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Need to get this off my chest.
I am, it must be confessed, a bit of a greenie. And ever since my son Jack was born 18 months ago, hubby and I have made a big point of having him in cloth nappies. (Not just because of the landfill issue, though: I also hate the idea of so many chemicals next to a baby’s skin, and the stories I’ve heard about how a child could die if they inhaled or swallowed the gel which all too frequently leaks out, because it would swell and block the airways and absorb the water in the body, terrify me!)
In the first couple of months we did use the occasional eco-disposable (which are chemical-free and biodegrade much more quickly), but apart from the very first nappy Jack had on him after his birth* he has never ever had a ‘normal’ disposable on him, and hubby and I are both proud of that fact.
Imagine our horror then, when my Mum, who has Jack 2 1/2 days a week while I'm at work, announced this afternoon that she had Jack in Pampers pull-ups!
OK, she's got bad thumb joints and she said fighting with him at each nappy change makes them hurt, which is fair enough. I don't have a problem with her trying something easier on medical grounds. But I am furious that she went straight out and bought Pampers without asking me to find a cloth or eco-friendly alternative first.
And then when she cited the recent Daily Mail article which is apparently based on a pretty old and very flawed report by the Environment Agency using a very small survey group of mothers, who apparently washed all their nappies at 90 degrees and then soaked them (most of us dry-pail these days) and always tumble-dried them and even ironed them, and which also failed to take into account that most of us buy at least some of our nappies second-hand and/or re-use them for several children! This has actually led to some clothies creating their own survey, which has already been completed by more than twice the number of the original one and should give a much more realistic picture, if we can just get the right people to pay attention to it.
Anyway, my Mum is a Daily Mail reader so this article had her trying to tell me that disposables aren’t any worse than cloth for the environment. I then had to try and explain the above to her, and also about the chemicals and the gel…and tbh I thought I had already covered this with her. She’s not such a greenie as I am, but she does recycle etc. and she did after all get through both my and my brother’s infancy using folded terries, with never a disposable in sight! And today’s cloth nappies are sooo much easier than terries!
*which was supposed to be an eco-disposable, but unbeknownst to me (as I was at the time recovering from a Caesarean) they got a Pampers from somewhere and that went on him instead. I didn’t find out about eight months later, taking a closer look at the photo of him on the scales and realising that the green on the nappy wasn’t the little patterns of a Tushies but instead letters spelling Pampers. I was furious. Actually, I still am. After all, the Tushies were right there in my bag.
Right, I’ve got that off my chest now. Just needed a bit of a rant :-)
I am, it must be confessed, a bit of a greenie. And ever since my son Jack was born 18 months ago, hubby and I have made a big point of having him in cloth nappies. (Not just because of the landfill issue, though: I also hate the idea of so many chemicals next to a baby’s skin, and the stories I’ve heard about how a child could die if they inhaled or swallowed the gel which all too frequently leaks out, because it would swell and block the airways and absorb the water in the body, terrify me!)
In the first couple of months we did use the occasional eco-disposable (which are chemical-free and biodegrade much more quickly), but apart from the very first nappy Jack had on him after his birth* he has never ever had a ‘normal’ disposable on him, and hubby and I are both proud of that fact.
Imagine our horror then, when my Mum, who has Jack 2 1/2 days a week while I'm at work, announced this afternoon that she had Jack in Pampers pull-ups!
OK, she's got bad thumb joints and she said fighting with him at each nappy change makes them hurt, which is fair enough. I don't have a problem with her trying something easier on medical grounds. But I am furious that she went straight out and bought Pampers without asking me to find a cloth or eco-friendly alternative first.
And then when she cited the recent Daily Mail article which is apparently based on a pretty old and very flawed report by the Environment Agency using a very small survey group of mothers, who apparently washed all their nappies at 90 degrees and then soaked them (most of us dry-pail these days) and always tumble-dried them and even ironed them, and which also failed to take into account that most of us buy at least some of our nappies second-hand and/or re-use them for several children! This has actually led to some clothies creating their own survey, which has already been completed by more than twice the number of the original one and should give a much more realistic picture, if we can just get the right people to pay attention to it.
Anyway, my Mum is a Daily Mail reader so this article had her trying to tell me that disposables aren’t any worse than cloth for the environment. I then had to try and explain the above to her, and also about the chemicals and the gel…and tbh I thought I had already covered this with her. She’s not such a greenie as I am, but she does recycle etc. and she did after all get through both my and my brother’s infancy using folded terries, with never a disposable in sight! And today’s cloth nappies are sooo much easier than terries!
*which was supposed to be an eco-disposable, but unbeknownst to me (as I was at the time recovering from a Caesarean) they got a Pampers from somewhere and that went on him instead. I didn’t find out about eight months later, taking a closer look at the photo of him on the scales and realising that the green on the nappy wasn’t the little patterns of a Tushies but instead letters spelling Pampers. I was furious. Actually, I still am. After all, the Tushies were right there in my bag.
Right, I’ve got that off my chest now. Just needed a bit of a rant :-)