Woow weee.... and diaper-free

Yeah, that's how i feel about my baby's impending arrival! Woowwweee. I suddenly saw the counter and realised it's only 18 days more (!!!) and in fact it could be anytime. I'm still the Energizer Bunny, zipping about everywhere buying this and that, and also (more typically me) lapping up books and more books - some childbirth and parenting related, others not. I re-read Charlie and the chocolate factory, the English Patient, and just started Mother Teresa's Come Be my light.

Thanks to my doula's extensive library, i've also been reading some great natural childbirth/parenting books, plus the latest one called DIAPER-FREE! Natural Infant Hygiene. It's a great book that i recommend to anyone who's keen to reduce their environmental footprint, but most importantly to learn to understand your baby more intensely. It's basically about how we can observe our babies from the start, to understand when they need to pee and poo and then help them do it without their diapers. In a nutshell, these babies go diaper-free from as early as four months, responding to their parents' sounds of shhh and caca (or other grunting sounds) to pee and poo. Instead of toilet training, this is the opposite - it's about using their natural instincts instead of dulling their natural instincts and teaching them to sit in wet diapers (yucks!). i remembered a friend of mine telling me exactly the same thing. She had her baby in South America, and the women there couldn't understand why she needed diapers for her baby and when she asked them why they didn't need diapers, they said 'this is your baby, surely you should know when he/she needs to go? no?'

Intrigued, i shared the book with my mom and she affirmed that this was what my nanny did to us too! She said that by three months, my nanny was stripping us off and making regular pee and poo sounds, so by four months we were also pretty much off diapers and could indicate our toilet needs. Isn't that cool? and actually it's so matter of fact and natural for people in many parts of the world. This is yet another encouragement for me to reduce the environmental footprint too. Cos before thinking diaper free, i was already considering cloth diapering, especially thinking of bring baby back to Timor. Imagine the disposable diaper rubbishload i would be creating everyday and where to dispose them of, when you think that pigs would be rooting through your rubbish! Yikes.

Anyways, i'll have three months here to experiment with this new (old) method of going diaper-free. The book warns of setbacks and regression, etc, but hey, at least now i know what signs to look out for, which will make breastfeeding and interaction with the baby doubly-fun and intriguing. I won't flog myself if i do not succeed, but luckily i have a supportive mom who is willing to go cloth diapering with my baby like she did with me and my sis. I know that most women these days give up cloth diapers cos it's simply too much trouble. Cloth diapering for me is the first step, the next is to go diaper-free!

Oh oh, by the way, i MUST share this with you. Susana (who is Portuguese married to a Timorese) left a beautiful note on my flickr site. She says that in Portugal old people say "ter uma boa hora" or HAVE A GOOD HOUR when it comes to birthing babies. Isn't that absolutely fantastic?