Babies have been known to defecate in their own pants. Supposedly they have no control over their expulsive functions. Furthermore, they do little to warn you or to help you when their proverbial “cup” runneth over. Mei breached her first diaper shortly after she came home. We blamed it on the cheap huggies we got from the hospital and, to a lesser extent, on our own inexperience with diapers. [As an aside I would like to give you our endorsement to Pampers first and Luvs second; Huggies may as well be treated like the crap they fail to contain, in our experience]
Last year I had a class where we explored the concept of time and particularly the concept of instantaneous change. In a nutshell, the traditional view of time is linear and views change as occurring across time. An alternate view is that time is non-linear and that change can be instantaneous rather than requiring the passage of time. I would have to say that my experience with my little newborn gives some evidence to the non-linear view. They say it happens. You know, IT. Well, it happens all at once. There’s a wrinkle in time and suddenly there’s crap in the diaper, next to the diaper and all over the carseat. Who knew my baby girl would have power over time and space.
The first really big blowout was in San Francisco. There are not many clean public bathrooms in SF. Couple that with the absence of wipes in the diaper bag and you have me, running to the car carrying Mei like a spring roll wrapped in a changing pad. The poop was soaked in her pants, onesie, jacket and blanket. Soon, it was all over my hands as well. After some deft manuvering and several hundred wipes (always have emergency supplies in the car) the two of us were remarkably clean. The main culprit here was the meager barrier around her legs. It just couldn’t hold up.
We learned a lot about diapers and physics from that experience. Thereafter, we took extra care to ensure that the bunching around the legs was in good condition and securely fastened about her legs. What we had not considered, however, was the persistence of physics acting within the universe. We stopped up the only outlet then known to us and found, as the title suggests, that feces will find a way to prevail. The next time it went right up the back. The really cruel thing about that is that you may not realize it until you unsnap the onesie and slide your hand up your baby’s back to clear her clothing from the warzone and feel that unwelcome mess all over your hand and possibly your watchstrap. In fact, Saturday night was one of these very instances. She decided to explode in the car on the way to a friends birthday party. It was dark and I pulled over after deciding that her screaming meant more than the usual fussiness. I soon noticed that there was a slimy substance on my wrist. Mei’s skirt was infected with the waste material and there were streaks of poop the consistency of a plasma dripped upon my jacket, shirt and pants.
There’s not really much you can do to about patching up that floodgate. All you can do is hope that, next time, your spouse will have to change it. I’m usually the one who gets the really messy ones. That’s cause I’m lucky and special. Mei just had another big blowout. She surprised us this time and made it blowout in the front. The onesie is destroyed. Maybe not destroyed; I’ll have to see what shout can do once we wash it. In a few days she will probably have another explosion and one of us will have to risk contamination to rescue our daughter from her last three meals. Apparently, it’s just one of those things that comes with being a parent. Who knew something so ugly could come from something so beautiful.
