated, but the general sign of constipation is usually poop that has a consistency harder than peanut butter. I then worried he was dehydrated and that was causing his intestines to reabsorb fluids from his poop, but according to Baby Center, a baby is dehydrated when:

• No tears are produced when he cries
• He goes longer than six hours with out a wet diaper (or he has fewer than 4 wet diapers a day)
• His urine is dark yellow
• He is lethargic
• He has a parched mouth and lips

Gavin had none of these, so I rested a little easier. The next day I massaged Gavin’s belly in the clockwise motion after his bath and helped cycle his legs. He pooped a little later with a mustard-like consistency. I continued to do the clockwise massage and cycling his legs and he seems to be pooping more consistently ever since so I guess that did the trick.

There’s something about being a parent (especially when it is your first child) that turns one into a hyperchondriac, or rather a hyperchondriac on my baby’s behalf. Whenever something appears out of the ordinary, the first thing I do is call the doctor or look up a differential diagnosis on the net (even though that is exactly what the doctor ordered us NOT to do).

I do think I am lightening up a little as Gavin grows older because I no longer jump at every little oddity I notice. For instance, when I first brought Gavin home, I used to rush over to his cot to check if he was still breathing if he seemed “too quiet” all of a sudden. Sometimes at night I’d lie awake beside him and watch the rise and fall of his chest just to reassure myself that he was okay.

I guess getting worried about your baby is a normal parent thing.

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