Wednesday 8 June 2011

Bring Up Baby: Elimination Communication

It boils down to baby-lead teaching, e.g. when the baby is ready to poop or pee, the adult helps the baby to learn the association between the commode and elimination (poop and pee).
The methods used are: consistent association - poop/pee into toilet (or appropriate receptacle); consistent communication - baby shows signs of irritability indicating bodily discomfort, adult makes consistent sound/s when baby poop/pee so baby learns when start poop/pee as well as being able to verbalise to adult when baby expects to poop/pee.

I'd heard about it sometime last year, but only read up on it just a fortnight ago. We have been practising it for a couple of weeks and it seems to be working quite well: savings on washing poopy reusable nappies, and reduced occurrances of nappy rash, and reduction in number of butt wipes used, and baby (5-month) has developed a very strong back through continual sitting up practice.

If the caregiver has the time, I truly recommend this interactive responsive attention.

Apart from the advantages associated with the nappy change process, here are some others which I think is happening in our family:

- baby learns to communicate precise needs to parents/caregivers (i.e. baby gains a sense of "self" and "other people"),
- parents/caregivers learn to practice baby-led teaching, i.e. consistency and patience and seeing the world from the baby's point of view,
- parents learn to be more communicative, e.g. I am learning bits of British Sign Language to communicate with baby.

Elimination Communication
- wikipedia.org
- www.pottywhisperer.com
- www.nappyfreebaby.co.uk

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